By Tracy Hagen

Good reporting is all about getting the facts right, using the right words to bring the facts to life, and giving the people in the story a voice.

The facts about Henny’s passing have been reported elsewhere. The last thing left to do is to give the people closest to Henny their voice. Here, in their entirety, are the stories they shared at the funeral of Henny Ray Abrams.

“I know from all the incredible outpouring of emotion and what I’ve read about to his family and all his close friends here right now, that Henny would be very touched right now. Yet at the same time saying, “What’s all the fuss about?” I kind of feel over-dressed up here. His sister-in-law, Diane, said she was going to make a phone call this morning to us so we could wear a baseball cap, a polo shirt, jeans, and some sneakers or desert boots.

“My Mom used to call the boys the Fab 5 growing up, each of us special and unique in our own way. Especially Henny. It kind of started from the time when he was a little kid. The first day of kindergarten Henny came home and he told mom he had to quit. My mom asked why he had to quit kindergarten. Henny said, “Because cowboys don’t serve milk and cookies.” And he quit.

“My brother was a brilliant man. He was self-taught and had a great dry wit and sense of humor. He loved cooking. These people can attest that his Thursday night dinner parties at 225 Lincoln Place was a much sought-after seat. He loved traveling the world, movies, and he had reached the pinnacle of success in his profession. I’m not sure how many of you people here would know that in 1990 The Society of Silurians, one of the oldest and most prestigious organizations for journalistic integrity, gave Henny a gold medallion for the photo of the year.

“From the many people I have heard from, he was revered yet you would never know that from him. I had been to a race or two with him and met some people, but it was one day when I was at a bookstore, several years ago, down in Washington, D.C., and these kind of big, burly motorcycle guys were reading this magazine and they were going on and on, “Look, oh my God, that’s Henny’s, that’s a Henny picture.” So I’m thinking, “are they talking about my little brother?” I walked over and said, “guys, I’m Henny Abrams’ brother.” I might as well had said I’m the pope or Michael Jordan. You know what they wanted? They wanted an autograph from Henny Abrams. I said, “you have a better chance of getting one from the pope.”

“There are so many things I could talk about when I think about my brother. But the one thing I want to talk about is his generosity. If you were his family or his friend, it was boundless. His friend, Michael Scott, called me from London and said that Henny was a true friend whose generosity was endless. A good friend of mine said that he had quietly touched so many people in his life with little or no fanfare. The thing about Henny was that he seemed to know what you wanted or needed. You didn’t need to say anything, he just knew. One of his very first assignments when he went to Brussels was to cover the royal wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana. My mom and I got up at three o’clock in the morning to watch the wedding and see this six foot, five inch guy with the baseball cap. She said to me, “I should have asked Henny to get me a trinket or something from the royal wedding. Henny came home later with six 8×10 color photographs of the royal wedding in a collage that he had made for her.

“He knew that one of my many passions was going to the 76ers games. When he started covering them in New York City, he would call me if he knew he was covering the 76ers and ask if I wanted to come up and go to the game with him. I remember the first time going in the press room, everyone knew him. They just knew him. Then, when we were sitting on the floor, I just couldn’t believe it. He knew how excited I was. In his dry way he looked to me and said, “pretty cool, huh?” He said, “well listen, I want you to look like one of the press here – put the camera around your neck.” So I said okay and I’m holding the camera up to my face. He started chuckling at me. I asked him what was the matter. He said, “well, if you are going to look professional, take the lens cap off.”

“He traveled the world and he always offered me if I wanted some frequent flier miles. A summer or so ago I was in Italy. He was always busy, working and working. Yet he was so excited that I was going to be in Italy the same time as he was, he took time out, changed his schedule, came to Florence, and showed me around Florence. He was already in my hotel room when I got there and took me out to dinner. If you know anything about Henny, he wouldn’t let me pay.

“About this time last year I was in a really horrible car accident. This is the last thing I want to talk about on his generosity. I called him and said, “Henny, I was in a real bad car accident.” The first thing out of his mouth was, “Oh, no.” The second thing out of his mouth was, “can I give you my car? If you need my car I will give you my car.”

