In 1995, my Dad recorded about 2 hours of tapes about his childhood and his experiences during World War II. I recently had the tapes digitized and have uploaded them to Google Drive.  You can listen to them by following these instructions (I hope).

Tape 1 Side 1 - Early Fairfield 
Tape 1 Side 2 - Fairfield & Covington
Tape 2 Side 1 - Italy
Tape 2 Side 2 - Japan

Another set of 5th great-grandparents:  James Allen and Margaret Anderson Allen.

And, you guessed it, James Allen is another of my DAR-approved patriots.  James Allen was a Captain in the militia in 1756 and participated in the Battle of Point Pleasant. Also, as a member of the Augusta County militia, James Allen signed a petition in 1776 supporting independence and the actions of Virginia's General Assembly. 

James Allen was a member of the Augusta Stone Church in Augusta County for 64 years.  And he was 94 years old when he died in 1810.  Margaret lived to be about 75 years old. James & Margaret Allen had 14 children, one of whom was Rebecca Allen, my 4th great-grandmother.  

 

Another set of 5th great grandparents: William Ingles and Mary Draper Ingles.

And William Ingles is another one of my DAR-proven patriots. He was a Major at the Battle of Point Pleasant and a Colonel in the Montgomery County militia.  He also was one of the signers of the Fincastle County Resolutions and was a member of the Committee of Safety for that County in 1776.  In 1777, he took the oath of allegiance as administered by William Preston.  In 1778, he was referred to as Colonel William Ingles, a position he held in the local militia until 1782. The Fincastle County Resolutions were one of many similar documents signed all over Virginia (and perhaps other states) that were precursors to the Declaration of Independence. 

However, I think it is ironic that his wife is more well known today than he is. You have to read my blog of 15 May 2012 to find out more about her...or just Google her.  I was taught her story as part of Virginia history in the fourth grade and my great aunts told me her story when I was a child.  But I didn't learn of William Ingles' patriotism until I researched it myself within the past couple of years.

The grave marker above is for one set of my 5th-great grandparents. The original tombstone is very worn and broken and lies in a cemetery in Augusta County that is on wooded private property.  but I trekked up to see it a couple of years ago with my sister and Crawford & Davidson cousins.

 

Patrick Crawford is also one of my DAR-proven patriots.  While the marker above says he was a Revolutionary War soldier, the service recognized by DAR is public service.  Specifically, according to the public claims index for Augusta County, Patrick Crawford furnished supplies to support the war effort.

 

Patrick & Sarah/Sallie Crawford had nine children, including a set of twins. I am a descendant of their sixth child and second son, John Crawford.

This is my Mom's high school diploma.  I just realized that the scan got a little funky at the bottom.  The colors are not on the original.  The copy center suggested that I get a color copy because it would better display the shades of gray.  Hmmmm. 

Anyway, John Marshall High School was located at 8th & Marshall Streets in downtown Richmond, Virginia.  The old school building has been torn down, but it was near where MCV is now just down from the John Marshall house, which has been preserved.  The enrollment number for 1938-1939, the year before Mom graduated was 3,717...and we think Fairfax County schools are big!

An interesting fact is that there were only 11 grades at that time.  So Mom was 17 when she graduated.  She went on to spend one year at the Richmond Professional Institute, better known now as Virginia Commonwealth University.  She said she signed up for biology & had to dissect a cat, which made her decide she had had enough of college.  So she went to work instead.  She worked in the old City Hall building, pictured below.

This is a beautiful building that is still in use today.  It is on the National Register of Historic Places and is a National Historic Landmark.  Here's an interior view.

Because I am watching ACC basketball right now, it seems fitting to post this artwork by my cousin Bob Alexander.  This was another gem we found rummaging in Mom's attic.  I didn't notice until after I scanned it that it is autographed by Allan Bristow (the one depicted as the Super Hokie) and Bobby Stevens (making the basket on the right).  And it features cousin Bob's signature mini-Bob caricature in the lower left corner.

Bobby was a talented artist and sports enthusiast.  So it was natural for him to combine the two passions.  In fact, he made a career out of publishing sports cartoons, mainly for the Lawrence Eagle-Tribune in Massachusetts. He also published a book of cartoons in 1978 called Benchwarmer's Sports Trivia.

Bob would send creative Christmas cards and he drew other cartoons/caricatures.  Some were about current events, such as the lunar landing.  Others were political, such as his tricky Dick caricature of Richard Nixon.  If I can find & scan that one, it would make for an interesting post!  

You can read a short biography of Bob at http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=hI1TAAAAIBAJ&sjid=7YUDAAAAIBAJ&pg=2367%2C5667624.  Unfortunately, Bob passed away in 1999 at the age of 55.

Found this at my Mom's house in a cabinet and had it scanned at the local FedEx Office.  It is my Dad's Diploma from VPI dated March 1943. As you can see, his degree was a Bachelor of Science in Agricultural Economics.  It also appears that the name & degree were manually written on the diploma. 

The original graduation date for this class was the usual May.  However, because the cadets were needed in World War II, the graduation was moved up to March.  And then it was cancelled entirely so that the graduates could join the service. At least that's what I've been told.

According to an online history of Virginia Tech, there were 523 bachelor degrees conveyed that year, a number that dropped to 97 in 1946 before rising again in 1947. In recent years, the number of degrees conveyed is about 10 times that number.  Also, when Dad was there, Burruss was a person, not a building--although I think Burruss Hall existed it just hadn't been named that yet.