A great American died yesterday.  His greatness was not the kind they record in history books.  You won’t hear about him on the news.  His passing will go unnoticed by all but a very few. 

But his individual greatness contributed to the collective greatness of his generation and that generation made a mark on history unlike any before or since.  They paid the price for freedom and then they enjoyed the benefits of it.  They redefined the American dream and then they lived it.  Courage, devotion, hard work, self-reliance – these were their hallmarks. 

My grandfather joined the Merchant Marines when he was 17.  While the other branches of military service had a minimum age of 18, a person as young as 16 could enter the Merchant Marines.  Though it may seem a fairly safe place to spend a war, statistically it was not.  1 in 26 mariners serving aboard merchant ships in World War II died in the line of duty, suffering a greater percentage of war-related deaths than all other U.S. services.  In 1942, 33 Allied ships were sunk each week.  It took courage for a kid of 17 to go off to war, but like so many of his contemporaries, my grandfather had courage.

He met my grandmother in 1943 while home on leave.  His military service concluded in July of 1945 after 4 tours and they married on June 11, 1946.  This began a 60 year marriage that would end too soon.  When my grandmother passed away on March 26 of last year, my grandfather effectively stopped living.  His body continued to function and he went through the motions of life but he was not the same man.  She was everything to him.  He once remarked that all he wanted in this life and in the next life was to be with her.  His devotion to her was clearly evident in their life together and it did not end at her death.  Great devotion to something as worthwhile as my grandmother is perhaps the facet of his greatness most precious to me.  Great men have great devotion.

He did not have the advantage of a great education but that was of no consequence.  He had the advantage of hard work.  He apprenticed without pay while working a second job to support his family.  He learned his trade and when he had the skills he needed, he moved to small town America and started a business. 

They ran a little Montgomery Ward catalog store and provided appliance repair services in the tiny town of Hayfork, California for 30 years.  He and my grandmother always worked together and made saving for the future a priority.  They were never wealthy but they always had enough.  Like so many of their generation, they were not in the habit of spending frivolously and they lived well within their means. 

When Montgomery Wards closed all of its catalog stores in 1985, it forced my grandparents into early retirement but they were prepared.  They had enough in investments and savings to remain self-reliant through the 20 years of their retirement and there is some left over to pass on to their children.  My grandparent's work-ethic was not the selfish pursuit of wealth and power and success that we see driving so many today.  Instead they were motivated by the necessity for self-sufficiency and a desire to make things better for future generations. 

I did not have the privilege of living through the 1950s but I regard it as one of the best eras of American history.  Men of courage had come home and they were willing to work hard to realize their dreams.  They were devoted to their families, loyal to their country, and way too proud to accept a handout.  They pulled themselves up by their bootstraps as had all generations of Americans before them and they built wonderful lives.  My grandfather was one of these men.  I am very proud of his legacy.

My grandfather was a quiet, unassuming man who led a quiet, unassuming life.  A life that should be the envy of all for it was a great life lived by a great man.