“He lived in Brooklyn and people here can attest that he had amazing friends. He traveled the world with the motorcycling crowd, but Delaware was Henny’s home. Whether it was hanging out with my mom and my brothers or taking pictures of my nieces or driving my sister-in-law absolutely crazy on Thanksgiving Day because everything had to be just perfect for that Thanksgiving dinner. Or his Friday night movie with his best friend, Andy Carota. When the key hit the door at 1302 Stanford Road, Henny was home.

“Each of you will have your own memories. I will sorely miss our emails on Fridays or our talks about which movies we are going to see. When he walked in the door on Friday nights he always had a bag of snacks. He went into his bedroom, put his stuff down, and said, “what are we watching?”

“The last time was a couple weeks ago. We stayed up to about three o’clock in the morning that night. He wasn’t much for emotion but the very next day, before he got to leave – he would usually leave, just get up and go and that was Henny – but he came in when I was reading the paper and asked what I was reading. We talked some more and he said to me, “That was pretty cool last night, staying up all night. We had a great time. I’ll see you in a couple weeks.”

“I will miss seeing my baby brother. I will miss seeing the smile on his face when he took that motorcycle out for the first ride in the spring. I will miss him at our Thanksgiving Dinner this year. He was one of a kind, my brother. — Bryan Abrams, elder brother

—

“I just wrote some random thoughts. I can’t top Bryan.

“Bryan ended right where I thought. Henny was a one-of-a-kind and somebody that did it his way. When he was in high school he had the longest hair in his graduating class. He cut class. You will never see his picture in the yearbook. That’s kind of how he lived his life – he did it his way.

“When Henny passed… it came as a sudden shock to all of us. At this time we don’t know exactly what was the cause but they think it was a heart attack.

“I’m a salesman. When I meet people and I find out that they are into motorcycles I would say that my brother, Henny, he travels all over the world, to Australia, to Asia, everywhere – he takes pictures and writes articles for motorcycle magazines. After Henny passed I Googled him and spent a lot of time on it. To say he took pictures and wrote articles for motorcycle magazines is like saying Tiger Woods plays golf for a living. It’s amazing, he was legendary. But knowing Henny, he never talked about it. He just didn’t. I absolutely had no idea how accomplished he was in the field of motorcycle racing, especially journalism. I would say that he took pictures but he was a legendary journalist. Reading everything I can get my hands on now, he told it like it was. It sounds like he rubbed people the wrong way. He didn’t mean to do it, he just told it like it was. I see a lot of heads nodding.

“He had a great sense of humor. He took a lot of pictures for the news journal, back in the ‘70s. He would cover Philadelphia sports. He would come home and I distinctly remember him having a picture of Ted Sizemore of the Philadelphia Phillies standing on second base with his hand on his crotch. I knew Henny arrived when he had a picture of Ilie N?stase holding up his middle finger.

“Henny read up on everything. Oine of the highlights every year was Henny coming to Thanksgiving Dinner. He had to do everything his way. He became an incredible cook. We would make brownies out of a box, he always had to make them from scratch. For Thanksgiving, if we were looking for a flat-screen TV; ask Henny, he researched it. Knives: our knives couldn’t cut butter and Henny would tell us what the best knives were. That was his thing.

“He would come down for Thanksgiving and that was really the one time in the year I knew that I would see him. Bryan said, there used to be five of us. Our brother, Ricky, passed away in ’89. So it was the four of us and it really was something we really looked forward to – my children, my wife, and my brothers. Unfortunately we won’t have that anymore. But we would see him for sure that day. My children danced and Henny would take pictures at the Nutcracker Christmas show. It was a highlight for our kids, all of us, to see what pictures he got of Ashley and Brooke. We will sorely miss that.

“I was thinking back to when he started. I remember him giving me a camera and a press pass. At the national anthem I was standing next to Henry Bibby and Maurice Cheeks – some of you may know them, some may not. During a loose ball Darryl Dawkins, who was seven-foot tall and 300 pounds, jumped over the top of me.

“For a Phillies playoff game in the ‘70s he met me down in the dugout and took me up for a press lunch. For the U.S. Open (golf) in 1981 I was his runner for film. He’s been in the industry for so long and was so successful.

