From me and my family, thank you all for your kind words and thoughts.
Yes, Dad got G’ma to sign off on his “age” so that he could enlist in '43; I don’t recollect the dates, and whatever service-related paperwork he had has been lost, but I do recollect him mentioning that he turned 16 towards the end of “Basic.”
He also related that the Chiefs knew, or at least strongly suspected, that he was actually younger than he (and more than a few other kids, too) claimed.
Dad always had a strong aptitude for “fixing stuff,” which I inherited (I do mechanical stuff, pneumatics, hydraulics, electronics, basic IT, basic industrial electrical, and otherwise know which end of the hammer to hold :p), and he got “picked” to be a Machinist Mate while in Basic.
As a SeaBee, his unit would go in after an area/island was secure, and build all the airfields, hospitals, piers/ & docks, warehouses, tent-cities, everything necessary to support the advance on the next island in the Pacific Campaign. The work that he actually did was “wrenching” on the jeeps and trucks and bulldozers and such that the SeaBees used to do their thing.
Due to the dates, he obviously wasn’t involved in the Aleutians Campaign, but did serve briefly up there afterwards.
As he related to me, the closest he ever came to combat was when they were supporting the off-loading of a munitions ship, and what they think was a Japanese “Betty” flew overhead, fast-and-low, most likely on some kind of reconnaissance flight.
It happened so quickly that the air-raid siren went off after the plane was already gone.
Mom got me into Cub Scouts and Weblos, but when I moved on up to the Boy Scouts, Dad got involved, serving as an Assistant Scoutmaster for many years until the Scoutmaster hung up his spurs after all his boys were grown and out of Scouts. We were both very proud of the fact that after I turned 18, that I was able to serve together with him (however briefly; I soon went off to the Army) as his Assistant Scoutmaster for a while.
Dad loved the outdoors; he hunted and fished in his younger years, but mostly he loved the peace and quiet of the deep woods, walking along, noting the different trees and plants, animals and insects.
Whether he was throwing on a “day pack” for a simple hike, or a backpack for some real deep hiking/camping, he loved “getting away from it all” in the hills and valleys of Missouri (anywhere away from cities and people, at least).
He wasn’t much as a photographer, but he was a “shutterbug,” and would point his 110 Cartridge camera at anyone and anything that stood still long enough for him to snap a pic; he had literally thousands of pics covering decades. Unfortunately, almost all of them were also lost.