Welcome to 2013 for a task I promised to complete,
In 2012, humanity lost many critically acclaimed individuals to death. While dying is part of life on our fair planet, some are not ready to die, while others prepare for it. As we will discuss herein, those ready to move beyond reality as we know it must ask themselves; Are You Ready to Die, Do You Know My Name, and Who I Really Was?
In December 2012, we lost one of our most respected critics, advisers and contributors, Robert K. Weeks Sr., my wonderful father, who passed in December of 2012 before completing his 87th year of life.
In the twenty-first century, Robert K. Weeks Sr. looked to accomplish several things that were a reflection of his past. Robert believed in the following which he tried to teach to his family. I learned this at a young age, while some I know never will be able to do so:
“What robs you of power, is anytime you take a position and you attach yourself to it. So power in the world is represented by being able to operate in it in a condition of no agreement from a position which you are not attached to – to be able to take a point of view, hold it in the face of no agreement, and yet not be attached to that point of view. So that the moment that that point of view is no longer appropriate, you’ll be able to drop it instantly. And that represents power, or that thing which serves people to be able to allow them to look at their own minds.”
Robert K. Weeks Sr. loved being around people and attending entertainment events and conventions. In the last years of his life he enjoyed Creation Entertainments Star Trek vendors room at the Saint Francis Hotel, The Alternative Press Exposition, and most of all Wonder Con, all in San Francisco during 2009, 2010 and 2011 during his 8th decade of life.
We here at WHR ask you understand why we honor Robert K. Weeks Sr., who had great involvement with WormholeRiders, casinos, entertainment, news, his family, his beloved wife, the love of his life, Jeannie Marie Weeks, all the while fighting for fairness and understanding against all odds until the end of his life.
Robert loved the Golden Gate Bridge, Stargate, 24, Star Wars (in specific, the wisdom of Yoda) and had great admiration for John Noble’s portrayal of Walter Bishop in Fringe, William Shatner as Captain Kirk and Sir Patrick Stewart as Captain Picard in Star Trek.
Although Robert thought Sean Connery was the best “007” in Goldfinger, he loved Roger Craig as the new James Bond feeling that the new films more accurately reflected the works of Ian Fleming of which he admired!
I will never forget his glee at being at the Moscone Convention Center meeting celebrities and fans who came to see Fringe, V Series, and Human Target among many others.
We include an interview below from April 2010 which reflects his pride and knowledge of the city he loved, San Francisco.
A Brief History of Robert K. Weeks Sr.:
Robert K. Weeks Sr. was born October 15, 1926 in San Francisco. He loved entertainment since his earliest pre adolescent days at the movies in the 1930’s when they cost a mere ten cents, often with a big bag of popcorn included in the price of admission!
Mind you ten cents was a lot of money during the Great Depression, but as discussed in his interview above, Robert worked as a newspaper boy turning over almost all the money he earned to his parents to help support his family. The only exception was the ten cents needed to gain admission to the movies he loved to see each weekend.
This followed with his involvement during World War Two in the Pacific where he took great pride in working with entertainment industry staff showing movies during his time with the Army Pictorial Service where hundreds of thousands enjoyed time away from war by watching feature films. This after he became involved with the first stereophonic films as a projectionist in San Francisco before joining the Unites States Army to fight the evil that threatened to loot the Earth.
Before entering the war, as he sailed under the Golden Gate Bridge, Robert was sure that he would never see the city he loved, San Francisco, ever again. He re-called the greatest mistake of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), when as a high school student he witnessed his friends, Japanese American citizens taken away, who were removed directly from his classrooms to face unjust interment.
With so many being lost to fight the scourge of the Nazi’s in Europe and the fascist Japanese in Asia, knowing he would be part of the pending invasion of Japan, Robert was certain he would make the ultimate sacrifice for freedom.
Although an admirer of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Robert never agreed with FDR’s decision in 1942 to unjustly imprison United States citizens over racial fear and race hatred.
Those taken were Robert’s personal Japanese friends, patriots themselves who went on to join the fabled 442nd Division who saved so many, answering the question “Are You Ready to Die?” at the cost of their own lives fighting for freedom against tyranny.
Robert’s love of life included a Courts Martial in the Philippines with loss of rank for failing to “shoot to kill” innocent citizens involved who were attempting to feed their families who had been starved nearly to death by occupying Japanese soldiers.
Robert had no issue with the “shoot to kill” order for combatants. He did “shoot to kill” to save his fellow soldiers and once to save his own life when a supply depot was overrun by Japanese soldiers outside Leyte.
Robert faced Courts Martial because as an expert marksman, he would “wing” the civilians, not once but several times. His superior officers, knowing of Robert’s great skill with firearms, knew he was deliberately saving the lives of the civilian looters against their orders. Robert was then re-assigned to a unit of the US Army Pictorial Service where he served with the entertainment industry until his honorable discharge from the US Army in 1946.
