It hardly seems it could be fourteen years since my dad passed away. It seems as if I could answer the phone and it would be the most natural thing to hear his voice.
He had the most penetrating questions. I know mother misses him.
When Matthew was deployed to Iraq, I picked him up at BWI and drove him to Dover AFB. Matt remarked that he wished his grandfather was still here and he could talk with him. I wished the same for him and for all of us. We respected his strength and understanding.
Jim grew up in lean times. If you read about Patie, his mother, you will know his mother made all his clothes for many years. This was not unusual for the times and community. He was loved and blessed to have a wonderful family.
Jim was a good student. So good that Mr Dorman, his teacher/principal, taught Jim math; then he had Jim teach younger students. Mr Dorman went on to be Superintendent of Schools in Spartanburg. Gaye, Barbara, Ashley & Brittany later graduated from the high school named after him.
Daddy told me about visiting his Grandfather, going out into a field and using his pocket knife to cut open a watermelon on a hot summer day. He told me about his chores and taking supper to his dad at night.
Jim's dad worked for Spartanburg waterworks. Their home was on a little rise overlooking Rainbow lake. This was a great source for entertainment and as a teen Jim worked there as a life guard.
Dating...
Mother and daddy met on a double date. Mother told her friend she wanted to go out with the tall guy, but daddy spotted her and decided she was the one for him. It is easy to see the look in his eyes in this photo. Wow!
Greenbay Packers
For many years my dad told us he "played with the Greenbay Packers".
Well he did - sort of. During WWII many of the Packers players enlisted in the army. They were stationed at Ft Benning at the same time my dad was stationed there. They had scrimmages together.
When we lived at Ft Benning, he told me the truth. But from time to time, he left out that they were just scrimmages.
Fort Benning
I am unsure what part of Daddy's officer training was done at Ft Benning, or Ft Jackson. However, I know part of his training was at Benning. He was commissioned before he married. He wrote to mother through out the war.
He was stationed there after returning from Okinawa. Barbara was born at the end of that assignment. We returned for two years for his last assignment before he retired in 1961.
Mother had a box of letters she saved. I hope they hae been saved. Many things are lost as folks "down size".
Daddy didn't share that much about the war. He served as an intelligence officer on the Texas on D-Day. Most of the men who trained to be officers for the war did not return. He was stabbed by a bayonet. He had schraprel had to be removed from his back side.
At one point he commanded a group sent to a fiord in Iceland. German u-boats would hide there to compete repairs. His men would look for them when they came and radio for bombers to come to destroy them. He learned to ski. It must have been a nice break from heavy combat in the middle of the war. This ended when snow drifts began to blow and cover their base of operations. They had a forced march out. Planes could not land to evacuate them. He lost all the hair on his body from frostbite. Even his eyebrows were gone for a while. (There are no photos to document this, but his sisters confirmed this through the years.)
Beach Trips
I have to add more, much much more. But later
