Because today is Veteran's Day, I thought it would be appropriate to finally introduce my father to my blog. I'm not only Lolo's Child, (and you've certainly all met Lolo here), but I am also Don's Child...some called him Hawkshaw.
No doubt, now that I've opened this door, I'm going to regale you with other stories about him, but today's opening story is of a Veteran. You see, he lost both legs above the knee near the end of World War II - at the ripe old age of 19. He was a foot soldier, whose job was to carry a bale of wire on the Phillipine Island of Mindanao. Just as they stopped for a rest, his unit was hit by a mortar shell. When he "came to," briefly, he felt for his legs and knew that one was hanging on by shreds, but the other appeared intact.
Taken immediately to basic medical facilities, both legs were removed above the knee. The one he thought was intact was so loaded with schrapnel, the doctors didn't feel it could be saved. Once stabilized, he was sent back to the US, where he spent a full year in a VA hospital near Salt Lake City - far from home and family for a young man from Minnesota.
The only thing he ever mentioned about his time in that hospital was that he played checkers almost daily with a fellow patient, a German POW. Neither ever learned to speak the other's language, they just played checkers together. About 20 years later, we took a family road trip and found that hospital; I remember little about it except that it was white, stucco, looked a bit like a large abandoned bakery, and sat back at the end of a long drive with a lawn in front. We didn't go any closer, just drove from Minneapolis to Salt Lake, and looked at the building from the end of the long driveway.
He spoke little of his experiences in WWII. Because his disability was the way he always was for me, I didn't find anything unusual about having a father with no legs. Only when we went out in public - long before any disabilities acts were in place - did I realize that our family was different. Someday I'll tell you stories about curbs without ramps, buildings without elevators, and children who walked backwards and stumbled while staring.
However, much like the men mentioned in Tom Brokaw's book about the Greatest Generation, my father didn't think he merited any special treatment or unusual attention. The fourth of "Ma Kraemer's boys" to go off to war, he simply did what he felt was right, came back, got a job in a factory, met & married, had two children.
Only in later years did I realize what a hero he was - yet another silent hero - because he did just that. We took for granted that this man who could ride a horse, drive a car or tractor, build an addition on the house, and "scoot" up a long flight of stairs to attend his nephew's wedding reception, never expected special treatment nor looked for a "handout."
He taught himself to walk, and walk well, wearing wooden legs with clanky metal knees. Therapists raved that he could walk without his canes in the house, and use but one cane outside - as you can see below, in the photo of him carrying me, his 8 month old child.
During my junior high years, he was told he could no longer have his wooden legs, he was forced to switch to "new and better" legs with soft cups and hydraulic knees. He hated them, found them painful, and never wore his artificial legs again. The photo below, taken in 1979, shows the way he looked most of the rest of his life - usually in a wheelchair (though sometimes sitting on a leather pad on the ground, with a strap across his thighs). When we had company, he would let the pants legs hang, giving some illusion of legs. Most often, however, he would simply tuck the ends of his pants up into the belt.
Though I have many, many stories to tell - from his youthful love of horses, to his grandfatherly love of my children, and all the living that came between - today's story is about just one of many veterans who gave so much, without expectation or complaint.
"Hawkshaw" died in 1982 at the age of 56 from one massive heart attack. We were told that amputees have a higher incidence of heart disease.
I still miss him.
Donald J. Kraemer
April 4, 1926 - June 5, 1982
(Finished magic wand - going in the mail soon.)
That's a pretty dramatic change in color palette in just three weeks, isn't it?
