Some legends are created and told for decades. The story changes, the facts are distorted and embellished, and the people in the stories become heroic, mysterious, and mythical.
When legends are born, they create a life filled with unforgettable memories. They follow their calling, all the while touching lives and inspiring others to learn from their experiences. Living legends are cherished and remembered.
Everyone has a legacy. The legacy you leave, the stories people will tell about you, will they be great? How will people remember you? As generations pass, will you be remembered, or will you be just a face and name in the family tree?
Jeff Brown, my Daddy, was a legend. He loved his life. He lived a life full of family and friends.
Jeffrey Lee Brown was born on November 26, 1948. His parents, Sterling and Isabel, were overjoyed to have a baby boy. His older sisters, Barbara and Beverly, didn’t know what to think of this baby boy.
Later down the years, 3 younger siblings arrived, Michael, Timothy, and Kimberly. Jeff’s homelife, in his younger years, were filled with memories of Pappy’s farm and the rooster that would chase him, sneaking away and getting ice cream with his dad and his dad would say, “don’t tell mom”, fighting and goofing off with his siblings, his mom’s unbeatable cooking, shooting a street light out with a BB gun, and delivering newspapers on his bike.
As Jeff grew, he went on to high school and met the love of his life, but they didn’t know it yet. Jeff said in high school, Cathy Eccles was too popular and never noticed him. After a few years, both Jeff and Cathy ended up in the same college. The Eccles and the Browns knew each other from church, and as the story goes, Cathy left her pillow at home, and she needed it at college, and it was sent with Jeff to deliver. As Cathy came to the top of the steps, looking down at Jeffrey, holding her pillow, their eyes met, and Jeff knew she was the one!
Jeff and Cathy were married December 26, 1970, in Cathy’s grandfather’s home. Cathy, once again, descending a staircase to meet Jeff, this time at the altar. Jeff’s sister Kim was their flower girl.
Jeff and Cathy graduated from Messiah College and went on to teach and expand an elementary school called Middletown Christian. Jeff, the school’s principal, science teacher, and athletic coach, with Cathy by his side as the English teacher and 3rd and 4th grade teacher, helped get this school off and running. The school, needing funding for athletic uniforms, started making and selling candles to raise money. The Eccles, Cathy’s parents, owned a few gift shops, and they bought some of the candles to sell in their stores.
In the late 70’s, Jeff left teaching, as the Browns needed more income for their growing family and opened his own company, Keystone Candle.
Kristen and Katie, Jeff and Cathy’s daughters, watched as their parents and the Eccles grew this small business that began in the basement of the Brown’s home, into a business that now sells products worldwide!
Jeff lived a life full of love and dedication to his family, business, and church. Even though Jeff left teaching, his love for children did not stop. He continued to teach children at church, using magic tricks to teach the children about God’s love for them. To the kids who were blessed to see one of his shows, Jeff was known as “Fireball Brown”. During Jeff’s magic shows, when a child would get a question correct, Jeff, from the stage, would throw into the audience a “Fireball Redhot Jawbreaker” candy. He is still known by some as “Fireball Brown”.
He built friendships in his church, and as he got older, he served as part of the video and audio team, and these friendships have lasted a lifetime.
He loved the old Superman movies (the ones with Christopher Reeves), Andrea Bocelli, Star Trek, Top Gun, the Dallas Cowboys, getting burgers everyday for Katie’s dog Buddy, cream chipped beef on toast, his mom’s apple pie, peanut butter cookies, peanut butter cups, his mom’s sauerkraut, vanilla ice cream with thick caramel syrup, and anything his granddaughters did or made.
He was a fantastic father but an even better grandfather. He adored his granddaughters, and they became his whole world! In Jeff’s eyes, they could “do no wrong,” and they deserved everything they wanted, and he would buy only the biggest and the best for them.
