Reply #19: My mom was a senior in high school [View All]

[dflprincess]

and the whole school was herded into the auditorium where a radio had been set up so the staff and students could hear FDR ask Congress for a Declaration of War (how quaint, a president who followed the Constitution). She said it was surreal, especially looking at her male classmates and knowing that most of them would soon be leaving and wondering what would happen to them. As it turned out, the first person from my mom's home town who was killed in the war was a nurse.

Like your uncle, my dad (he was 21) headed off to enlist that morning. His mother drove him and some of his friend into Minneapolis to a recruiting station. I can only imagine what went through my grandmother's mind as she turned her youngest child over to the Army Air Corp. He reported for duty on December 30. Because of the training he got, he didn't get sent overseas for about over a year. My grandmother made the trip out to San Francisco to see him before he shipped out - another thing I wish I'd talked to her about. Several years ago I took a tour of Alcatraz and, as we were being ferried back to the city, I stood looking at the Golden Gate and wondered how pop felt when he came home and saw that bridge come into view.