Had I been asked to write a one-line epitaph for Joseph Loferski, it would be this:
A great soldier died last week.Few, though, would recognize his name. His fame was limited. We seldom celebrate those who do battle in the field he chose.
Joseph Loferski was a man of science. His focus was the energy of the sun. Quietly, over decades, in his lab at Brown University, he unlocked the secrets of drawing electricity from light.
He did it out of love of research, but it's apt, perhaps, to call him a soldier because if you talked to him at length, you'd have heard a vision that spoke of more than that, almost a sense of duty.
No nation, Loferski felt, could remain secure, and prosperous, if passed by in the global race of innovation. He saw his work as part of that.
That's the side of Joseph Loferski I got to know a few years ago. I traveled abroad to write about America being challenged in an area we once had to ourselves: technological leadership. One chap-ter was about solar energy. Loferski, I learned, was one reason America led the world in it.
But in recent years, other governments were pouring research money into solar labs and factories while American solar experts like Loferski found their funding in decline.
Some reading this might say: Yes, photovoltaic cells power calculators, they power path-lights and satellites, but is that a technology vital to a nation?
It isn't. At the moment. That will likely change within a decade, and more so in years beyond.
Loferski knew it would take that long. It's to his credit that he stayed at it. It's an uncommon person who gives a lifetime to work he knows he may never see blossom. Most prefer harvesting to planting. Loferski was a planter.
He looked and acted like what he was, a scientist. At his funeral, a son-in-law spoke of the first time he went to dinner at the Loferski home. All over, there were mementos Joe and his wife, Sylvia, had gathered from trips around the world. But one unusual piece of decor stood out prominently on the wall of a family room: A large poster of the periodic table of the elements.
The truth is, Loferski was probably more revered in distant nations than his own neighborhood. A few months ago, after Joe got sick with cancer, Sylvia Loferski had a get-together for her husband in Providence, R.I. A number of attendees, on short notice, flew here from Taiwan, just for an afternoon, to honor him.
To people in such places - countries that have risen from shanties to prosperity in the past 15 years by way of technological innovation - it is clear than men like Joe Loferski are giants.
A month ago, Sylvia Loferski called me to see if I could come to that get-together, perhaps even write about Joe. I could not make it work in my schedule, but her gesture touched me, and reminded me of a line spoken by the wife of Willie Loman in "Death of a Sales-man."
"Attention must be paid," she said of her husband Willie.
Only that was about a man who never rose to greatness - it was about Willie Loman's short-coming.
That more attention was not paid to so great a soldier as Joseph Loferski - and the other Lo-fer-skis among us - that is our shortcoming.
At the funeral, I saw a side of him I had not known: the family side. He had six children, 10 grandchildren.
And I'll always remember this moment: Sylvia Loferski spoke of how they met almost 50 years before. It was in a church. Somewhere in the congregation, a young Joe Loferski was captivated by the soloist, who was singing "Ave Maria." He asked his mother next to him: "Who is that girl? I'd like to get to know her."
She finished the story. Then, standing there near her husband's casket, she gave Joe a final good-bye. She sang "Ave Maria" again.
I saw in the paper that Joseph Loferski was a veteran of World War II.
May it be said that his service to country did not end there. May it be said that he was a soldier until the end.
He died at 71. He was laid to rest in Gate of Heaven Cemetery in East Providence, R.I. The burial was with full military honors.
Mark Patinkin is a columnist for the Providence Journal-Bulletin. Readers may write to him at: 75 Fountain St., Providence, R.I. 02902.