My Father In Law
Someone whom I since blocked from this site, felt it was within the bounds of polite discourse to insult my father-in-law.
Just so no one else feels the impulse to belittle this my father in law, let me tell you something of him. His name was George Lamplighter. He was one of the most shy, most rude, most loving and supportive, most angry and most honest men I have ever met. He was vehemently honest: the kind of man who, if the candy machine gives you two candy bars instead of one, will leave the second bar in the bin. He was the kind of man who walked through parks, picking up other men’s litter.
He served in World War II, and he was assigned to the HOME FRONT newspaper as a reporter, so he was given a camera instead of a gun. He was told that he would not see front line service, but that did not turn out to be the case: he was with the LIFE magazine reporter and was ahead of the US troops; the group of reporters were the first Americans to cross the Rhine and meet up with the Russians.
He got offered a Purple Heart when the unit he served in came across a concentration camp. Behind the wood and wire walls were starved and beaten Jews and other undesirables, including American soldiers. While the rest of the unit waited for a carpenter to come by with tools (for the gates were locked) my father in law climbed the fence and began tearing out board with his bare hands. His hands, as you can imagine, got considerably splintered and blistered from this, enough to send him to the medic. If you knew him as I did, you would know that the same kind of anger and honesty which formed his character would have made him attack a wall to free the imprisoned.
He was embarrassed by the Purple Heart, and did not accept the medal.
My wife had to learn of my father’s war experiences though her mother, because her father was reluctant to speak of the horrors he had witnessed, both in the concentration camp and elsewhere where the Nazis held sway.
He was a reporter for STARS AND STRIPES that was reporting on the Nuremberg Trials. He saw the evidence of the Nazi atrocities first hand.
About John C Wright
John C. Wright is a practicing philosopher, a retired attorney, newspaperman, and newspaper editor, and a published author of science fiction. Once a Houyhnhnm, he was expelled from the august ranks of purely rational beings when he fell in love; but retains an honorary title.
