CULLY JUDD Solar Pioneer

Cully came late into our lives and left suddenly.  Our sense of loss at his passing is not just one of grief but of a budding friendship that was nipped in the bud before the flower ever bloomed.

Lori had met him through Don and again through Steve whom Cully had invited to visit with his kids any time at the house Cully had lived in since his school days at Punahou next door.  We also took up the offer and stopped by his house one evening for a beer and a chat to get to know him and his business better.  Lori recorded the conversation on her iPhone.  To listed to it now is to hear a voice of intelligent kindness that is striking upon hearing it a second, and third, and fourth time.

Punahou had had a requirement in those days, when service to one’s country was considered honorable, to belong to ROTC.  Cully had participated as had his father 25 years earlier, eventually going off to war in  Vietnam.  Cully held fond memories of his R&R days at the beaches in Thailand, where he fell in love with the flora, fauna, and humanity.  We heard stories of Cully’s first love there, a beautiful Thai girl that had obviously made a huge impression on him. 

We also heard other stories.  Recreational hunting in Thailand, easily accessible from Cambodia, brought back memories not of relaxation and fun but of pity for the pigs and animals who had fallen perhaps at his own hand.  Memories of those poor beasts intermingled in Cully’s mind with an elephant in Africa Cully witnessed his friend shoot.  After all the intervening years, the image of those poor creatures remained with Cully as vivid as his first love. 

Cully’s wife Carolyn looked out the bay window askance and saw Steve with a bunch of his kids and wondered who the hell is this walking up to my house uninvited?  But actually we had been invited.  Cully told Steve please bring your kids to my house.  Just come any time.  You don’t have to call. 

She will make it.  That’s what he said when we asked her about Carolyn, who was not present for our second visit.  We had asked him about his wife’s sickness.  “Oh, we just discovered it from a lump on her breast. After that, boy those were the greatest fake boobies of all time.  She is healthy as can be.  She’ll lick this thing.”   

“What kind of cancer is it?”

“Breast and liver cancer.”

“So it has metastasized?  What stage is it?”

“Stage 4.  But she is healthy as can be. No change. Her doctor is wonderful.”

God for some inexplicable reason rains brutality on those who face cancer with hope. 

“Where did you meet Carol?” 

“She went to Punahou.  She was in my Spanish class. I was looking over her shoulder during a test.  She thought I was cheating.  I was actually just looking at her boobies.”

When Carol had left this earth, Cully seemed lost.  Nothing was spoken about it.  He was not one to complain.  But he seemed only half himself now that the other half had passed on to another realm.

Perhaps it was a sixth sense that lured us to visit him at Queens Hospital after he had had only a “minor” heart problem easily repaired with a stint.  He showed Steve his wrist that they had fished the stint through.  “I didn’t feel a thing.” 

“ How are you feeling?”

“I feel great.”

But a heavy congested cough and strained breathing said otherwise. 

“Hospital COVID policy only allows four visitors per day, and I’m the fourth, but I’m going to try to get the nurses to allow Lori up to see you.”

But they wouldn’t allow it.  He was looking for her when I came back. 

“Lori?”

But it was only me.

I wondered about his business.  He was on the phone on a business call when I arrived.  Although he had sold off his solar business through a generous ESOP program to his 80 employees, he was still pioneering innovations in the solar field.  The latest one was a solar storage battery that did not use cobalt, a mineral in short supply worldwide.  His previous company was not interested in the product, so he had taken $500K of his own money to fund two containers full of this innovative battery.  If his previous company did not want it, he had other buyers.  But he was still chairman of the board of his previous company.  That’s a big vote in favor of the deal. 

Rest In Love Cully, sweet man. Condolences to his family.