CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- In the musical "Carousel," Billy the carnival worker learns he is to be a father. He sings about all the things he will do with "my boy Bill," then thinks what if the child is a girl.

"You can have fun with a son/ But you gotta be a father to a girl," he bemoans.

We talked to several fathers and daughters about that line. Are fathers disappointed when a he is a she? Do they raise a he differently than a she? Are hes more fun than shes?

"Well, yes, I did have my heart set on a son, as I expect every man does," acknowledged Joe Wiersteiner of Larwood Road.

After three daughters, he thought, "Oh boy, I am not going to get a boy." Then the fourth was a boy. "We tried for a brother and got another girl."

Richard Schafer of St. Albans believes it's natural for men to want a son. "Our first two were girls, then a boy, then three girls, then a boy, then a girl. I said I wasn't going through four girls to get another boy."

"It would have been nice to have a boy, sure. But is my life worse off for not -- no," replied Greg Stone, the father of three daughters.

"Once they're here, you quit focusing on gender," said Stone. "They're just kids, my kids, and I'm happy to have them."

Joe Wiersteiner, 79, and his wife, Laura, had five children in six years. "It was overwhelming," he recalled.

When his children were young, he traveled frequently in his jobs as equipment inspector and later as a regional supervisor for Union Carbide. "My baby is 50," he said.

Schafer repeated what he told the priest when his eighth child in 12 years was baptized. "I said, 'Father, I hope this is the last time I have to avail myself of your services.'"

Schafer, 80, is a retired Union Carbide engineer. His wife, Ellen, died in March. Their children range in age from 42 to 56.

The 43-year-old Stone is communications assistant for the state treasurer. He is a single father.

"You do miss out on a lot. The time that you lose, well, it is what it is," he said. His eldest, Hannah, just graduated from Capital High, where Maddie will be a freshman. Marta is in seventh grade at Horace Mann.

"Since the day they got married/ He had been praying for a little baby boy/ Someone he could take fishing/ Throw the football and be his pride and joy ..." -- Carrie Underwood, "All-American Girl"

Dresden Matson said her dad, Mark, threw football with her, took her fishing and more.

"It was mostly soccer. He would always be the goalie cause I played forward," said Dresden, who played the sport at George Washington High School and in college.

"When I was 9, he taught me how to surf. We always go on surfing trips together for a couple of days."

During high school, she and her father taught snowboarding at Winterplace twice a week.

Home for the summer, Dresden has a job as a nurse extern at Charleston Area Medical Center. She is studying nursing at Cedarville University near Columbus, Ohio, where she'll be a sophomore.

When she's in from college, father and daughter still go out for sushi like the "dates" he used to take her on when she was a child.

Dresden and her dad like to mountain bike together and go off-roading in jeeps. Although her mother, Rhonda, doesn't join them on these strenuous adventures, her elder brother Jeremiah in California does occasionally.

"I think the main thing is that Dad spent time with me," Dresden said. "He took time out of his day to do things I liked to do."

As children, boys may play rougher than girls, but Stone said "you still wrestle with them and run through the house with them."

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- In the musical "Carousel," Billy the carnival worker learns he is to be a father. He sings about all the things he will do with "my boy Bill," then thinks what if the child is a girl.

"You can have fun with a son/ But you gotta be a father to a girl," he bemoans.

We talked to several fathers and daughters about that line. Are fathers disappointed when a he is a she? Do they raise a he differently than a she? Are hes more fun than shes?

"Well, yes, I did have my heart set on a son, as I expect every man does," acknowledged Joe Wiersteiner of Larwood Road.

After three daughters, he thought, "Oh boy, I am not going to get a boy." Then the fourth was a boy. "We tried for a brother and got another girl."

Richard Schafer of St. Albans believes it's natural for men to want a son. "Our first two were girls, then a boy, then three girls, then a boy, then a girl. I said I wasn't going through four girls to get another boy."

"It would have been nice to have a boy, sure. But is my life worse off for not -- no," replied Greg Stone, the father of three daughters.

"Once they're here, you quit focusing on gender," said Stone. "They're just kids, my kids, and I'm happy to have them."

Joe Wiersteiner, 79, and his wife, Laura, had five children in six years. "It was overwhelming," he recalled.

When his children were young, he traveled frequently in his jobs as equipment inspector and later as a regional supervisor for Union Carbide. "My baby is 50," he said.

Schafer repeated what he told the priest when his eighth child in 12 years was baptized. "I said, 'Father, I hope this is the last time I have to avail myself of your services.'"

Schafer, 80, is a retired Union Carbide engineer. His wife, Ellen, died in March. Their children range in age from 42 to 56.

