I'm sure we all have interesting stories in their younger days our parents have told us, so I figure this would be a fun thread for us to share those stories. There are several good ones, but this is one story my father told me.

When he was 10 or so, he was an excellent student with beautiful handwriting, so basically he was the teacher's pet. On a no school day (Thursday), the teacher would have him come to school to help him write lessons. Then, he wanted to marry off his daughter to my dad. My grandfather was all excited about it, but, my grandmother was an adamant no. Reason was, the teacher's house was across the large river, and she was afraid that, going back and forth, they might have an accident and drown. My father is the only boy in the family, with 6 older sisters. There would have been no one to carry the family name. Dad eventually married my mom, when he was 14. And, the rest is history. Thank you, grandma.

My dad used to tell me stories of how he would race Mustangs in his Trans Am on I-90/94 in Chicago in the 70s. Also told me of him fishing in Minnesota in the 70s when he lived with his sister. Or listening to his older brother play guitar as he was, probably still is, a huge fan of Elvis and the Beatles.

My daughter just turned 8 and asked my wife, “mommy, did daddy go to war?” Those stories will have to wait for a day when she’s a little older. But I have plenty of other stories to share with her.

Turns out my grandfather ran booze for the Capone outfit

My dad loves to tell his hunting story about the time he was hunting with my grandpa and saw this giant buck. He took a shot, and missed, but the buck just stood there looking at him. Dad tried to reload, but grandpa's cheap old break-barrel single-shot failed to eject and he couldn't get the spent shell out. Finally the deer ran off, and dad didn't get him.

That was the closest dad ever came to actually shooting a deer, but I still have that shotgun.

quote:

Originally posted by darthfuster:
Turns out my grandfather ran booze for the Capone outfit

A Great-Uncle was, what we called, a tailgunner on a beer truck during the early days of Prohibition, then later a liquor license inspector, I suppose for whatever passed for the ATF in those days.

He told me about an inspection visit he made to a Doctor's office in Chicago. It was still legal for Doctors to prescribe alcohol to patients, but they had to keep records, which is where my G-E came in. He said the inspection went well, bookwork was perfect, but when he discussed the visit with other agents later that day, he said he was surprised to see two rather healthy looking men in the waiting room. One of the agents asked who the Doctor was, then told my G-E that he was Al Capone's personal physician, and those were two of his bodyguards.

Too bad Al didn't keep such close tabs on his tax records!

My dad went to a prep school and one of his classmates is a member of the Saudi royal family many of us have heard of. They kept in touch over the years at the class reunions.

My dad has been showing some signs of cognitive decline and my mom is getting pretty concerned. Two weeks ago he called me at 6:30am, totally forgetting our time difference. First words out of his mouth were, "Hey, your mother and I are going to KSA in Nov. and I was wondering if you think it's worth the money to upgrade to business class for such a long flight."

I was sure he had lost his mind. But no. His classmate invited the remaining members of their class and their wives to KSA for a 60th reunion. My folks just have to cover airfare and thereafter are guests of the royal family.

So I expect to have some stories on that in a few months.

My dad was raised in rural southwest MS, near the Louisiana line. They were a poor family and his father (my grandfather) was too proud to allow himself to be a sharecropper, so he always just rented his home/land for an agreed upon fee. Nuanced, but not officially a sharecropper.

My dad would take a shotgun to school with him on some days, either carried or sideways on his bicycle handlebars. After school he would shoot whatever game he happened across, and that would be dinner that evening. He was always embarrassed, because apparently his family wasn't as well to do as many of the other boys who attended the school with him. As a result, he somehow associated hunting with poor people who couldn't afford to buy meat at a store.

Years later he was a doctor of psychology and had his own practice, and an avid golfer and liked boating, but would have nothing to do with shooting or hunting. When he found out I did (parents divorced, not around all the time) he told me hunting was for poor people. I laughed and explained that most guys I knew who were duck hunters or deer hunters had plenty of money, but with him it stuck that hunting and shooting were for folks who couldn't afford to golf.

