Copious Notes

Dave Shuffett, host of "Kentucky Life" and a KET producer, teamed with author Neil Chethik to produce a KET special "FatherLoss," based on Chethik's best-selling book of the same name. Photo by Rich Copley | staff.

Dave Shuffett thought he was prepared for the death of his father.

Bill Shuffett had lived a full life before dying two years ago at age 84. By his son’s account, he was a hero dad, a guy who passed up the chance to play baseball with the St. Louis Cardinals to serve in World War II, where he earned several honors, including a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart.

Later, after a divorce, he became a single father of three until he remarried.

Young Dave Shuffett with his father, Bill. Photo courtesy of KET.

“He was this baseball star, war-hero dad who came home and devoted his life to his kids,” Shuffett, host of Kentucky Life on Kentucky Educational Television, says of his dad, who lived in Greensburg. “He was, for me, larger than life.”

He lived a complete, long life. And Dave figured he would be ready to carry on after the inevitable.

But his life fell apart.

“When we lost him, my whole world turned upside down,” says Shuffett.

He was on a lonely journey, thinking he was a unique case until he found a book while doing an Internet search: FatherLoss: How Sons of All Ages Come to Terms With the Deaths of Their Dads.

It was the only book he could find on the subject, and he was surprised to find that the author, Neil Chethik, lives in Lexington.

Shuffett reached out to Chethik, and initially thought about doing a segment on the book on Kentucky Life.

But KET programming director Craig Cornwell saw more.

“Dave was really hurting after his father died, and I didn’t think five minutes was enough time to express it,” Cornwell said. “It had the makings of a good story.”

Shuffett’s journey weaves through the half-hour FatherLoss: A Kentucky Life Special, which premieres at 8 p.m. Saturday, the day before Father’s Day.

Read the rest of this entry »