Rest if Peace to ‘Dr. Longshots,’ the legendary Tom Eshenfelder
Many of us will spend the rest of our lives missing “Dr. Longshots,” otherwise known as the New London original named Thomas E. Eshenfelder — “Esh” — a man who made us laugh effortlessly, constantly, everlastingly.
Esh died after a short illness earlier this week. He was 63. The human mind and spirit is not wired to process the loss of anyone this young, let alone the cleanup hitter of local characters. But then, it has been suggested that you never really die until they stop talking about you, thus giving Esh immortality through the hundreds and hundreds of us who won't be able to look at a lobster, boat, clam fritter, Joe Burrow, racing form, Waffle House or a Tito's and soda again without breaking into an Esh-inspired giggle.
Esh made his living, among other endeavors, as a fisherman and then in the family business, Captain Scott's Lobster Dock, the home office of summer here in our corner of the world. But his passion, aside from his family and friends, was sports.
We have no better sports bar among us than the Birdseye, a city institution, and Esh's headquarters. Oh, to see the walls of the Eye during the Kentucky Derby/Breeders' Cup weeks. Memorabilia down, Esh's mathematical breakdown of every race up. It looked like the New York Stock Exchange, only more detailed.
“If I paid attention to math like this in high school,” Esh once said, “I'd be working for NASA by now.”
Esh was a horse owner with friends Dan and Bill Spellman. They formed Speshell Horse Racing and owned a number of horses, including Altered Shot. Nowhere else was Esh happier than at Saratoga or Churchill Downs.
“Esh loved just being in the game, with the trainers,” Dan Spellman said.
He also loved betting on the game. Not just horse racing. He had a gift for predicting which baseball players would hit home runs on specific days. He would study pitching, ballparks, streaks and slumps. (Even made me a nice chunk of change on FanDuel by suggesting I take Bryce Harper on some nothing Tuesday night last season.)
Which brings us to Joe Burrow, whom Esh bet on every week while he was at LSU. Burrow never lost and always covered, making him something of an annuity. Or as Esh once said famously, “Joe Burrow is my own personal ATM.”
Esh and I shared several laughs over the perils of Howard St. in New London, the road that delivers Electric Boat employees out of town at rather murderous rates of speed. He was sensitive to the issue, increasingly annoyed that trying to leave Captain Scott's on Hamilton St. and making a left on Howard has become an Olympic sport.
“As you know, I'm a frequent flier on Howard St., also known as the Howard Street International Speedway,” Esh once wrote in The Day's reader comment section. “I'm also a senior member of the Hamilton St./ Howard St. intersection team. My life insurance company actually put me in a higher risk pool when they found out how often I use that intersection, also dodging cyclists, pedestrians and motorized skateboards.”
And yet while humor was tethered to him as the blanket was to Linus, there was another side to Esh, almost secretly philanthropic, never calling attention to the causes, charities and kids he helped. He was a member of the Cactus Jack Foundation and founded the Emily Eshenfelder Foundation, named after his late daughter “to uphold her spontaneous joy for life, and kindness to all, by contributing to individuals and causes throughout our community.”
“Life can really hit you with a gut punch sometimes and this is one of them,” close friend and fellow Cactus Jack member Rick Beaney wrote in tribute on Facebook. “We lost a great one. It's hard to find the words to demonstrate the impact Esh had. He was such a generous man, always looking out for people, especially kids. It's hard to believe we won't hear these words from you again: ‘Esh is out.'”
Except that he's back in every time someone tells an Esh story.
Thomas E. Eshenfelder loved the poem “Crossing the Bar” by Tennyson. It so perfectly applies to Esh's life. This is how we shall end:
“Sunset and evening star, and one clear call for me! And may there be no moaning of the bar, when I put out to sea; But such a tide as moving seems asleep, too full for sound and foam; when that which drew from out the boundless deep turns again home.
“Twilight and evening bell and after that the dark! And may there be no sadness of farewell, when I embark; For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place the flood may bear me far, I hope to see my Pilot face to face when I have crost the bar.”