Long after we were kids, but my mother in her early 80s decided to tell us that how she met my dad (mid 40s) was she and her friend had a college room across from the dance hall, social club, whatever. They had seen Georgeair Sr. but needed to accidentally cross paths.

So, they waited and watched until he showed up. After loitering out front for a bit with friends he went in. This was their time to strike, and after a reasonable time off they went. Indeed, that was the beginning of what became a lifetime relationship. She was soooooo sneaky.

But - our dad was acutely aware of everything around him. So after hearing this stalker story my sister and I laughed our asses off and told her she wasn't stalking him, he was REVERSE STALKING and baiting her! The look on her face showed she instantly knew that was a real possibility.

Alas, my father had passed away ~30 years earlier so no way to verify. That made it even better, and we laughed about that until she passed.

When our dad was a very young boy, he would walk around the neighborhood pulling his wagon door to door, asking folks if they had broken radios or TV sets that he could have. Then he’d take them home and take them apart to figure out how to fix them, whenever possible. Thankfully, my brother and I got that “I can figure this out” mentality from our dad!

When my parents were first married, they lived in a small town in the California desert. Shortly after the birth of my brother (their first child) in 1965, my dad put my mom and brother on a train in Barstow so she could go home to Utah to be with family for awhile. I guess my dad stayed too long on the train helping my mom get settled, because the train left the station with him still on. When the conductor found out he didn't have a ticket, he stopped the train and put my dad off in the middle of the desert. My dad says he found a handcar and used that to get back to Barstow, but I think he just walked all the way back.

In the mid 70's my dad traveled a lot for work, and he tells about the time he was flying into Beirut but the pilot had to abort the landing at the last minute because a bomb went off on the runway.

My Dad never told stories. Just reminded me of how good I had it compared to the Depression years.

Moms story ,
Told by her sister Nellie.
There
Was a snow storm in very rural eastern Iowa on moms 17th birthday.
.
Nellie had had left home last year on her 17th birthday,
And was living ten miles away in Iowa City.

Their parents rule was work 12 hour days for room and board with out financial compensation or get out into the world.

All of the kids left.two before turning 16.

Cold, very windy and snowing made for a long 10 mile walk ,
Nellie met Mom at the five Mile half way point.

Nellie grabbed one of Ruby's two small suitcases with mostly home made clothing,
and they walked back together in to the unknown life away from the 8o acre farm ,where they grew up.

It was 1941 , growing up on a farm without electricity with 11 other siblings was a grind and a half.
Two siblings had passed prior to completing the 7th grade.

Being Mennonite in an Amish community was no party.

My Great Grand Parents had a large family and then they took in two more kids whose parents had died. My Grandfather did not have a middle name, and his story was that his parents were to poor to give the kids middle names.
Rod

I remember numerous times the grownups would be talking and laughing about something when I would ask what it meant. My dad would say "I'll tell you when you're older", and the grownups would all laugh again. But he never did tell me when I got older!

My mom told stories about growing up in the 1930's and during WWII in England. Being sent to her grandmother's house in the country to get out of the industrial town which the Nazis were bombing. But soon after she was sent home because it wasn't really any safer. After the war her grandmother took her every week to get ice cream in Henley-in-Arden. My grandparents took me there, and now I have pictures of my mother with my kids there.

My dad told a lot of stories about growing up in Dearborn, Michigan in the early days of Ford Motor Company. He and his friends, who were all around 10-12 years old at the time, would take their .22 rifles into the woods to goof off!

My mom told me the story how I got my name.

When my mom was pregnant with her first, mom and dad decided "Ronnie" for a boy and "Rowena" for a girl. My sister was born, so "Ronnie" was shelved.

Naturally, my next question was, "What was my "girl" name?" "There wasn't one. You had to be a boy." was her reply.

Apparently, when she was pregnant with me, her "evil" MIL teased/taunted her. My mom has four sisters, three of them already had kids then and they were all girls. Two of them had three girls! Of course, her own first-born was also a girl. "Your family is producing nothing but girls. This one's gonna be a girl too!", said my "evil" paternal grandmother.

