He was born in 1893 in rural Switzerland, one of twelve children. He came to America at the young age of 15, speaking no English but fluent in Low German, a language spoken by the rural folks of Switzerland. His American neighbors referred to him as the “lad from the old country.” He married a young woman from his home country who was of German-Jewish descent. Together they raised three girls and three boys. His native tongue remained the language spoken within the family.
There were a multitude of communication problems as he wrestled with getting to know his neighbors. Finally, after some years, he realized the need to speak “the English,” but learning it was a big hurdle. It was common for him to pronounce “th” as “d.” A man might have been “dat feller” or a group of people, “dose folkses.” He never did get it quite right but he managed well enough, along with his wife, to do the farming and raise and educate their six children.
That man was my father! He lived to be 86 years old before he left this world. During all of that time he struggled with the English language. One word I recall that was most difficult for him to use properly was the word “assurance.” He was forever confusing it with “insurance.” The neighbors would chuckle to themselves when he confused the two.
Insure? Assure? The two words give me pause as I try to understand why the neighbors chuckled. A look at the two words in the dictionary reveals some interesting similarities. The person who has “insurance” is “assured” with regard to their life, property and well being. By the same token, a person feels quite “assured” when they have “insurance.” Is this a play on words? I think not.
Most Americans and many other people worldwide are strong advocates of insurance policies – on their lives, homes, automobiles, children and just about anything of value – that give assurance that we will be able to replace a loss we may experience.
Life insurance does not replace life. It does, however, assure that any survivors to such a loss of life will have some assurance about being able to continue living. In recent fires, floods and other damage associated with this season’s hurricanes, those who were properly insured were also strongly assured of recovering their losses, in the monetary sense at least.
One type of insurance – life insurance – has the capability of not only providing the usual benefits of an insurance policy, but also of providing financial support to the Deafness Research Foundation (DRF). A gift via life insurance is a tax-deductible way of giving big with little impact on your finances. During my nearly seven years of raising funds for DRF, more than 200 people have given substantial gifts to DRF via their personal life insurance policies. In all cases, these persons provided first for their bereaved family members and then made provisions for the research work of DRF to receive a portion of extra insurance.
How is this done? Quite simply, in an insurance policy, estate plan, will or other such legal document, one legally specifies that a certain amount should go to DRF. Most persons designate a percentage of an insurance policy to go to DRF. Some donors have purchased an insurance policy separate from their main policy. Their main policy goes to family and friends and the other policy to the charity – in this case, DRF. In most situations, when a charity is the sole beneficiary of an irrevocable insurance policy, the premium is tax-deductible for the policy’s owner. There are many ways to configure such a gift and an insurance agent can and will be happy to assist you in preparing your gift of life insurance. You may also contact me through the DRF office.
Including DRF in your insurance policy, will or estate plan is an excellent way to assure the people you love who have hearing problems that there is help and hope for future solutions through DRF-funded research in the years to come.
If my father were here, he would probably say, “I ‘insure’ you of dat! Or is it ‘assure’ you of dat?”
Thanks, Dad!
