MOUNT VERNON — Donald Ramsey is a lifelong jigsaw puzzle enthusiast.
His success rate is high, but the 1,000-piece puzzle he’s working on now has him … well, a bit puzzled.
“There are pieces in this puzzle that have the same cutting and will fit several openings,” the 90-year-old explained. “When you put it in the right place, there will be a thin black line. When you put it in the wrong place, it has a little bit of space.
“It will fit, but it doesn’t belong,” he added. “It’s a jigsaw puzzle, and they are talking about precision. I never heard of a puzzle that would fit more than one place.”
He typically completes a puzzle in a month, maybe six weeks. Certainly not over six to seven weeks, as he pointed out.
This one, however, has taken six months.
“That makes me mad,” the Danbury Senior Living resident said.
“We had a month on this one, and we weren’t getting anywhere. I never worked with a puzzle that was anything like this thing. It’s a nightmare.”
“He’s had the patience of Job,” Danbury staff member Cathi Fithian said of Ramsey’s effort.
When they discovered that there were missing pieces and that pieces fit several areas, Fithian sent a letter to the manufacturer with the UPC.
“I received a package by return mail, but it was a different puzzle,” she said.
“It will fit, but it doesn’t belong.”
Donald Ramsey
Ramsey’s not giving up.
“I’m not a quitter,” he said. “If I start something, I like to finish it.
“But I don’t know whether I’ll get this one done.”
Personality match
Ramsey said he’s been working jigsaw puzzles since he was old enough to play with toys.
His mom and dad worked puzzles, and Ramsey said, “it just fell on me.”
“I started playing with puzzles. They fascinated me,” he explained. “I just loved to put them together.”
Ramsey was born in 1933 in Coshocton County, where Coshocton, Knox, and Licking counties meet.
As a child, he would hide a puzzle piece in his pocket, producing it when all other pieces were in place.
“I always like to put the last piece in,” he confessed.
Because he’s unable to walk a lot, jigsaw puzzles fit Ramsey’s lifestyle.
“I can just sit there and enjoy it,” he said. “And I do enjoy it.”
Puzzles fit his personality, too.
“I’m something of a loner,” he acknowledged. “I’ll talk to people, but I don’t have to have them in my ear all the time.”
Raised in the country, Ramsey’s family moved in 1936 to Marne, just east of Newark in Licking County. In 1938, they moved again to “18 acres of stone and rock,” with a quarter-mile lane leading to their house.
It was the same house his dad lived in when he was younger.
Ramsey’s mom was a Knox Countian, living near Martinsburg during her school years. His caregiver is a life-long family friend who lives near Martinsburg, which is how Ramsey came to reside at Danbury Senior Living.
He was one of the first residents to move into the facility when it opened in August. Four other puzzles he completed are framed and previously adorned the facility’s walls.
Ramsey still hasn’t finished his current jigsaw puzzle, but Fithian reports that he “made a great deal of progress on the six-month puzzle this past weekend.”
Knox Community Hospital proudly supports the vibrant pulse of our community by sponsoring the Life & Culture section on Knox Pages, celebrating the stories and experiences that make our region unique.
