Maile Blume
Nicole Wheeler remembers her father stepping out into the snow at 7 a.m., bundled in three layers of clothing and donning his neon-yellow crossing guard coat, ready to ensure Chenery Middle School and Wellington Elementary school students made it safely across the street.
“Even in those moments, he was still so happy to be out there. He would be out there wanting to get dressed and freezing because he just loved what he was doing,” she said.
Reuben Wheeler, affectionately known to students as “Ruby,” was the crossing guard on the corner of Washington and Common streets for 10 years. He died Sept. 25 and is remembered fondly by the many families he befriended during his career.
“He [was] always smiling…always ready for a hug,” said Jennifer Brown, a Belmont resident who would sit and talk with Wheeler after dropping off her son.
Brown said Wheeler cared deeply about everyone he interacted with and would ask people questions about their lives with genuine curiosity, focus, and care.
Through her early morning chats with Wheeler, she learned of his love for apple pies, starting a long-standing friendship and a tradition of bringing him a homemade apple pie every fall. She also recalled Wheeler noticing when students were absent and asking them how they were doing when he saw them again.
“He knew everybody, you know. I mean, he made it that way,” she said. “He was so open and available and just really wanted to be a part of those kids’ lives.”
Jennifer’s son, Anderson, who met Wheeler when he was a student at Wellington Elementary, chose to write an English essay about Wheeler for his freshman English class. In the essay, he wrote that Wheeler “called out to everyone as they walked by, and seemed to have inside jokes with each and every one of them.”
“He was a consistent force of goodness and a bright light in my life no matter what,” he wrote.
Wheeler’s wife, Betsy Wheeler, said her husband considered being a crossing guard more of a calling than a job.
“He didn’t get up every morning to go to work. He got up every morning to be with the kids,” she said. “He’d come home with Christmas cards and gifts and things like that, and I thought, ‘Oh, this is nice, you know, the families do things for the crossing guard,’ but it was so much more than that…He was invited to dinner at their homes. The kids wanted him at their birthday parties. It was more than a connection. He became their family member.”
Before becoming a crossing guard, Wheeler served in the Coast Guard and worked as a book binder.
“I can’t remember him taking any time off work in our 47 years together,” Betsy Wheeler said.
She added that he took tremendous pride in his work. Despite increasing traffic in the area, she said there was never an accident at Wheeler’s intersection during his time as a crossing guard.
After Wheeler left his position due to illness, Betsy Wheeler received phone call after phone call from parents asking if they could bring their children over to visit him.
This year, Brown still plans to drop off her apple pie to the Wheelers.
“It’s tradition,” she said.
She and a group of other parents are also hoping to mark Reuben’s post with a commemorative plaque to remember his years of service.
“That’s going to be Ruby’s crossing,” she said. “That’s Ruby spot.”.
