Military Monday - San Antonio Aviation Cadet Center (SAACC)

As I mentioned in this post, my dad, Warren Westcott Grant, was in the Army Air Force during World War II and was honorably discharged as an Aviation Cadet just before he finished his flight training. At the time of his discharge, he was stationed at AAAF Amarillo, TX. Before that, he was an Aviation Student at San Antonio Aviation Cadet Center (SAACC) in Texas.  My father spent 11 months (according to his Separation Qualification Record) at San Antonio before moving on to Amarillo.

According to Wikipedia:
"On 8 January 1943, the War Department constituted and activated the 78th Flying Training Wing (Preflight) at San Antonio and assigned it to the AAF Central Flying Training Command. The 78th provided aviation cadets the mechanics and physics of flight and required the cadets to pass courses in mathematics and the hard sciences. Then the cadets were taught to apply their knowledge practically by teaching them aeronautics, deflection shooting, and thinking in three dimensions. Once completed, the graduates were designated as aviation cadets and were sent to one of the primary flight schools for pilot training."

The San Antonio Aviation Cadet Center is now part of Lackland Air Force Base.

My father successfully completed the course at San Antonio before he moved onto Flight School in Amarillo. Here are the cards that indicate the completion of his Flight Checks at SAACC.



Flight Check Cards - SAACC, San Antonio, Texas

The second flight check took place on his 23rd birthday. It was just one day later his mother died in New Jersey and his flight training was interrupted for a month-long leave to settle his mother's estate. His father had died 5 years earlier.

Sunday's Obituary - Edna Veith

Sunday’s Obituary is an ongoing blogging prompt developed by Leslie Ann at Ancestors Live Here and tallied on the Geneablogger's site.

Edna Veith
1903 - 1994

Edna Veith was one of my grandfather's sisters. She and her twin brother, Edwin, were the youngest of five children and Edna is the only child who never married. She was born on 20 August 1903 in Hollisterville, Wayne County, Pennsylvania to Gottlieb Veith and Hannah Zeiler, and died 22 February 1994 in Atlanta, Georgia.  She had moved from her parents' farm in northeastern Pennsylvania by 1920 and lived with her sister and brother-in-law, Carrie and Charles Heffner in Hoboken, New Jersey. At some point, she and her sister, Esther Veith Foster, shared an apartment at 7 East 86th Street in New York City before they both retired and moved near their nephew Art Foster and his family in Georgia.

VEITH, Miss Edna, 90, Avondale Estates, Georgia, died Tuesday, February 22 at the Budd Terrace Nursing Home, Atlanta, Georgia.
   Born in Hollisterville, daughter of the late Gottlieb and Hannah Zeiler Veith, she was the last surviving member of her family. A graduate of Wyoming Seminary, she was an executive secretary in the banking business in New York City before retiring in 1964 to Atlanta, Georgia.
  Surviving are two nephews, Harold Veith, Jr., Lake Wylie, S.C., and Arthur D. Foster, Duluth, Ga.; a niece, Mrs Warren Grant, Little Falls, NJ; grand nieces and nephews, including Mrs. David Dulay and James Foster, both of Honesdale; several great-grandnieces and nephews.
   She was preceded in death by a brother, Harold Veith Sr; two sisters, Carrie Veith Heffner and Ester Veith Foster, twin brother, Edwin Veith; also a nephew, Burton W. Foster.

Thanksgiving 1956

Here is my first Thanksgiving at my parents' home in Little Falls, New Jersey. My mom, Dorothy Veith Grant (1922-2006) is on the left and her parents, Harold (1891-1978) and Minna (1893-1977) (Badendick) Veith are on the right. My brother is in the middle. My dad, Warren Westcott Grant (1922-2005) took the photo.

We always called this set of china the "chicken plates". It was a set that my mom purchased when she was first married. It is a Deruta pattern called 'Galletto' and it is still being made In Italy today. After my mom died, the set came to me and we use it for our holiday meals. I still love it as much as I did when we used the 'chicken plates' for special occasions when I was growing up. Unfortunately, the platter was broken a few years ago, when it skittered off the counter while the turkey was being transferred to it.

