Have an awe-inspiring, blessed day. Don’t forget to smile, be grateful, and be kind.
I have several things that I cherish, mainly pictures, old letters, a postcard, brass uniform buttons, and an old pair of perfect scissors a saw, and a very sharp axe that, with a bit of care, seem to never lose their edge.
A cherished family picture postcard of my father, sent home to his parents around 1931/32. My dad, like many young teenage men, dropped out of school at 15 to join the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps), living for 18 months in a camp in Pine Furnace, PA. It was one of the Roosevelt programs that gave men and young men an opportunity to earn $30 a month to relieve families with young men aged 16-28 during the Great Depression, and to do manual labor in exchange for three meals a day and a cot to sleep on. It was later said that these programs put the men who would later fight, die, and win WWII in shape.
I have many images of my father from his time serving in World War II, during which he spent various periods in Newfoundland and at a military camp in Bangor, Maine. He completed basic training before the war and achieved the rank of Staff Sergeant. My father often said that my mother saved his life. Just a few months before the attack on Pearl Harbor, he was offered a commission in Hawaii, and by that time, he and my mother were already engaged.
Coming from a family that didn’t have much, he told my mother that he really wanted to go. He remarked, “When is a poor kid from South Philly ever going to have the money to go to Hawaii?” However, my mother pointed out that since they were engaged, she wouldn’t get to see him as often if he were stationed on the East Coast. They were looking for an opportunity to get married when he got leave, which they did in September of 1942.
Ultimately, he turned down the commission, and a few months later, Pearl Harbor was bombed on December 7, 1941. As then-President Franklin D. Roosevelt stated, it was “a date that will live in infamy.” I still have the buttons from his uniform and his – Fidelity, Efficiency and Honor medal.
Dad had a debilitating stroke while driving the El for PTC out of 69th Street Depot in Upper Darby on February 10, 1958, just 15 days before my 2nd birthday. My father would say his St. Joseph Novena every day, faithfully, in the hopes of living long enough to see my kid sister graduate from High School in 1976. He did make our wedding, but would die later that year, just days before my wife had our first child, and about a month before his 61st birthday – I was 20, and the day our daughter was born at 3am in the morning, was also the day the old Army Sgt mentor of mine was laid to rest.
Lastly, that leads us to some things my father gave me one day, when I was doing an odd job for him at their house and needed a pair of scissors. He handed me an old pair of steel scissors, adding that they were his dad’s, who was a painter and wallpaper hanger. He knew I knew carpentry and had made a plant stand for them in high school, among other things. He said you’re married now, and we went through some of his tools, offering me the chance to scavenge some for a day when I, too, would own a house. At the time, I took an old belt sander, a rasp, a screwdriver and hammer, a wood plane, and an old axe/hammer combo, most of which I still have and use to this day! They just don’t make things like they used to, and even if they did, they wouldn’t come attached to the fond memories that can never be replaced —just to be passed on with the same fondness.
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