Keeping Truth Alive----Dan Carlson

A big thank you to Libbie at The Middlest Sister for sending in a special story, in her own words of someone who served-her father. If you have a photo or a few lines of someone's story you would like to tell who has served for your country, please send it to me at littleprairiebaby@gmail.com.

Dan Carlson is my Dad. He survived living in a home with his wife Cheri and three girls. He has always made sure all his girls were completely taken care of & spoiled a bit too :) Even today I have four kids (5 in a month) and an amazing husband but wouldn't you know my Dad is still trying to take care of us all. I never leave his house without finding a case of diapers, a few boxes of cereal or even a huge package of toilet paper in the back seat of my car (and I am there all the time!) He is a loving Dad & I couldn't be more proud of him.

One thing I am very proud of him for is his service in the U.S. Army. He served from October '63-October '65. After PostalSchool in Indianahe served overseas in Verona, Italy. Here are some of his stories I really enjoyed:

My Dad worked the Army Postal Service in Italy. He worked the counter and guarded the mail as he picked it up from Milan. "All the military mail was handled by Americans. Even payroll. We would go pick up cash for payroll with no guards and no guns. We were driven around by crazy Italian drivers. I was in three accidents while I was there. I delivered a lot of Dear John letters. Almost every solider got one eventually"

"We could not make the trip from Milan to Verona, in the Deuce& amp; a Half, without filling up so we would stop at this one fruit stand to pour the gas in. We would always buy the cherries during cherry season. But every time we got back to the base we would all have diarrhea because the farmers used human manure. The cherries were so good that we didn't even care and bought them every time."

"On one trip the Italian driver was talking to the fruit stand owner and he told him how I was a good solider, that I never fell asleep like all the other American GIs and took my job to guard the mail seriously. He told them what a hard worker I was. The fruit stand owner rounded up his five daughters and lined them up. He told me to pick one." (My Dad was smiling big as he recalled that. I asked him if he picked one but he said no:)

"During a drill one night they told me to run back to the base for something. It was completely dark outside & I ran smack into a barbed wire fence. Thank goodness I had been holding my rifle up, it took most of the shock but I cut my upper lip badly and had to be sewn up by a plastic surgeon. It is the only time in my life I had to grow a mustache because I couldn't shave until it healed. I looked a lot older with it."

"One night soon after I was walking a girl home from the service club and I asked her, 'Where have you been all my life?'

She said, 'Probably not born for half of it.' I was really only 23 but it was my mustache."

"Vietnam was just starting up when I was getting out. We were each required to give up one uniform because they were recruiting heavily for Vietnamand they needed more uniforms for the incoming soldiers."

"Veronawas beautiful. It is the home of Romeo and Juliet's balcony, has sidewalks made of marble, and boasts the 2nd largest coliseum in Europe." He actually just returned this week from visiting Italy, and even Verona where he served, again with my mom.

My Dad had many more memories that I am so thankful to have written down. I wouldn't have thought to write down his stories without Cheyenne's blog here, and now I am going to make a keepsake for our family! Thanks Cheyenne for letting me share my very special Dad with you!!!

The War to End All Wars

This poignant post, written by my Auntie, brings a great lump to my throat. 

If you would like to send in photos or some written words about someone who has served for your country, or is serving now, please e-mail me at littleprairiebaby@gmail.com. You can also simply share these stories. Help keep truth alive. 

The War to End All Wars

Many years ago, I visited my great aunt (the little girl shown above standing in front of her mother) for what was to be the last time. She had cancer and died later that year. It was a week of sharing and getting to know each other, she a widow in her seventies and I, a young married mom in my twenties. Because I shared her name, she was very special to me. And I certainly felt special to her.
One of the many stories that Aunt Johan shared, took place in her childhood on the windswept prairie near Three Hills, Alberta. Two brothers, William and Alex had neighbouring homesteads. One day, Johan’s father, William, called to her in an urgent voice. “Johan, I can see John coming. He’s running. Something is wrong. Go now, and learn the matter.” With that, Johan, just a child herself, began to run up the road toward her cousin.
These 90 years later, I picture the scene. I know that road; we still own that land. Young John winded but continuing to run; Johan, a small girl, running with all her might to learn the reason for the urgency. When at last they met, John’s message was not one of trouble, or concern, but rather one of joy. John’s family had just returned from town where they learned the wonderful news, “The war is over!”
I can still see my aunt’s eyes filling with tears as she ended the story, “and that was the First World War – the war to end all wars.”
No one celebrating that day would have considered that two short decades later, the world would once again be at war. And then another, and another…
This morning as I pause to remember those who died for our freedom, I also want to remember that we are promised a time when “Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore” (Isaiah 2:4). Imagine it!