Spending time with his family was his favorite thing to do. Even if it was just to sit at his desk at work and have his granddaughters tell stories about their day, annual family reunions, or Thanksgiving at Jeff and Cathy’s home. He loved parties, except for when they were for him. His 60th birthday, we threw a big surprise at his home, and he came in with bags of food, excited to have people in his home, but then found out it was in honor of him. Katie read his facial reactions as, “Yay, it’s a party! Oh crap, it’s for me!”
Jeff was one who listened with such compassion and empathy that it made you feel like you were the only one in the room. He was always willing to stop what he was doing and listen and would be the first to show up if you called. He always knew the right questions to ask to keep you talking about the problem. He was willing to give you advice but knew that by asking the right questions, you could come to the right decision on your own.
He would make friends everywhere he went. He always gave everything he had to others, never expecting anything in return. Jeff didn’t like it when people did things for him. He would take you to dinner and want to pay for the entire bill. If you protested, he would always say, “Don’t take my joy!”
Jeff taught that you never give up on family. Jeff was a peacemaker and hated when others were at odds with each other. He taught his daughters, “No matter how angry you get, you are still family, and family doesn’t quit on each other.”
Jeff emulated that sometimes “just showing up is enough”. Sometimes words don’t need to be said, but just being present matters. Even to stand in the rain to watch your granddaughters play soccer or to let the candle orders just sit for a few minutes and go out in the candle factory parking lot to play a game or make chalk drawings on the sidewalk. He knew that people were more important than anything.
His love for his employees and business relationships were evident by how he valued their time and respected their lives. He tried to create relationships and got to know every customer who walked into the store. Customers knew him by name, and while he was terrible at remembering their names, he remembered their stories!
Jeff’s life and values were built on his faith.
Matthew 7:24-25 says, Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall because it had its foundation on the rock.
That rock, Jesus Christ, was who Jeff built his life on. Jeff believed that no matter how hard life could get, he was loved by a good God who would see him through it all. He believed the Bible to be true and placed his whole life on that.
Jeff knew that there was nothing more important than showing God’s love to others. When you build your life on Jesus, you know that you will be prepared for anything that happens to you in this life, and you are not walking the hard times alone. When the storms come, and your business burns to the ground in a fire in July of 2000, you have the One who created it all to help you rebuild.
Jeff would want you to know, that even if you are so blessed that you never have a bad day, you know that one day, this life will come to an end, and on that day, you will stand before God. Jesus Christ is the only thing that can prepare you for that day. Only by Christ’s death on the cross, sacrificed for our sins, and His Resurrection, are we able to get into Heaven.
His belief in God and by the example of how Jeff lived his life, his family hopes and prays that you come to know the God that Jeff knew.
Jeff knew that the only thing more beautiful than going to Heaven is taking someone with him. He lived his life trying to teach kids about God’s love and trying to make sure others went to Heaven!
Jeffrey Lee Brown, known by most as Jeff, or even Fireball Brown, entered Heaven’s gates on August 4th, 2024, surrounded by his family.
There was a line of people in Heaven, on Aug 4th, waiting to embrace Jeff. Sterling and Isabel Brown, with his older sister Barbara, along with many of our friends and family who were so excited to greet him.
This feels tragic and huge to those of us left on this side of Heaven because Jeff is leaving such a giant hole in this family and this community. Death is hard for those of us left on this side, but while we will miss him, we know he RAN to His Savior’s arms!
As sad and as hard as it was to say goodbye to him, there is nothing else we needed to say, and there was nothing else that we needed to hear him say. It’s such an honored place to be with someone, to have the time and the close relationships to be able to say all that needed to be said.
Many of us worry about leaving a legacy when we go. The thing about leaving a legacy is that you JUST have to do your job every day. You have to be there every day and just show up.
The hardest part of leaving a legacy is that you have to leave. When people leave us, what stays behind is how they forever changed us! The legend of Fireball Brown will not die because he left such an impact on all the lives he touched.
Our loss may be great, but our God is greater, and Jeff is in the arms of the One who created him.
Cowles Farm 