“One story that I look back on… when Henny wasn’t hold enough to drink legally he took Bryan’s birth certificate, who was two years older than Henny, went to the Delaware Motor Vehicle and told them he had lost his drivers’ license. So they ended up putting Bryan’s name and home address on the license, Henny’s picture, and Bryan’s age. Now Bryan – you saw Bryan, he’s about five-foot, five-inches tall. When Bryan got his license there was a stipulation: he needed a seat cushion. The clerk looked at Henny, six-foot, five-inches tall, and said “looks like you don’t need it now.” Now, when I wasn’t old enough to drink, Henny took me down on his motorcycle and I had his birth certificate. I got my picture taken and I came this close to failing the eye exam. He was so mad because he thought he might have to wear eyeglasses.

“I just want to thank everybody for coming. I’ve met many people from many parts of the country today that took the time to come here today and pay tribute. I know Henny would be rolling his eyes because if he was leaving, he just left. He didn’t say goodbye. I’ll tell one last story: I remember Henny was down visiting and Ashley, our oldest one, was visiting one of our neighbors. When she came home she asked, “where is Uncle Henny?” She started crying, ”He didn’t say good-bye.” I just said, “that’s Henny.”

“He left that way, unfortunately. — Ronny Abrams, younger brother

—

“I wish I could speak extemporaneously like the two speakers you just heard, but I had to write it down. I’ll try to go as fast as I can.

“Just about this time a week ago, on Thursday, February 28, I received a call on my cell phone. I had the ringer turned off and I didn’t feel the vibration so I didn’t pick up the call right away. Not too much time passed before I received a call and the caller had left a voice mail message. Even if the phone had not spelled out his name I would have recognized the number: it was Henny.

“I was expecting his call or maybe an email. Whenever he was going to be in Brooklyn over a weekend he would call me on Thursday to tell me whether he was coming down for the weekend. If he were we would typically meet for dinner and maybe a movie. He had to wait until Thursday afternoon to confirm his plans, for three reasons. There was always at least three reasons with everything Henny did. First, he had to wait to see if AP was planning to give him an assignment on the weekend and, if so, on which day because he knew that it was a two and a half hour drive each way. One day was enough for Henny if that was all he had. So he often came down when all he had was one day. Whether it was Saturday or Sunday depended on AP. Second, he had to wait and see if there were any promising movies opening on Friday. If there were no good movies he wasn’t coming down. And then, of course, the last consideration was to see if I had many any plans for the weekend.

“As I was getting ready to check the voice mail message I recalled that on last weekend I did have plans for Saturday night and I had already checked the movies and nothing good was opening. So I was pretty sure that Henny would not be coming down.

“The thing was, it wasn’t Henny on the voice mail message. My hearing isn’t good at the best of times so I strained to hear what the person was saying. Even now, when I play back the message, I think the guy was introducing himself as Austin Cooper. For a fraction of a second I thought of a car, the Mini Cooper. I wondered if somebody had gotten a hold of Henny’s phone and was playing a practical joke on me. I just as quickly, from the tone of his voice and what he was saying, that this was no joke. He said he was from the 78th precinct and he was calling regarding Henny Abrams. He left his phone number which I noticed was different than Henny’s cell phone number, and he asked me to call him. Finally, he said that they were trying to locate next of kin.

“He ran those last three words, next of kin, as though they were one word. His voice dropped off like he didn’t want to be saying that at all.

“I was pretty sure I had heard what he said the first time, but I didn’t want to believe it. I played the message back again and there was no denying what he had said. I tried to think of some other explanation for why he was using Henny’s cell phone and why he wanted to locate next of kin, but I couldn’t come up with anything. I tried to resist it because I couldn’t be sure, but suddenly I had a sinking feeling that Henny was gone forever. If he was out there anywhere it was now on the other side of an unbridgeable divide.

“Well, this is a memorial service so rather than dwell on the shock and pain we are all feeling right now – like me, for instance – I’d like to remember a few positive things about Henny. These are not intended to be a list of Henny’s greatest hits, just a few things I think about when I reflect on how Henny managed to be the remarkable person that he was.

“First of all, except for a short period of experimentation when he was a kid, he was sober all of his life. Anyone that knew Henny knew he didn’t drink or do drugs, and not too long ago he downshifted from coffee to tea. I think this goes some way to explain how he could perform at the top of his game as well as he did for as long as he did. No one that I’ve ever known accomplished as much as Henny did in a fixed amount of time with a minimum of sleep without apparently suffering any long-term effects.

