Legacy of fun, hard work
Whether as a colorful clown or a county commissioner, Dale Pinkerton's dedication and service to the people of Butler County can only be described as “faaaantastic.”
Pinkerton, 79, died Sunday night at his home after an illness.
Listing Pinkerton's service to the county he adored is nearly impossible.
He was elected as a county commissioner in 2007 and re-elected in 2011, serving Butler County from 2008 through 2015, when the current board of commissioners took up the county reins.
During Pinkerton's tenure as commissioner, Sunnyview Nursing and Rehabilitation Center was sold to a private operator and construction began on the new government center annex that included a new parking garage.
His awards for service to the city and county are many and include the county's Distinguished Service Award for volunteerism in 1995 and the Butler County Endowment Award for Philanthropy in 2002.
Still, Pinkerton always deflected commendation for his tireless devotion.
“I think Butler County is one of the most giving counties in the whole state. If it's the right project, we and other organizations have been able to raise the money to be able to put the project together,” Pinkerton said in 2015. “We're very fortunate to live in Butler County and to have the great people who live here who support the programs and the projects that we try to put together.”
A member of the Rotary Club of Butler since 1981 and a past president and past district governor, Pinkerton founded the county's annual Rotary Turkey Round-Up in 1992. The fundraiser continues to this day, enabling food banks countywide to provide each needy family with a turkey and all the trimmings each Thanksgiving.Pinkerton was also a major fundraiser for the Butler Public Library, Butler YMCA, Butler Citizens for Decency, Lifesteps and Boy Scouts of America.He was a member of the Butler County Chamber of Commerce and co-chaired the United Way Campaign with his wife of 59 years, Millie.“I don't think you could even begin to count all the things he did for Butler,” said Bill McCarrier, who not only served alongside Pinkerton as a county commissioner, but counted himself among Pinkerton's chums. “Nobody will ever be able to understand or know all the things he did.”Pinkerton also served on numerous boards of directors, including the Butler Salvation Army, Butler Emergency Relief Initiative and the Maridon Museum.He was a past president of the Downtown Butler Merchants' Association, a past member of the Butler Parking Authority and served on the Butler Financial Advisory Board.In 2017, he and Millie co-chaired the Presents for Patients volunteer committee, which provided gifts for 200 patients at Sunnyview through St. Barnabas Health System.Pinkerton was also a 33rd degree Mason — the highest attainable rank as a Scottish Rite Mason.David Hilliard, president and CEO of the Butler County Family YMCA, was saddened to learn of Pinkerton's passing, adding how his involvement throughout the community exemplified all the best about the county.“He will be sorely missed for his absolute care and lifelong investment in making Butler a wonderful place to work and live,” Hilliard said. “Steadfast generosity, persistent hope and prudent determination. We trust his legacy will live on through the good works he accomplished in his life.”Eileen Collins said she and her husband, Michael, have been friends with the Pinkertons since the early 1980s when the two men enjoyed eating together at the old Hot Dog Shop on East Jefferson Street. She said Pinkerton was equally proficient at helping existing organizations and starting up new projects as needed, and he did both with gusto.“He put 100 percent into every day,” Collins said. “It's amazing what he accomplished.”
Reflecting on her husband's penchant for helping others, Millie Pinkerton said his naturally giving heart and childhood were likely the two reasons.She said his parents divorced when Pinkerton was 7 years old, and a neighbor paid for the boy's YMCA membership every year.“He just learned to be a giving person because he saw that in his life as a kid,” Millie said.When Pinkerton learned at a meeting many years ago that the Portersville/Prospect Food Bank was in need of money to continue providing food to that area's needy residents, he came home and told her to write a check.“He always said God will take care of us, so go ahead and send the check,” Millie said.Retired SRU President Robert Smith, who was with the college for 10 years from 2002 to 2012, fondly remembers the lessons about leadership he learned from Pinkerton.“When I think of my time in Butler, I credit Dale with a lot of the inspiration for me to be the kind of giving, servant leader that he demonstrated himself to be every day,” Smith said.Smith and his wife, Ramona, met the Pinkertons through the Rotary Club of Butler. He said his close friend was always willing to help anyone with any need, large or small.“It didn't make any difference to Dale what your religious affiliation was or that you may have been a bourbon drinker and he was a Scotch drinker,” Smith said. “No matter how successful I thought I might be, there was always a reminder that I hadn't really achieved anything compared to Dale.”Ron Vodenichar, president and publisher of the Butler Eagle, considers his close friend a man of great integrity and honor.“He looked first to help others and only afterward considered his own place in the situation,” Vodenichar said of Pinkerton. “He was a tireless volunteer and a leader in the truest sense of the word.”
