You can recognize Don Gabriel by his laughter even before you
see him. It begins deep in the stomach, gathers volume as it rises,
and is full bodied as it bursts from his mouth. It never fails to
inspire laughter in others.
You can recognize Don Gabriel by his laughter even before you see him. It begins deep in the stomach, gathers volume as it rises, and is full bodied as it bursts from his mouth. It never fails to inspire laughter in others.
“I get a kick out of life,” he said recently at his Ridgemark home. “It’s been good to me.”
Donald Louis Gabriel was born on July 6, 1920 in Fort Fairfield, Maine, the first of two sons of Joseph Gabriel and Alice Meelan Gabriel. Ralph (Mike) Gabriel followed 3-1/2 years later.
“Dad came from Lebanon in 1906 when he was 13,” Gabriel said. “Our mother was of Lebanese descent and both were grateful for the opportunities here. They passed the work ethic on to us.”
The Gabriel brothers spent much of their early life in Redondo Beach in southern California where Joseph Gabriel was president of the American Trust and Savings Co.
“It was a great life for kids,” Gabriel remembered. “It had a lot of tourists because in addition to the ocean there were also a roller coaster and carousel.”
They came to San Benito County in 1937 and Gabriel enrolled as a junior at Hollister High School. After graduation in 1938, he attended Hollister Junior College for two years, then enrolled at Stanford.
While he was there, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and the United States went to war. Gabriel signed up for the V-7 program and after college went to Chicago to train as a naval officer.
He was commissioned an ensign in April 1943 with his first assignment at Submarine Tracking School in Miami. That August, he reported to the Brooklyn Navy Yard to the USS Frankford (497) a destroyer. It soon was sent on convoy duty to Casablanca, then to the Caribbean and Londonderry, Ireland.
When the invasion of France was launched on June 6, 1944, Gabriel was assistant communications officer. His ship helped protect the general area.
It next went to the Mediterranean for the invasion of southern France. While it was docked in Naples Harbor, Gabriel went to Vatican City and was granted an audience with Pope Pius XII.
Next the Frankford went to Portland, Maine, then Gabriel was assigned to the destroyer USS Forrest (24) as its communications officer in February 1945. He had been promoted two grades to lieutenant.
The Forrest went to the Pacific for the invasion of Okinawa. In May, Gabriel narrowly escaped death when a kamikaze (suicide plane) hit the Forrest just 25 feet beneath where he was standing. Of eight destroyers in his squadron, seven were sunk or damaged by kamikazes.
Following that battle, all dry-docks in the Pacific were full so the Forrest steamed 19,000 miles to Boston where it was when the war ended. Gabriel was discharged in May 1946.
He returned to work in the Hollister Ice Co. In 1951, he and Mike Gabriel took over the business, “with our parents’ set of ethics to guide us.”
In the fall of 1950, Gabriel went on a double date with Ed and Marg Brady and met Margaret (Margy) Power of Salinas. The attraction was mutual, and they were married on July 7, 1951 in Salinas.
The union resulted in six children: Dee Eckhardt of Olympia, Wash.; Joe Gabriel of Eugene, Ore.; Anne Paxton of San Francisco; Mary Paxton of Hollister; Tony Gabriel of Redwood City; and Paul Gabriel of San Francisco. There are seven grandchildren.
In 1946, Gabriel joined the Hollister Rotary Club of which his father was a member. He is now the senior member and was its president in 1958-59.
Business interests took him to Salinas in 1950 where he became a director of the Junior Chamber of Commerce and served on the Salinas Planning Commission. He returned to Hollister in 1955.
In 1960, he and friend John Coughlin successfully ran for Hollister City Council and Gabriel served two terms, and was mayor in 1967-68. In 1970, Gabriel was appointed to the Hollister Planning Commission and served for five years. In 1977, he was appointed to the Local Agency Formation Commission as a member at large and resigned in June 2000.
Other community service includes membership in the Hollister Elks Lodge, finance chairman of the local Red Cross chapter, the Boy Scouts of America and its Century Club, and the Little League, of which he was manager of the Indians and treasurer for more than 10 years.
Gabriel is proud that International Rotary and the World Health Organization have eradicated polio in the Western Hemisphere as well as most of Asia, India, Europe and Africa through a massive fund-raising program.
“By 2005, we hope to have the world free of polio,” he said.
He and Margy Gabriel have traveled extensively, especially since the brothers sold their business in 1986. They have visited Asia and most of Europe as well as New Zealand, South Africa, Mexico and Central and South America.
Before his eyesight began deteriorating a few years ago, Gabriel enjoyed golf, fishing and gardening. But he does not permit decreased vision to stop him from keeping up with the world. In his den, festooned with pictures of his naval service, he has a light box that illuminates and expands any text of interest. He also supports Margy Gabriel’s interests in Kinship Center and the Great Books Program.
The family is all-important to the Gabriels and they are in frequent touch with their sons, daughters and grandchildren.
“I owe so much to my parents,” he said. “They taught Mike and me the importance of working, giving back to the community and respect for others. It all comes from that.”
He will be 83 in less than two weeks, but life has never grown stale for him, and he relishes any amusing anecdote, especially one that reveals the foibles of the human condition. In fact, Don Gabriel is the most appreciative audience for any friend with a joke.
