Albert Raymond Gorski

Albert Raymond Gorski was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1941, the second of five children in a family that valued hard work above almost everything else. He carried that value with him his entire life, spending 38 years as a machinist at the GM assembly plant in Lordstown, Ohio, where he became the kind of worker others called when something would not cooperate. His hands were always rough, always capable, and his toolbox was a subject of ongoing family admiration -- each tool in its place, each wrench wiped down before being returned. Al was a husband to Ruth for 57 years, a father to three, and a grandfather to seven, all of whom called him Pop. He had a reputation for arriving early to everything and leaving late, always the last to clear the dinner table and the first to offer a hand with a project. His neighbors knew to knock when they had a leak or a car that would not start. He never charged anyone, but he always accepted coffee. In his final years, Al spent mornings in the garden and afternoons with crossword puzzles. His family remembers one particular Sunday afternoon when he sat on the porch in the late autumn light and told his youngest granddaughter that the best feeling in the world was finishing something and knowing it would hold. She did not fully understand at the time, but she does now.