Dennis Baglier, owner of Baglier Buick, GMC and Mazda, will always remember Pinkerton's commitment to community projects through several organizations, especially Rotary.“He got me to join Rotary 18 years ago and we became close through that,” Baglier said of the friend he'd known more than three decades. “He was always a good time. He was a lot of fun and adventurous.”He said he enjoyed a handful of vacations together with the Pinkertons over the years, plus a Rotary trip to Scotland. The men spent a good deal of time together over the past year working on community projects.Baglier credits Pinkerton's insight with being able to spot a need in the community and then find a way to help solve it.“I think he was a great mentor to me in Rotary by showing me how to be a community servant,” Baglier said. “Unfortunately, the Butler community has lost a great asset with his passing.”
But Pinkerton wasn't all business.“He loved kids,” McCarrier said. “He'd go anywhere to entertain kids.”Many remember Pinky the Clown zooming down Main Street in a miniature car, waving, shouting and generally delighting paradegoers in his Syria Shriners clown getup for 35 years.McCarrier remains astounded by his friend's relentless fundraising and service to the organizations he served. He said Pinkerton especially loved being a Shriners clown, and patiently spent two hours on his makeup and costume before appearing as the lovable Pinky.Anyone around town who noticed a bright pink or colorful plaid jacket, Pinkerton's unabashedly whimsical sartorial choices, knew to expect a smile and warm hello or the advice to “keep smiling.”Millie Pinkerton said the distinct jackets came from the necessity for her husband to wear dark suits in his early job as a funeral director, then dark clothing as the owner of Pinkerton Goodyear Tire & Rubber on Main Street.“He always has been very colorful,” she said. “He was the first guy in our neighborhood to wear Bermuda shorts.”She said her husband went to the late Frank Cicco Sr. for his sport jackets, which Cicco tailor made.Millie said Cicco brought fabric home from trade shows in New York City, and the couple would go to the tailor shop to select fabrics for his coats.“He knew what he liked and he also bought all my clothes our whole married life,” she said. “He was unbelievably awesome.”
“We've been very good friends since he came to town almost 40 years ago,” McCarrier said.He said while serving together in an elected position can negatively affect a friendship, the opposite was the case with him and Pinkerton while the two were commissioners together.“Our friendship grew stronger,” McCarrier said. “In those years, we never had one angry word with each other.”Karen Diehl, another longtime friend of the Pinkertons, joined Collins in spending Monday with Millie Pinkerton to offer support. She thought of Pinkerton as a brother and will forever remember his always helpful nature.“He was such a giving person,” Diehl said. “If you needed help, he was there to help you with a smile. The community will never be the same without him.”She will never forget that sunny grin of Pinkerton's, which is what appears in her mind when she thinks of him.“When he was in the hospital, I said 'I need to see that handsome smile,' and he gave me a big one.”Baglier best summed up the feelings of all who knew and loved the larger-than-life character of Dale Pinkerton.“I miss him already,” Baglier said.
Above all else, Pinkerton was a man of deep faith and relied on Christian tenets all his life.“We are going to miss him as a friend, but we know where he is,” McCarrier said. “He's with Jesus.”Vodenichar agreed, adding that “Today he brightens heaven with a new enthusiasm as he greets one and all with his famous phrase — 'Fantastic!'”In recent weeks, Millie held out hope her husband would respond to the cutting edge cancer treatment he received at UPMC-Shadyside Hospital in Pittsburgh.When he returned home a few days before his death, all the nurses on his floor came to say goodbye as he was transferred onto an ambulance gurney, Millie said.“He told everyone he met how blessed he was and how good God was in his life,” Millie said. “He was truly ready.”Now faced with life without her beloved partner, Millie hopes those who remember her husband will take a page from the playbook of his life.