“I have just a little bit of experience myself making complex international travel arrangements, but they were nothing compared to what Henny did on a regular basis. My travel was for fun, I had no work to produce while I was away. But still, as much fun as it was I was exhausted when I got home.

“In contrast, Henny’s schedules were ridiculously complicated because he had to be at multiple locations ranging all over the world at certain times on certain dates. He crammed as many venues as he could in each trip. Once he got to where he was going he had to produce work. Shooting photos and writing stories at each of these venues or on planes between these venues or at some nameless hotel in the middle of nowhere because he had to make a deadline at a headquarters half-way around the world.

“I’ll read just one email Henny sent to me on Sunday, January 8, 2012, 4:34 pm. I’m going to add some words where I need to for clarity, so here goes:

Off to Milan, Italy, at 6:35 pm today. Home next Sunday afternoon, January 15 for about eleven days before heading to Bangkok and Malaysia on January 26. After eight days in Asia I’m back to the U.S. via Bangkok at 6:30 pm on Friday, February 3. I leave for London on Sunday, February 5 at 9 am for a week. In the middle of this trip I’m doing a day trip to Bologna, Italy, to visit a race shop. Home on Friday, February 10. I’m planning on coming back to Wilmington the following weekend on Thursday, February 16. Will let you know… but I may have to go to Buffalo.

“This year, after a ten-day, four-country trip to Asia, Henny came home on February 9. Henny took a sixteen hour flight from Hong Kong to Newark, New Jersey. He took off at 10 am Hong Kong time and landed sixteen hours later at noon, New Jersey time. If you are wondering what happened to the other 13 hours your body’s internal clock is wondering the same thing. Any normal person would have gone home and crashed, but Henny hopped into his car and drove two hours down here to Wilmington, where several hours later still he had at PF Chang’s with my son Charlie and I. Then we saw the movie Side Effects at Painters Crossing, Pennsylvania. You would forgive a person if he was a little cranky after that sort of marathon but Henny’s only complaint was my choice of a restaurant. He thought that lacked imagination on my part considering he just spent a day and a half in Hong Kong.

“Sobriety was a necessary condition for Henny to keep up his break-neck pace, but it was not a sufficient one. Besides being sober he was also very resourceful and very well organized. Those two things helped him work especially quickly and effectively. Travel inevitably throws up road blocks: canceled or delayed flights, missed connections, lost reservations, etcetera. You must be resourceful to overcome those obstacles without losing too much time. You must be extremely well-organized to even attempt such complicated schedules.

“Now, all of that is for naught if you are not a little bit aggressive, if you are not a little bit pushy. Aggression may not have been one of Henny’s endearing qualities, but if you were traveling with Henny – or, more accurately, following in his wake – you tended to get to where you were going a lot faster than you would otherwise.

“Still, other factors came into play besides being sober, resourceful, well-organized, and aggressive, he cared about having a reputation for reliability, for delivering quality goods on a deadline. To do that he had to have the will to get the work done and the endurance to actually do it. He always put work first. He canceled many trips to Wilmington to get his work done. That attests to his willpower. Recently he told me an all-nighter in order to meet a deadline. I thought all-nighters ended in college but Henny, at 58, pulled an all-nighter in order to meet a deadline. That says something about his endurance.

“Finally there is the most important factor of all: Henny loved what he was doing. He loved photography. He loved motorcycles, including the one that he left in his garage here in Wilmington. He loved writing about motorcycles and motorcycle racing. Those things all came together for him when he found his true calling: working in the motorcycle racing press, where many revered him as one of the finest practitioners.

“Rest in peace, Henny. — Andy Carota, friend

—

“Two words: rainbow cookies. The world of deserts have lost one of their great champions. All of Henny’s cooking was delicious, but he particularly loved to bake. Rainbow cookies were his signature treat. He gave most of what he baked to his friends. He packed up rainbow cookies, took them on planes and delivered them all over the world. Those of you who did not return your Tupperware: you know who you are.

“In the last few days the word ‘generous’ has been used over and over to characterize Henny. It bears repeating: it was his generosity of paying attention and his generosity of remembering. He observed those around him carefully, and he noticed the little crevices of light into which he could inject some gesture.

