Thanks you, Veterans! I remember my dad’s stories of joining the Navy in January of his senior year in high school. Malcolm Dennison McLean was not yet 18 and my Grandfather had to sign his enlistment papers. He got a ride home from boot camp (along with several other teen soldiers and sailors) in the middle of the night before graduation, and received his diploma from Stevens High School in Rumford, Maine in his uniform, the envy of his friends. Thank you, daddy, for leaving home and the fun of your senior year to stretch up and be a man, ready to defend his family and country. The Greatest Generation, indeed!
My Grandfather (Elbridge McLean) certainly knew what war was about. An ambulance driver in France during WWI, he was poisoned by mustard gas and suffered a palsy that shook the tea in his cup his entire life. His service in France had been in his late 20’s, when both he and his brother Reuben spent several years overseas. This Victory Medal was kept in Grandfather’s tie box, along with a single thin silver dress stirrup that made its way back from a victory parade. Of all the stories Grandfather told of purloined motorcycles and ambulances racing ahead of clouds of gas, the silver stirrup remained a mystery.
My own personal veterans, to remember and thank and praise.