“The Lord showed me how to make the best use of my time, I guess,” Pitstick says of his career.
Pitstick grew up on a farm near Fairborn with eight siblings. “It was such a peaceful way of life,” he says. “And we had such freedom.” After milking the cows and feeding the hogs, young Paul roamed the woods, looking for birds’ nests and playing games with siblings.
At 18 he attended the General Motors Institute studying engineering. World War II started, and in 1943, he was stationed in the Mediterranean theater in the 460th bomb group of the 15th Air Force. His job was to help bombardiers target their drop. He even flew missions with bombing crews.
“They had to fly as low as possible,” he explains. Closing his eyes, Pitstick says he still remembers the sound of the powerful German machine guns strafing the skies. “We got quite a few bullet holes in the planes. But we’d patch them up.”
He gave thanks when the war ended and stayed in Italy to help rebuild the war-torn infrastructure. Pitstick hitchhiked to mass with Padre Pio to receive the friar’s blessing and kiss the stigmata on the hands of the padre later venerated as Saint Pio of Pietrelcina.
As Pitstick worked to restore Italian stores and businesses, he says he came to an important realization: No one was producing meat for store shelves. When he returned to Fairborn, he found the same demand for meat products.
Filling that demand became his life’s work. Pitstick saved his wages from the Dewine & Hamma seed and grain company to invest in a hog farm. But he knew he couldn’t do it alone.
A pretty brunette caught his eye as she twirled around the square dance floor on a cold February night near Springfield in 1946.
“He asked me to dance, then we danced the night away,” says Pat, now 96. They were married the following February and soon rented Pitstick’s parent’s farm. They bought their own farm from Pitstick’s uncle.
Hogs were usually raised in fields, but Pitstick had a better idea. He designed his own hog barns with special concrete floors. Waste dropped to a lower level, keeping hogs cleaner and healthier. Pitstick Pork Farms grew, and Pitstick added more buildings. Other pork farmers from across the country, even from Europe, came to tour his operation, which sent thousands of hogs to market every year, according to family members.
“Still, I tried to keep things simple so I could handle everything with a couple of hired hands,” Pitstick adds. He wanted time to be a dad and help Pat with their growing family. The couple attended mass daily and prayed for each child every night.
Pitstick retired at age 70, so he and Pat could travel and spend time with grandchildren, then great grandchildren. Now there are great-great grandchildren to cuddle and keep in prayer.
“I’ve been so lucky,” he says with a smile.
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