“His generosity expressed itself in small and sometimes silly ways. He used to take a suitcase of sugary breakfast cereals to England because he knew the children of his colleague, Michael Scott, liked it.

“For me, he knew I needed to have milk in the refrigerator. There was always a fresh carton waiting for me when I came home from a trip. He liked to make purchases for me in Delaware lest I pay sales tax. And so my television and my computer came up from Delaware. He knew that I would forget to take Kleenex when I go out on a cold day. There was always one in his pocket. There were countless – countless – small examples of attention and remembering.

“Henny’s generosity expressed itself in huge and amazing ways. Most of you know that Henny took wonderful care of me during my treatments for cancer almost ten years ago now. He re-arranged his schedule to be with me on the hard days. He cooked the foods I could tolerate. He managed communications so that all my friends and family knew of my progress. He did this with a lightly humorous touch that helped them and me to be more cheerful and optimistic. It will always be a time that I will remember with gratitude.

“During my illness was one of the times that I managed to influence Henny’s behavior according to my own agenda. When I lost my hair he shaved his head in solidarity. He finally reconciled with his hairline and never re-grew his horrible comb-over.

“For me, Henny set the standard to be a friend. For all of us, Henny set the standard to which we may never measure up for what constitutes meaningful dessert. — Dianne Pohlsander, friend

—

“I’m Paul Carruthers and I’m the editor of Cycle News, so I worked with Henny for 25 years. I remembered when I started at Cycle News Henny was already this – well, he was a foot taller than I am – he was this big figure. I would be lying if I didn’t say that I wasn’t somewhat intimidated by him.

“We roomed together at races for the next 25 years. He always controlled the remote.

“By the end of the weekend we both worked so hard that we were almost a married couple at that point – without the sex.

“Professionally, he had no peers. He was somebody that I could rely on no matter what. He didn’t have a wife. He didn’t have children. Yet he cared very deeply about mine. He cared very deeply that we worked hard together but he knew that there was certain times that I needed to do those family things, whether it was an important anniversary or a Little League game that was important to me. He would make it very clear that he wanted me to stay home on those weekends. He would take the entire burden of all the work. My family, obviously, appreciates that. It meant a lot to me because it showed how much he cared.

“He wasn’t the type of person to tell you, “Paul, I love you,” or, “Paul, you’re this,” or, “Paul, you’re that.” If I didn’t hear that I did a bad job with Henny then I just assumed I did a good job because he would let you know one before he let you know the other. But that was his personality.

“I learned so much from him. I gave up awhile ago on…if we stayed up working in the hotel room at a Hampton Inn or a Ramada Inn, if I worked until 11 pm he would work until midnight. If I worked until midnight he would work until 1 am. So finally I said, “screw it,” and I went to bed at 9 pm.

“I think that is what allowed me to carry on. He was always someone I could count on. If I needed a story he would ask me when I needed it. On a Monday, which is our deadline day at Cycle News, I would hear from him in the morning, “Hey, I just talked to this guy. I know you need this story. You will have it in an hour and a half. In an hour and a half it was in my email box.”

“People have asked me since this has happened, “Oh, can I help you? How can I help you?” for the most part, they can’t, because what he’s done for me it’s impossible for anybody to ever do that. I appreciate their offer and we are going to get through this. If I have to have two write to do what Henny did then I will find those two guys and we will do it in his memory.

“Right now he would probably tell me to get the hell off the podium and get some work done. I appreciate you having me here. He was a great man and I am going to miss him on a personal level and I am going to miss him on a professional level.

“I go to Daytona next week. We’ve shared the same hotel room there for 23 or 24 years. I would come into that room on a Wednesday night after flying from California. He would be already at work on his computer. I would walked in and he would grumble something, make sure I would not change the TV station which I knew already. We would go about our business, eat our five minute breakfast, and work until dinner time. Back in the old days, before the internet, we used to have time to do movies. We don’t have that luxury anymore once things got so busy. We would get through those weekends and I was always proud of the body of work that we produced. I could not have produced that body of work without Henny.

“I’m going to miss him on many levels, as I’m sure the rest of you will. — Paul Carruthers