Lest We Forget

We need to remember what our forefather's sacrificed for our 
freedom. We need to be mindful of those that are serving 
today and their brother's in arms that have fallen to continue 
to make our nation what it is; a land of opportunity and 
choice.  We need to keep these stories alive to keep it fresh in
our mind what has been given to us. It's up to us to record 
these stories and to pass them along. Please join me this month, in a month of remembrance to write these things down. If you have a relative or friend who has served or is serving for our nations, whose story you'd like to share, please send it to me at littleprairiebaby@gmail.com. I'd love to feature someone's story for the next few weeks on my blog. It doesn't have to be long, it doesn't have to be perfect, even a photo with some simple words is great-it is simply to keep the truth alive. 

Grandpa Bill

It's stories that our generation is called to continue to tell as the days of our Grandparents' are being laid to rest. It's these legends that will stick in our minds; it's the faces, not the statistics. 


My Grandpa Bill signed up to serve in the second world war, at the signature of his mom's hand as he was only seventeen years old. Grandpa was a prairie kid from central Alberta that hadn't known the water. He headed to Calgary to train with HMCS TECUMSEH, leaving his younger brother Glen to run the farm; their dad had died a year earlier. The next year the farm was going to be left to a hired man when Uncle Glen would sign up. 


Grandpa Bill was a gunner in the Navy, on the triangle run in the North Atlantic on a corvette. The ship  was only 100 feet long and there were 100 plus men on it. I wish he was still here so I could hear more about everyday life on that great creature that lived on the water. 


I know Grandpa's very favourite meal on that ship was Red Lead & Bacon. Canned stewed tomatoes cooked up in bacon grease with little bits of bacon in it were a delicacy! Grandpa Bill also learned about rum in this time of his life. A big barrel of it sat on the ship. Grandpa had a bad cold, and never having had a drink before didn't know the appropriate amount of rum to take to finish that cold off, so filling his whole mug up, he woke up in the morning with the cold gone; but he could ring out the sheets he had slept on.

Grandpa Bill

Grandpa made special friends in that time of his life, too. Ted Forshner would go on to guide with my Grandpa for Uncle Glen for years to come and we'd so often hear of dear Jonny Bonhamm. Our family never realized that his actual name was Jean Louise Bonhamm, as a man from Quebec's name would be, not Jonny. Jonny's family didn't know Grandpa's real name either, he was always talked about as cornflake.It was Jonny that relieved his fears in their biggest storm out on the Atlantic. As Grandpa sweat bullets each time the ocean swelled against the ship, and it leaned so far it threatened to topple over, Jonny came to the rescue. Jonny was a wise old man to Grandpa Bill's young seventeen year old mind, and so when the twenty five year old talked to Grandpa, he listened. Jonny assured him the ship wouldn't sink; it would act just like the clowns filled with air that children knock over, and no matter how hard they hit, they will always pop up. It wasn't until they were both old men, sitting around my grandparent's kitchen table that Grandpa learned that Jonny, in spite of his calm demeanour  was just as afraid, and told Grandpa the first thing he could think of to alleviate some fear. 

For all the hardship and the lonesome days away from his family and farm on the flatlands, this was the highlight of my grandfather's life. Those were his glory years, he spoke of them with fondness and with pride in his voice. Every year, on Remembrance Day a cousin from Ontario would phone Grandpa to thank him for serving for our nation, and for our people; now that Grandpa's gone, he phones my mom and my auntie's. We are all still very proud of our Grandpa who served.

Lest we forget. 


***Thanks to Steph for asking some questions. HMCS in Canada  stand for Her Majesty's Canadian Ship. TECUMSEH was named for a great man, a Shawnee chief, that during the war of 1812 served with Canadian & British forces.***