bronze star and a purple heart

Both of mine died of emphysema before I was 8, So I got a bad attitude about smokers.

I have an old pocket knife of his, an old Henry, like a mini case trapper.
I have one of his Purple Heart license plates
One of his old gardening shovels, it hangs on the wall behind my desk
And I have his old 30-30. We are still searching for the Mauser that h brought back from WWII. That one is like new, and only dropped once.

I have my Granddads 1907 Springfield Baby rolling-block .22 cal rifle. It was made for young boys to shoot and is only 33 inches long from end of stock to end of barrel. The firing pin is messed up and the last time it was fired (by my uncle over 65 years ago) if flashed into his eye. I had a shadow box built for it to display. I also have his WW1 foot locker.

Remington 742 woodsmaster from one and pocket knife, tackle box & meat grinder from the other one.

Got his old 22 rifle.

Gave his name to my son, think about him every time I say my son's name and it makes me smile.

My maternal GF raised me.

Things I have that remind me of him:

Belgium made hump-back Browning 16ga., his squirrel gun.

His Savage 99E in .308, saw him shoot his 1st deer with it (back in the day not many deer in East Texas).

A bunch of his old tools but I have an old Schfield hoe that I've watched him work with for many hours on end in his gardens.

His sarcasm and dry humor.

Carpenter tools from the early 1900's. He was a master carpenter. No power tools. Did everything by hand. Several of the wood planes still have shavings in them from his last job and a note pad where he was calculating out window openings. Never met him. I know he use to ride the rails from Taylor to job sites. Wish I could have met him I understand he was one of the toughest men you would ever want to meet. (Explains my Dad)

Never fired 1100 .410. Got it last year, dad told me Pawpa had it for a while and planned on giving it to me when I was 5 or so but never got the chance.

I have his chair and a few pictures, but mostly I remember him by stories. My grandfather was the generation before WWII, and the stories that I grew up hearing about him and the rest of my family are absolutely incredible.




We're just ordinary folks.. farmers and sharecroppers. Extremely poor. But they're good people.

Once my granddad "made it" he went out and bought a new Rolex. He ended up buying a couple more over the years but he gave me his first one. He was a little man, so it looks like a women's watch on me, I can't even clasp the thing, so it sits in a safe.

His pocket watch, his oil derrick cuff links, his shotgun, his tool kit, his lunch box, his hardhat and a spent WWI artillery shell engraved with the word "Verdun" (France) and a date which escapes me at the moment.

My first tackle box...gave it to my mom the day I was born...small cardboard box with some hooks, ball of twine, cork, and few weights...the man loved to fish and took me all the time...where I got my love of the outdoors...miss him to this day...

A pocket watch from Ma's dad.

From Pa's dad on the Philippines...
Type 99 rifle Arisaka with Bayonet


Type 89 Knee Mortar

Going up, I remember helping him burn the grass every spring. So this weekend, in his honor I did the same to mine. First time in 50 years I've intentionally set fire to my lawn.



Then we did the backyard. Started the fire on the downwind side, But once it reached the center, the wind switched from north to south. That when things started to get interesting.