The 43-year-old Stone is communications assistant for the state treasurer. He is a single father.

"You do miss out on a lot. The time that you lose, well, it is what it is," he said. His eldest, Hannah, just graduated from Capital High, where Maddie will be a freshman. Marta is in seventh grade at Horace Mann.

"Since the day they got married/ He had been praying for a little baby boy/ Someone he could take fishing/ Throw the football and be his pride and joy ..." -- Carrie Underwood, "All-American Girl"

Dresden Matson said her dad, Mark, threw football with her, took her fishing and more.

"It was mostly soccer. He would always be the goalie cause I played forward," said Dresden, who played the sport at George Washington High School and in college.

"When I was 9, he taught me how to surf. We always go on surfing trips together for a couple of days."

During high school, she and her father taught snowboarding at Winterplace twice a week.

Home for the summer, Dresden has a job as a nurse extern at Charleston Area Medical Center. She is studying nursing at Cedarville University near Columbus, Ohio, where she'll be a sophomore.

When she's in from college, father and daughter still go out for sushi like the "dates" he used to take her on when she was a child.

Dresden and her dad like to mountain bike together and go off-roading in jeeps. Although her mother, Rhonda, doesn't join them on these strenuous adventures, her elder brother Jeremiah in California does occasionally.

"I think the main thing is that Dad spent time with me," Dresden said. "He took time out of his day to do things I liked to do."

As children, boys may play rougher than girls, but Stone said "you still wrestle with them and run through the house with them."

A former high school football player who still lifts weights, Stone said he has spent countless hours at Charleston Town Center Mall with his daughters. "They love to shop, which is to be expected," he said.

Recently he had to suspend a favorite ritual when his daughters came to visit. He used to make super-good popcorn to eat while they watched movies together. Then Maddie and Marta got braces on their teeth.

Richard Schafer's daughter, Caryn Gresham, says her father always found time to attend his eight children's swim meets and school activities. Growing up, she said, there were camping trips to state parks, Sunday drives to places like Summersville to watch the dam being built and even a cross-country road trip to California.

"And now, he's wrapped around her finger/ She's the center of his world ..." -- Carrie Underwood, "All-American Girl."

Schafer doesn't think he and his late wife, Ellen, distinguished between their six daughters and two sons.

With his daughters, though, he said, "They're girls; you handle them a little differently. You talk to them in a different tone of voice or you've got a crying mess on your hands."

Looking back, he believes that at times he might have been too hard on his children, but he believes they understand his reasons.

According to Gresham, "He rarely says no to his daughters."

"All fathers have a soft place for their daughters," Wiersteiner said. "That's not to say they don't for a son, but it's different."

He, too, believes he may have been too hardheaded, too stern in raising his children, and he blames his German heritage.

Still, he points out that his daughters call him "Tough Cream Puff." And when they cozied up to him, "I couldn't refuse them anything."

"Turn around and you're 2/ Turn around and you're 4/ Turn around and you're a young girl going out of the door ..." -- Malvina Reynolds, "Turn Around"

As his three daughters grow older, Greg Stone said the terrain changes. "That's where it's a stretch for a father. I didn't go through adolescence from their perspective -- high heels, fancy dresses -- it's all foreign to you."

He used to take each daughter out for a birthday dinner alone, but that has evolved into a group dinner. "They have their own friends and interests."

And for Joe Wiersteiner, who believes he might have been overprotective of his four daughters, it's payback time. "They're protective of me. They are taking care of me now."

Two of his four daughters went with him last week when his wife, Laura, had surgery at the Cleveland Clinic. He said all his daughters "came to the rescue" when he needed help taking care of his wife.

Caryn Gresham says she and her seven siblings have trying to watch over her father since her mother died in March. One sister continues to houseclean on Wednesdays as she did for a few years before her mother died. Gresham helps him in the garden.

"They take care of me," said Schafer, who had just received the second card that week from his daughter in Morgantown. "I would have been lost without them."

Any advice for new fathers of daughters?

"Listen to your daughters. Don't ignore what they're trying to tell you," Wiersteiner advised.

"Just be thankful you have a child, and take care of it," answered Schaefer.

"Do the best you can," said Stone. "I like to think I have put a certain amount of effort into [fatherhood]. Divorce is not a good thing. I am not proud of its effect on my kids. But you do what you can do."

"She mightn't be so bad at that/ A kid with ribbons in her hair!/ A kind o' sweet and petite/ Little tin-type of her mother!/ What a pair! -- Billy's "Soliloquy" from "Carousel."

Reach Rosalie Earle at ea...@wvgazette.com or 304-348-5115.