Memorials Written for my Mother and Her Revised Will to Benefit 6 Non-Profit Organizations

A newspaper obituary written about my mother was titled, "The Ultimate Volunteer, " I blogged about that obituary five years ago, see HERE. Now, 26 years after her April 16, 2016 death, I am posting three memorial articles to my mother. From the obituary, "She died of a heart attack, at the age of 70, doing what she loved, leading a group of bicyclists on an annual Patriot's Day bike ride in Lincoln [sic] (should be Lexington)."

Alan Dressler, Marta Gredler and Sharon Cain wrote memorial articles and Jean H. James wrote the Memorial Ride in my mother's name. Part of what they wrote are these statements: "Just a few of her activities: the Presidency of her Skidmore college class; Westford (MA) teacher; AARP; the Concord Piece-makers (her quilting group); Boy Scout recycling drives; Rails to Trails projects; and of course Bicycling with the Nashoba Valley Pedalers." "Long-time volunteer of the New England Quilt Museum." Personally, I know she was a Girl Scout volunteer and for several years the Sunday School volunteer administrator.

Her revised will dated 1 March 1990, just 6 weeks prior to her death and a few months before a scheduled trip to France, replaced her original one prepared in ca. 1955. She thought so much about her love of the Church, Rails to Trails, New England Quilt Museum, Friends of the Acton Council on Aging, Northfield Mt. Hermon School (where she attended a private high school), and Skidmore College that she left each of them 1/6 of 1/4 of her estate.

Marta

NARA Separation Form 214 For Free

The National Personnel Records Center (NPRC) is located in St. Louis, Missouri. If you are looking for your father's, mother's or brother's military record, you might be able to find it here, at a ridiculous low price of FREE. After going to the home page of the NPRC,  click on the Personnel Records, Quick Find, shown below. My example is for "the veteran separated from military service before 1951 (for my father).

Personnel Records, Quick Find:

MILITARY PERSONNEL RECORDS
If the veteran separated from military service before 1951	If the veteran separated from military service after 1950

CIVILIAN PERSONNEL RECORDS
If the Federal civil servant's employment ended before 1952	If the Federal civil servant's employment ended after 1951

Step two is click on the link in this sentence.  Please order these records by using the process outlined in, "How to Access Archival Records, Official Military Personnel Files (OMPF)". (Even though there is considerable information, you probably won't need to figure anything out. I found it was easier to put in information about my father, then just see if I qualified for the information, and more importantly, see if there was information.

After clicking on the "How to Access..." (above link) you will be brought to How do I request copies of records? Read everything, then click on REQUEST RECORDS ONLINE!

You are brought to: Online Requests Using eVetRecs

“Our online eVetRecs system creates a customized order form to request information from your, or your relative's, military personnel records. You may use this system if you are:

·                          A military veteran, or 

·                          Next of kin of a deceased, former member of the military. The next of kin can be any of the following:

o                                          Surviving spouse that has not remarried

o                                          Father

o                                          Mother

o                                          Son

o                                          Daughter

o                                          Sister

o                                          Brother

Please note:   Records are accessioned into the National Archives, and become archival, 62 years after the service member's separation from the military. This is a rolling date; hence, the current year, 2012, minus 62 years is 1950. Records with a discharge date of 1950 or prior are archival and are open to the public. Records with a discharge date of 1950 or after are non-archival and are maintained under the Federal Records Center program. Non-archival records are subject to access restrictions.   Learn more”

Click on: Launch theeVetRecs System to start your requestOnline.

This is where you begin filling out your information, such as: Your relationship to the Deceased, Branch of Service, Officer or Enlisted, Reason for information, such as medical, genealogy, retirement, and others. I selected medical since I wasn't sure what would happen with the genealogy option. I also needed to provide the name, birth date, and other bits of information, nothing too difficult. Since this was done in August 2010, I don't recall everything, but do know it was very easy. I received immediate online verification, just to be sure they had a record for my father, and a form, shown below.  I had to sign it, and mail it to them before I could receive two copies of the record.

A few weeks later, I received Form 214, Report of Separation (shown below) with information on my father. (I used white-out on some of his personal information.)

My Father on the USS Yorktown

My father is in the front row, far left.

My mother wrote:  U.S. Navy - USS Yorktown Aircraft Carrier

My father wrote the following:

April 2, 1944    In the Shop   Arrow to "my helmet"

L to R Top row.  W. Musson, N. Trepaskp, W. Rosenbaum, E. Hoegeman

Mid row:  C. Culbertson, R. Pagel, T. Mosbey, L. Goldsmith, C. McCarthy

Bottom row:  ? (my father)  Lt. J. O. Hatchet, J. Jones, Lt. G. H. Klans and J. McCormick

(There are probably errors, as he always had terrible penmanship. If anybody wants to make a correction, I would love to hear from you.)

Wikipedia site about the history of the Yorktown

 (It was interesting to see where he was in World War II.)

Yorktown Aircraft Carrier information