By Sam Abbes

“Lives do not have plots, for the most part they accumulate events, day by day like a stack of old newspapers. But sometimes someone glimpses a fixed point in the flux of things, a hard certainty around which the rest of life turns like the pages of a good novel.” – Phillip Lord
Phillip Lord, 5 feet 1 inch and about 120 pounds, aged to the ripe age of 89 years on earth, went back home on Wednesday, January 28, pining away to the broken heart syndrome – his body surrendered to respiratory defeat. Phillip Lord was born in Athens, Pennsylvania, on February 21, 1925.
Phillip Lord was a resident of Venice for 51 years at 15 Rose Ave #5 in Venice.
In 1943, after high school, Phillip Lord joined the army and landed in Utah beach, Normandy, France, days after the invasion in 1945. He participated in the liberation of France and the Buchenwald concentration camp near Weimar, Germany. He saw horrific things. When pressed about Normandy, he would rather not talk about the trials and hardships.
Phillip Lord subsequently went to Palmers College of Chiropractor under the GI bill. He was nominated inventor of the year in 1990, and granted patent 4,633,899 for “Cap a leak”, a microencapsulated technology to seal leaks on a roof, to help facilitate the preservation of repairs and cost-saving devices.
He was very fluent in French, German, Italian, and the proof was in the English pudding: Phillip the philologist. He was good with words. Flowing poetic famous quote from Phillip: “Meaningless words are like raindrops on a tin roof … their only function is to hasten the sleep of the listener.”
Phillip Lord was like a fish drawn to water when it came to languages – it was an art of communication and theatre. He was an avid body builder in the ‘60s with Jack Golds at the original Muscle Beach. He was an avid chess player, always ahead of his opponents. He had resolutness bordering on doggedness and when he made his mind up to do something, he did it. Like taking a six week bicycle trip from Rochester, New York, to the Santa Monica pier in 1963, when Phillip Lord was 38 years old, 5 feet 1 inch and about 175 pounds. He used the trip for multi purposes and unwittingly lost 30 pounds while getting to know people along the journey from the East to the Pacific ocean. Phillip Lord learned orinthology and astronomy on his journey, while sleeping under the dark night skies, and trees from nature’s university.
Phillip Lord’s friends in Rochester, New York, were laughing at him when he told them he was embarking on a trip to Santa Monica. There was talk that he needed a tricycle, because at 5 feet 1 inch, the bike frame was bigger than Phillip Lord…. Undaunted, he took criticism as a compliment, hopped on his 10-speed English Raleigh bike, shifted to low speed, and after six weeks of paddling he was on Ocean Avenue, at the Santa Monica pier. When Phillip Lord embarked on the journey he had such a stomach that he couldn’t bend, but that changed after he lost 30 pounds. The entire adventure cost him $130.
In October 2008, when he got sick, Phillip Lord fell victim to the injustice of ageism and old age bias by the Los Angeles Public Guardian under the guise of dementia, which was not proven. Conservator was started by the Pacific Convalescent center and this was a death sentence for Phillip Lord, who overcame surmountable obstacles in his 89 years of cherished earthly life. He will be dearly missed by cousin Dorothy Riley, numerous friends and all the people he knew.