My oldest is now in college and she has two medium term
goals, to get her degree and to graduate as a United States Marine Corps
Officer.
This prompted me to tell her how Papa became a US Army
Officer. This is definitely a story that
may need additional support from others for authenticity.
After Papa was in the USMC and married for a while, they
determined that the two do not mix (at least for Papa and Boushette). Papa got out of the Marines and joined the
Marine Corps Reserve.
A few years and three sons later Papa was an E7 (Gunnery
Sergeant) and competed for NCO of the Year.
He won in fact and was awarded NCO of the Year for the entire USMC
Reserve. At about the same time he was
applying to attend OCS (Officer Candidate School) with the Marines.
This is where the story gets fuzzy for me. Either they forwarded the wrong paperwork and
some numbskull who was also named William La Fleur was rejected (I can't
believe any William La Fleur would be anything less than stellar, but that's
just me) and/or his paperwork was delayed because it was the same paperwork
that got forwarded for the NCO of the Year Award.
Either way, in the end he was 34 years old before the
package went to the board. At that time
(I don't know about now) the USMC had a cutoff of 33 to attend OCS. He was too old.
He was already a Sergeant in the Chicago Police Department
and some of his friends there suggested that he try the Illinois Army National
Guard because the Army cutoff age was 35.
He transferred to the Army and ultimately
retired as a BG (Brigadier General). The
moral of the story is, keep your goal in sight and keep your legs pumping,
never give up there is always a way.
