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Colorado State Open Thread, 5/28/2018, Memorial Day

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This is a first for me — a Memorial Day where I get to memorialize my father as a member of the Armed Services, a WWII Navy photographer who passed away this last July at the ripe old age of 91.  Obviously he didn’t give his life in combat — his holiday is more appropriately Veteran’s Day, but this is my first Memorial Day without him and I’ll be thinking of him a great deal.

He graduated from his Boston high school early and went to work in the shipyards of Boston, working on building part of the fleet, including merchant marine ships (I think he may have worked on Liberty Ships, but on that point I’m not entirely sure).  He was crawling around spraying asbestos insulation and doing grunt work given to unskilled teenagers who were there to help the war effort.  He mentioned once that he wondered if he had contracted Mesothelioma from the asbestos work, but since it hadn’t become something like a cancer perhaps not.  When he was old enough, he joined four of his five brothers in the military — they were in the army, marines, and my father in the Navy.  The eldest brother was in business and he was helping to support the various wives and families remaining at home.

Dad began that navy career as a lowly seaman but would volunteer for a photographer’s mate position that came open.  He had long been using his old cameras around Boston and this was something he liked doing, even as he felt a bit lost in the whole huge navy.  He spent his war years in the Atlantic, at various ports up and down the east coast.  He served on just about every variety of ship in the fleet and his role mainly was to take photos and films of the gunnery practices so that the gunners who might be miles from the target could see how close they came to hitting targets towed behind ships.  It wasn’t glamorous or exciting, but it did help the navy and he did get to travel.  In later years, in interviews, he was very proud to say he never heard a gun fired in anger.  That’s a claim far too many were not able to make.

When my father was laid to rest this past fall, my sister thought to ask if a color guard might be present for the service.  He had expressed occasionally through the years that he might wish to be buried in a military cemetery, having earned that right due to his service.  He later reserved a pair of plots in at a cemetery managed by the University of Kansas on campus land that had been a cemetery as early as the 1850’s, when Kansas was still a territory.  It had seen some burials in those early years, mostly soldiers from the US Army who had been sent to Lawrence to protect against Indians and other potential attacks during the territorial years.  Many of them were from Wisconsin.  These soldiers, for the most part, perished from diseases of the time, not any cause more worthy of a soldier.  The Civil War was still a few years off when those soldiers were laid to rest.  There are also a few townsfolk there.  After this early stretch, many years passed without anyone being buried there.  Eventually, however, when it became University land, the cemetery was made available to faculty, staff and some individuals who had made significant contributions to the University.  My father had been an English professor at KU for 41 years, so he definitely had earned his space there.  I like to think of those Wisconsin boys continuing to keep watch over the cemetery and my parents as the seasons, years and eventually decades roll on.

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The upright row of tombstones are the boys from Wisconsin, guarding the faculty and families under the prairie sky.

I mentioned above that my sister asked for a color guard.  It turned out not only was there one available for the service, but there would be two men from the navy — one a bugler who would play taps.  This would have pleased Dad very much, since Kansas is far from where one might expect to find members of the Navy on short notice.  These sailors not only played taps, which was very emotional and moving, but they also brought a flag they used for the service.  They folded the flag very smartly and presented it to my sister as the eldest survivor.  They told her Dad’s service was appreciated by a grateful nation and that the flag was being presented to her by the President of the United States.  We hadn’t really thought about that — Dad and Mom were both lifelong Democrats and they raised my sister and I in that tradition.  To have Donald Trump, “Cadet Bonespurs”, be the one from whom the flag was given, was something that probably caused my freshly placed father the first of many flips in his grave.  Still, we took the flag as a symbol for the country which he was willing to lay down his life for, and it now is in one of the triangular boxes that are made for such things.

This is the first Memorial Day that I’ve had a direct family member to remember, honor and thank for their service.  I don’t know if you have family or friends you’re remembering on this day; you’re welcome to add their memories down below.

The floor is yours.


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