After the war, returning to San Francisco to his parents whom he loved and honored until their death, Robert moved to Las Vegas when the city had but a single street. During his time there, Robert met, partied, gambled, and drank with many more celebrities, entertainment industry executives and politicians who would use the booming city as one of their “Hollywood getaway” locations.
Earning respect among them for his high ethical standards, Robert would call upon these powerful people later in life to fight injustice and help those less fortunate in life after many successes that made him a wealthy man in the 1950’s and 1960’s.
During the Civil Rights Riots in San Francisco during 1966, a city still suffering from racial prejudice dating back to the United States Civil War of the 1860’s when California was allied with the Confederate Slave States of the South, Robert made it his personal goal to hire and train racial minorities so they could have good paying jobs to support their families.
While others cars were being fire bombed, as police manned the streets to stop the the riots, Robert was safely escorted by community leaders through the dangerous Hunters Point, Bay View and Potrero Hill districts by black leaders for his service to their community, including generous donations of food to the poorest of citizens from his thriving mobile catering business that spanned the entire San Francisco Bay Area.
Like many good people who rise to power, others, some racially prejudiced from his circle of so-called friends, later plotted against him to take away what he had worked so hard for. Partly due to his own penchant for drinking and gambling from his time in Las Vegas, Robert thought that people could be trusted if only he did the “right things” in life as an example to them. He was incorrect in this regard, a lesson that everyone often needs to learn the “hard way” in the “school of the hard knocks of life”.
Stricken with several heart attacks and strokes from alcohol abuse, Robert’s food service empire crumbled as his enemies, vultures all, swooped in to devour what he had created.
After many years of rehabilitation thanks to hundreds of dedicated doctors and nurses at the Fort Miley VA Medical Center, part of the United States Veterans Administration, Robert became involved with several business ventures, some successful, including a return to the historic Hunters Point Naval Shipyard in 1980.
Robert was once again stabbed in the back by his partner in 1986 who embezzled funds from a Four Star San Francisco restaurant, television and movie location catering project, Bay Area Location Catering, a successful endeavor that he had worked so hard on.
Many blamed him rather than seek the truth as had the Grand Jury who cleared him of any wrong doing thanks to a computerized records keeping system developed by this editor that documented he was innocent of wrong doing.
Members of his own family, including two of his selfish children often blamed him and others for their own problems. These two of his children attempted to loot his mother’s and sister’s estates after their deaths, including theft of jewelry, personal property and manipulation of real estate land titles.
Robert K. Weeks Sr. forgave them as any father should, but they never really forgave him for catching them “red handed” with their hands “in the cookie jar” of the family estate.
They retaliated by forcing a sale of his mother’s ranch property rather than work in unison as a family to save the historic estate that had been a family retreat for over 185 years before California was even part of the United States of America.
It broke Robert’s heart when one of his children refused any and all offers to save “The Ranch”.
Their most heinous act was on June 17 2011, the day before Fathers Day, when the two threatened that unless he went along with their plans to favor them over his other children, among other things best left unmentioned at this time, that he would never be allowed to see his grandson or ex-wife ever again.
They made good on their threat, tormenting him for the next 18 months, only relinquishing to allow him to speak to his wife via telephone on his death bed.
In his last words, Robert, whom was “Ready to Die” after fighting and winning against heart failure for over 32 years, asked me to share these words in a news report with you here to say “I forgive them and love them”.
Many hours of high definition video of Robert K. Weeks’ adventures in life are being prepared per his final request to share privately with his family.
Caring for Robert during his last years of life, especially in 2012 caused me to make well considered choices leading to falling behind on reporting some events, movies and television series.
I was honor bound to attend to his last wishes on planet Earth and am proud to have done so.
I also note, with great appreciation, that the fine doctors, social workers and nurse’s at the Fort Miley Veterans Hospital made my fathers last months of life as comfortable as possible. I am deeply indebted to each and every one of them, many whom have written, called or sent cards about Robert’s life. Thank you.
This is the hardest news article I have ever written, to relate a person’s last wishes, but as he requested, and as I promised… Now “You Know His Name”; It is Robert K. Weeks Sr. – “Rest In Peace” Dad!
The MGM Studios “Casino Royale” theme song “You Know My Name” by Chris Parnell was specifically selected for this article reflecting what Robert wanted to let you know about how he felt about his life.
In closing for now, we have redesigned this main blog site for 2013 and beyond. We will return with more of the new format here at RockwaterReports now that my task in reporting this story is complete.
I leave you with one of Robert K. Weeks Sr. favorite songs, “I Left My Heart in San Francisco”, performed by Tony Bennett, whom he met more than once in his lifetime.
Stay tuned as Kenn from RockwaterReports announces more of our new Real News series in the future!
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Thank you.
Best Regards,
Kenn, great article about your father. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to meet him. So many historical stories to reminisce.