Saving My Dad’s (Private Ryan)

My Dad was in the Canadian Navy for 4 years in the sixties. Prairie guy with a bad case of wanderlust and an 8th grade education. My grandfather had to sign papers so he could join at 17. Ended up in the bridge as a communications guy because he could type and tested very well on hearing.

Saw a bit of the world that he wouldn’t have otherwise seen. Only remarkable story he tells is of being off the East Coast when Kennedy was shot and being told to hold in place.

 

My dad was drafted into the Army in '61 (or maybe 62). He graduated high school in '57 and had been working as a certified diesel mechanic. He was asked if he had any skills that would be useful. He pretty much told them he could go to work on trucks and tanks that afternoon without any additional training. They made him a medic. He was in Germany the whole time, and his biggest times of action were during the Missile Crisis and when Kennedy was assassinated.
I enlisted in the Navy six days after my 17th birthday and reported to bootcamp some months later right after graduation. Our job was to chase Soviet subs. I saw some things and did some things I will still neither confirm nor deny, but in the grand scheme of things, my time in the Navy was uneventful in terms of thinking I wouldn't make it out alive.
I've posted this before: I absolutely lose my shit when people ask me about the Navy today and their only point of reference is the SEALs. No, I was a sailor. We didn't fight in the desert. I was a haze gray and underway, salt in my veins, sea dog.
When some kid asks, "Did you ever shoot anybody?" "No, and more importantly, nobody shot me."

 

My grandfather served in the Navy during WWII as a German translator. My other grandfather served in the Marines in Korea. My father retired as an E-7 in the Marines but never saw combat. Joined at 17 but never went to Vietnam and was too old for the Gulf War.

 

My uncle was very small (5'2", 115-120 maybe) so he was an Army ammunitions guy in WWII; he told my cousin and me that he was the guy who crawled into foxholes and other small areas to plant explosives. I only saw a couple of pictures of him smiling with his fellow soldiers.

He worked very hard, running a one man grocery store in 60's-70's, 7 days a week and treated me extremely well. Raised 6 college graduates in a two bedroom flat where the boys slept in the living room every night. Unfortunately, when he got home at night, I knew not to go in the kitchen after midnight because that was when the whiskey bottle was out and you heard the conversations with someone not there, the mysterious cackles. Only one of my cousins will even drink alcohol because of that and the others 5 expressly disavowed any drinking. He unfortunately passed very early, in his mid 60's.

Back then no one talked about PTSD but I'm sure I saw it. Vets, from any country, are amazing IMHO.

 

Can you imagine the PTSD that the WWI vets endured, the ones who fought in, and survived, the trenches?

 

So many Canadian communities had all or nearly all of their young men report to battle when Britian put out the call in 1915. Close to 10 percent of those who served were killed, and nearly a quarter were wounded.

My grandfather was already 26, married and living in the United States, but my grandmother's brother did serve and survive. We have his riding crop from his time in the cavalry.

Nov. 11 is a very sobering day indeed for our neighbors to the north.

 

I can't "like" this post, although I do. I just appreciate this story.

 

Me, too.

 

My dad was drafted into the Korean War, so that was the reason my parents saw each other only twice -- twice! -- after that until their marriage two-and-a-half years later. Needless to say, their love was almost immediate. My dad -- shy and not typically demonstrative -- nonetheless always said that he knew by their second date that my parents would marry. My mom, who only reluctantly went on their first, blind date, took a little longer -- until the third date, to realize the same thing. Once that happened, theirs was the epitome of the romantic-faraway-sweetheart saga, as they really did write nearly daily letters to each other, keeping their long-distance relationship alive and well during a two-year engagement.

I was stupid and never asked my dad much specifically about his time serving in the war, and I regret that. I know he was a communications specialist, and we have an old photo of him climbing telephone poles, etc. from that period. But I wish I'd talked to him more about his experiences in Korea. He was never shot or otherwise injured and his service would probably be considered by most to be uneventful. But it probably wasn't to him.

I only realized that many years later, in the days immediately following the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center. We were talking about that event out in our driveway, while we were washing a car, if I recall, and I brought up how it seemed like nothing else mattered right then -- that practically everything paled from the new perspective we all suddenly had. He totally understood, and our conversation continued. I brought up a documentary show about WWII that had been aired recently by the National Geographic channel in advance of what would soon be the 60th anniversary of that even more infamous attack on Pearl Harbor. The documentary had some incredible footage of the destruction, as well as the rescue operations undertaken in the Pearl Harbor waters at the time. I watched, mesmerized, as one sailor, in a small life boat, tried desperately to pull another, more severely injured man out of the oily, fiery water by grabbing his arm. He ended up sloughing the injured sailor's badly burnt but tenderized skin right off, the victim screaming in agonizing pain the entire time. Then, the film cut to a more-recent, current interview of the now elderly rescuer. He had visible, rolling tears on his face. Sixty years later.

I remember relating that to my dad, and being, frankly, kind of incredulous that even those horrible events could (still) have that much impact, after a veritable lifetime lived. I remember saying something along the lines of, "I mean, people's mothers and fathers die, and we don't usually cry about it after maybe the first few years."

My dad stopped what he was doing, stood up straight and nodded solemnly -- and also seemingly truly knowingly -- as he replied, "There's nothing good about war. That's for sure."

 

I was going through FB this morning and saw a photo I've never seen before. My niece posted a photo of her grandfather -- my Dad -- sitting in the cockpit of a German plane. It is unmistakably my Dad and the writing on the photo is absolutely his. He wrote that when they were closing in on Berlin, the Germans ran away so fast they didn't turn off anything. The plane's engine was still running. Dad climbed in to shut off the motor.
Amazing.

 

My dad said the same things for my two oldest brothers. I remember being a little surprised by it -- but not really.

 

A guy my dad worked with was a Marine on Iwo Jima and saw the famous flag-raising. He wasn't one of the guys in the photos. He wasn't the photographer. He wasn't involved in any way. He just happened to be in the right place at the right time to be a literal eye witness to history. He said he really didn't think much of it until he was home after war and started seeing the iconic photo. I'm certain he was exhausted and thankful for still being alive, so a guy taking a picture of some other guys raising a flag wasn't really a time of reflection when it was taking place.