Edward Lionel "Pat" Pattullo

Edward Lionel Pattullo (Pat Pattullo), aged 92, of Newbury Court in Concord Massachusetts, died peacefully on May 7, 2015. He was the husband and lifelong sweetheart to Elizabeth Titus Pattullo who died at the age of 95 on December 25, 2014.

Pat was born in Muskegon Michigan on July 2, 1922, the son of Lydia Marshall Pattullo and Andrew Pattullo, and the younger brother of Marshall Pattullo. Pat served as a page for two terms of the Michigan State Senate in Lansing Michigan, but still managed to graduate on time from Muskegon High School in 1940.

He attended Northwestern University in Chicago for one semester, but Pat's longing for adventure and his natural sense of curiosity compelled him along a path rarely traveled by a nineteen year old from a small Midwestern town.

Pat volunteered for the American Field Service and was assigned to spend a year as an ambulance driver with the British Eighth in North Africa, just before American entry into the War. He traveled by troopship to Capetown and Suez, and spent the next year attached to various regiments of the Eighth Army who were dodging the Luftwaffe and fighting Rommel's German Army forces in Alexandria, Tobruk, Benghazi and Tripoli.

During the famous second siege of Tobruk, Pat's was the last ambulance to escape, and he was able to transport many casualties who desperately needed the attention they might get at a field hospital.

As the troops retreated back into Egypt, Pat was assigned to a unit of the Fifth Division of the British Indian Army, an assignment that led him to transition from civilian to soldier, joining the British Indian Army in 1942. He attended basic training in an Officer Cadet Training Unit and was then sent to Abbottabad to join the 13th Frontier Force Rifles, a regiment of the Punjab Irregular Frontier Force, otherwise known as the PIFFERS. It was in India's northwest frontier where he met a young Brit by the name of Basil Highton who became a lifelong friend. Though he never saw combat as a soldier, he attained the rank of Captain, learned to speak Urdu fluently, was chased by a water buffalo, assigned a bearer, and grew fond of afternoon tea, among other rituals of military life under the Raj. By the time he returned to the United States in 1947, Pat had acquired a distinctive British accent.

The GI Bill allowed Pat to enroll in an accelerated program at the University of Chicago, finishing his bachelor's degree in two years. Working in the mailroom at the University Press while he was an undergraduate, Pat become active in organizing an employees' union, and it was at one of their meetings that he met Elizabeth Titus. He would invite her to breakfast a few days later, an event which their daughter Betsy refers to as "the date that lasted a lifetime".

On September 7, 1948 Pat and Elizabeth were married in Traverse City, Michigan. George Robson Pattullo III (Rob) was born on March 9th, 1950, and Elizabeth Ann Pattullo (Betsy) was born on April 20, 1952. During the years following graduation, Pat worked for the Great Books Foundation, traveling the country organizing community groups in small college towns to read great works of literature.

Pat was recruited to Harvard University in 1957 by Nathan Pusey, and became an Assistant Dean to McGeorge Bundy. They lived in Cambridge where he met dear friends Jack and Ann Cobb, Jimmy and Annie Freeman, Eleanor and Lee Campbell, Babette and John Speigel, Margie Clauson and Tom Lehrer.

Pat's concern about the antics of Timothy Leary and his student experiments with LSD led to a broader interest in the ethics of using human subjects. He would eventually write extensively on this topic. He was instrumental in handling the logistics of Fidel Castro's visit to Harvard to address the Ford Hall Forum, and traveled to the Soviet Union on a University sponsored cultural exchange program, a trip Pat would later be asked about when he was investigated by the FBI for his association with the American Communist Party during his union organizing days in Chicago.

In 1963 Pat was recruited by York University in Toronto, where he served as Vice President of this newly founded provincial university. He missed his Cambridge community a great deal, so when Harvard called with an invitation to return as Director of the William James Hall Center for the Behavioral Sciences, Pat accepted gladly, moving to Winchester Massachusetts in 1965. He would remain in this position until he retired in 1987. During his Harvard years, Pat cultivated his strong contrarian streak that resulted in various controversial and outspoken public positions on issues ranging from gay rights to the war in Vietnam. He was a prolific writer of letters to the editor of the Boston Globe, the Harvard Crimson and the New York Times, which he signed E. L. Pattullo. So many were published that, for his 90th birthday, his children and grandchildren presented him with a bound version of "The Published Letters of E. L. Pattullo ", which had been collected from the archives. Pat was an avid tennis and squash player, as well as an enthusiastic member of the Play Readers Group, becoming an expert on the characters of Tom Stoppard.

Pat and Elizabeth celebrated many anniversaries with their dear friends and Winchester neighbors, the much younger Robyn and Sol Gittleman. In retirement they delighted in an annual road trip down the Eastern coastline, wending their way as far as South Carolina, leaving in March to "greet the spring". Many happy adventures were shared with Basil and Violet Highton in England, Scotland, Ireland and France, as well as travels with Marshall and Josephine Pattullo to Disney World with too many grandchildren, rendezvous in Ely Minnesota with their dear friend Mark Fisher, and annual forays to the Fourth of July baseball game on the farm in Sparta Michigan.

Pat and Elizabeth moved to Newbury Court in Concord Massachusetts in 2006, where they lived very happily in a community of close friends. Pat became known as the Popologist for his skill in keeping the popcorn machine in the Cafe full at all times.

Pat is survived by his daughter Betsy and her husband Greg Torres, his son Rob's widow, Susan Pattullo of NYC, grandchildren Jess and Gabe Torres of Somerville Massachusetts, and Claire Pattullo of NYC, great grandchildren Jack, Lydia and Quinn Torres, grand nephew Henry Walters and many nieces and nephews.

Services will be private.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be sent to Brattleboro Area Affordable Housing, an organization founded largely by Byron Stookey, who along with his wife Lee, are very dear pals. Checks maybe be sent payable to : BAAH, P.O. Box 1284 Brattleboro VT 05302

We miss you already