Webb: Grandpa’s service not forgotten 75 years later

I don’t know much about my Dad’s old man. I was 7 years old when he passed on June 8, 1984. It’s a day I’ll always remember because I’ll never forget the look on my old man’s face when he got the call. It was pure sadness.

My memories of Grandpa are of visits to his and Grandma’s modest home in Goodman, Missouri, a small town about 15 minutes south of Joplin. I’d sit on his lap as he sat in an old, comfortable chair. I’ve had the cushions to that chair for more than 20 years now.

Grandpa was a big man, about 6-foot-2 and strong. As I sat in his lap, he’d drink a Coors Light in the old yellow can and smoke his pipe. He was a man of few words, but one who was respected.

My father was his first child and born while Grandpa served in the Army during World War II, including a rugged stretch driving an M-3 half-track on the front lines of the Battle of the Bulge.

I think about the old man’s old man often, and not a Veterans Day passes that I don’t think about him for hours. Growing up, I wanted to be G.I. Joe, so to have a grandfather who fought the Germans was as cool as it gets.

I remember asking him about his service. And I remember that he would not talk about it. It was the one topic that was off limits to everybody.

“Dad just would not talk about the war,” my dad said a few months after he was diagnosed with terminal cancer. “One time he said he saw some awful things there and didn’t like to talk about it.”

When my brother and I were young, Dad had a gun cabinet with two drawers that were always locked. After Grandpa passed, he let us look in them. We found several items from Big Ernie’s service, including medals and photos.

I hadn’t seen those items for more than 30 years when Dan and I looked through Dad’s possessions a few days after he died. I took some clothes Grandpa was wearing on that fateful day in 1984 while mowing a lawn in 100-degree weather (The Webbs have always been incredibly stubborn).

Looking through Grandpa/Dad’s treasure trove of sentimentals was like traveling in a time machine. There are photos of Grandpa as an Army private and newspaper articles about his return from overseas. There are several medals and a certificate of honorable discharge. The trucker’s wallet he wore for years still smells like he did.

The stories about Grandpa endure. My Dad spoke often about the look of pride on Grandpa’s face when he held me as a baby for the first time. “I think to him it was that his oldest son had finally straightened out,” Dad said.

My favorite story is about Dad and Mom’s wedding in 1976. They had invited a neighbor, who had too much to drink and disrupted the celebration. My grandfather, usually a stoic man, finally had enough and confronted him, eventually leading to a haymaker to the neighbor’s jaw. He ultimately ran the man out of the church and down the sidewalk.

My father also spoke about road trips with his dad in the 1950s, as Grandpa drove trucks across southeast Kansas and up to the Kansas City area. Years later, my dad said the only time he cried was when he happened to be driving along the same roads by himself years after Grandpa died.

Until he was diagnosed with cancer at age 72, I’d only heard of Dad crying once. A few weeks after Grandpa died, my brother and father were together in the old man’s workshop outside of Lebanon, Missouri.

As my brother talked to my dad, he said, “Dad, why did Grandpa have to die?” Dad said, “I don’t know, son. I don’t know,” which led to tears from both.

I think about that quite a bit these days and I find myself asking the same question my brother asked Dad 35 years ago.