Remembering my father
Today is Veterans Day. I thought of my father . Second Lieutenant Thomas Parker served on a destroyer in the South Pacific during WW2. He was always very proud to have served in the military.
I thought I would share a story about my Dad. As a young boy growing up in Napa California, Dad had a pen pal named Wolfgang in Germany. They corresponded for years. When the US entered the war Dad joined the Navy and he didn’t hear from Wolfgang for the remainder of the war.. After the war ended Dad received a letter from Wolfgang explaining what had happened to him. “From the first day of the war till the last I was a soldier forced to fight against people whom I didn’t want to hurt because they hadn’t hurt me.” He shared his experiences during the war, his time as a prisoner of war, and how he came home and was reunited with his family.
At the end of the letter he wrote that he would like to continue correspondence but would understand if my Dad would not want to. My Dad wrote back and they continued to correspond for the rest of their lives.
My parents traveled to East Germany in the 70’s and met Wolfgang and his family. I still have the teddy bear that they gave my mother to give to me. For me it’s such an amazing story of two men divided by war but reunited by friendship.
Remembering my father
Today is Veterans Day. I thought of my father . Second Lieutenant Thomas Parker served on a destroyer in the South Pacific during WW2. He was always very proud to have served in the military.
I thought I would share a story about my Dad. As a young boy growing up in Napa California, Dad had a pen pal named Wolfgang in Germany. They corresponded for years. When the US entered the war Dad joined the Navy and he didn’t hear from Wolfgang for the remainder of the war.. After the war ended Dad received a letter from Wolfgang explaining what had happened to him. “From the first day of the war till the last I was a soldier forced to fight against people whom I didn’t want to hurt because they hadn’t hurt me.” He shared his experiences during the war, his time as a prisoner of war, and how he came home and was reunited with his family.
At the end of the letter he wrote that he would like to continue correspondence but would understand if my Dad would not want to. My Dad wrote back and they continued to correspond for the rest of their lives.
My parents traveled to East Germany in the 70’s and met Wolfgang and his family. I still have the teddy bear that they gave my mother to give to me. For me it’s such an amazing story of two men divided by war but reunited by friendship.