Here goes nothing.

 

I've never done this before so we'll see how it goes.

 

My grandfather,  Ralph Thomas Mullins,  was a big steady part of my world growing up and it devastated me to lose him the end of my junior year. 

But he had a rich history,  and I want to share some of it. 

He was born in 1900 in Oklahoma territory.  Yeah, it hadn't reached state status yet.  I don't really know much about his childhood except he was one of 8 or 9 children, a farm family. The first story I remember about him was as a young man. 

World War I was taking place, and like any young man, grandpa wanted to serve. The issue? You had to be over 17 to join. 

Now, I've been told that in those days the family Bible was your birth certificate,  and no one went around toting the family Bible to prove their age. And I don't imagine the recruiting officer had time or the patience to look up everyone's birth year. But grandpa and his friends (I believe a small group joined up together) didn't want to start their important career future by lying. So they watched a few men of age sign up and listened to the questions. The most important one?  "Are you over 17?"

It took some thought, and I honestly don't know who came up with it,  but they found a way. Each boy that was younger than 17, took a piece of paper and wrote the number 17 on it.  Then they put it in the bottom of their shoe. 

"Are you over 17?"

"Yes, sir!"

A sneaky technicality, and I'm quite sure the recruiter probably knew some were not 17 years old, but given that these were strong farm boys, he probably didn't dispute much. 

And thus started a full and interesting military career that took him to different countries and introduced him eventually to his wife.