My mom was determined to prove her MIL wrong. She basically "willed" me into boy.

Hey, it worked! Good job, mom!

Mine should be titled "Stories My Father Never Told Us"

My father joined the Coast Guard in 1939, He served through the prewar times right up until October 1941 when he deserted the USCG to join the Canadian Army because they were already fighting in Europe.

This was not known to the family until after his death. In 1992 we received a letter from the Canadian Embassy inquiring about the last known whereabouts of my father. It turns out that his last known presence in the Canadian Army was December 5, 1941, just before Pearl Harbor was bombed

Nothing more was known until we obtained his service record in 2005 (approx). It turns out that on December 7th or 8th, 1941, he turned himself into the Border patrol in upstate New York. Naturally he was shipped back to his place of desertion and given a General Court Martial. Of interest, the Admiral in charge of the Court Martial; Admiral Leahy (the WW I Leahy and father of the WW II Leahy). The short version was that after hearing his story he was demoted one rank, fined about $50.00, confined to the ship for 30 days and given extra duty. It appears as if he went on to do well. Near the end of WW II he took the officers exam, scored very high, and was recommended by his ships commander for commissioning. In reading between the lines of his official record, it seems as if the draw down at the end of the war (VE Day) and especially his desertion, did his chances in. He was never commissioned and was discharged in 1946.

He never spoke of this even to my mother whom he met in 1943. Every family has its secrets.

Dad was a tool and die maker, apprenticed to Ford in 1938, becoming a journeyman in 2 years. Shortly thereafter Ford went on a war production schedule. You worked 7 days a week 12 hours a day. If you missed a days work without a Drs. note, “Ford was good enough to call the draft board for ya” Dad worked 3 1/2 years without a day off, worked the leading edge of the B-24 wing and held to 0.0002 for the gauges on the Pratt Whitney engines.

Dads story.
Dad and his friend were six y.o..

They were playing after school one Rainey day in eastern Iowa,
They had jackets on ,they were zipped up as it was chilly.

Paul's dad had stopped in front of their house with a two horse team,
This was in the 30's, and Paul's dad hauled freight, mostly liquids.
Well,
Paul and Dad decide to sit in the driver's seat.
Now I of course was not there.

As Paul was climbing up his foot slid on the slippery surface,
Hi weight shifted to his hand and other foot and began to fall.

Without a dry area to get a firm
Grasp on to,
he hit the soggy mired ground between the team and wagon.

He bounced off of the double tree and that startled the horse which reared a bit.

Both horses came forward enough
that the pulled the wagon wheel completely over Paul's head.

Dad panicked and ran for help.
Paul was as limp as a
Wash rag when they hauled him to the hospital.

They were old enough to know better ,
Dads head was reeling with guilt,sorrow and self disdain.

He was sick to his stomach .
Two and a half days went by without a doctor's prognosis.

Both family's prayed like they never prayed before.
Nary a dozen words were spoken in either house while the tumultuous waiting transpired.

The day at school was torture with our Paul ,
Time had stopped,nothing was moving .

Dad (Leo) would remember every hour for the rest of his life.

60 years later they were both retired from the same Gas and Electric company,
Telling hunting ,fishing and drinking story's around the campground fire,.

My Grandfather was on the USS Indianapolis and was fortunate enough to be dropped off on Tinian Island before it was sunk in a torpedo attack. He didn't know it then, but the two atomic bombs were on the ship with him. He later served as part of the occupying force in Japan and saw the destruction in Hiroshima first hand. One of the things he said that stuck with me was: "There was nothing left but twisted steel from buildings."
I always thought my Grandfather was a simple farmer from Alabama. I didn't know he witnessed such a powerful historical event.

My dad was home from work when the telephone rang. My neighbor called and she stated the water broke.
My dad being a machinist/maintenance man said he would be right over to fix it.
She said, "Its not that water!"
LOL she was pregnant.