Thanksgiving 1956 - Little Falls, New Jersey

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Hazel Skinner Grant obituaries

My father's mother was Florence Hazel Skinner.  She was born to John Francis (Frank) Skinner and Annie Florence Betts on 6 September 1894 in Valley Falls, Rhode Island. She died unexpectedly on 12th January 1945 at age 50, of a cerebral embolism about 2 weeks after a routine hysterectomy, just as she was about to be released from the hospital.

In a box of  family papers, I found several different clippings of her obituary. None of the clippings are dated or note the newspaper they were found in. I expect some of them were from her local newspaper in Clifton, New Jersey, and some were from her hometown of Valley Falls, Rhode Island. This obituary is the longest of the group.



Hazel Grant obituary

Died 12 January 1945 
unknown New Jersey newspaper

Mrs. Hazel Grant Dies In Hospital

                   ------------------
   Mrs. Hazel Grant, of 267 Rillins [Rollins] avenue, Clifton, whose husband, Ralph Grant, was a former plant manager of the National Rubber Machinery Company in Clifton, passed away early yesterday morning in St. Mary's Hospital, Passaic, following an operation of two weeks ago.
   Mrs. Grant was born in Cumberland, R.I., and came to Clifton more than 25 years ago. Since her husband's death, she had been associated with the aforenamed company, and was a member of the Clifton Women's Club and the Y.M.C.A. Women's Auxiliary.
   The Rev. F. W. Thurston, pastor of Clifton's Trinity Methodist Church, will conduct the funeral services tomorrow afternoon at 3:30 o'clock in the Andrew D. Mason Funeral Home, 440 Clifton avenue, Clifton. Friends may call at the funeral home from 12 noon until 7 p.m. tomorrow.
   On Sunday, the body will be forwarded to a mortuary in Central Falls, R.I., where a brief service will be held on Tuesday, followed by internment in Moshassuck Cemetery there.
   Mrs. Grant is survived by a daughter, Miss Shirley Grant of Clifton; a son, Warren, an air cadet in an Army Air Force unit in Texas; her parents, Mr. and Mrs. John F. Skinner of Valley Falls, R. I.; one sister, Mrs. George Blackmar of South Attleboro, Mass., and a brother, Harold Skinner of Rutherford [NJ].


An obituary from an unknown Rhode Island newspaper lists the bearers at her funeral in Rhode Island. William E. Betts was Hazel's maternal uncle;  Earl Betts was his son and Hazel's cousin. I believe David Betts might be Hazel's great uncle and John Nelson was his son-in-law, married to Hazel's cousin, Mattie Betts. James Yetter was married to Hazel's cousin, Eva Betts. I think Edward J. Eastwood was a Valley Falls neighbor and family friend.




Hazel Grant obituary
unknown Rhode Island newspaper

MRS. HAZEL GRANT

   The funeral of Mrs. Hazel (Skinner) Grant, 50, wife of the late Ralph W. Grant and former resident of Valley Falls who died Friday in Clifton, N.J., was held yesterday from the D.W. Bellows and Son Funeral Home, 85 Park Place, Pawtuket. The Rev. John H. Tremberth, former pastor of the Valley Falls Baptist Church, officiated. Burial was in Moshassuck Cemetery, Central Falls.
   Bearers were William E. Betts, Earl Betts, David Betts, John Nelson, James Yetter and Edward J. Eastwood.

Zophar Skinner - Veteran of the Civil War

Zophar Skinner, a Civil War Veteran, was my great-great-grandfather. He died on Veteran's Day exactly 85 years ago at the age of 83.

Zophar Skinner
12 September 1843 - 11 November 1926

 Zophar enlisted in the 2nd Rhode Island Infantry, Company C on 5 June 1861 as a private.. He mustered out of the same unit on the 17 June 1864 as a full corporal. Despite serving in many of the major battles of the Civil War, he was one of the lucky ones and returned home unwounded.

Zophar died of a heart attack on the morning of 11 November 1926 in Valley Falls, Rhode Island, where he was born and had lived his entire life.

 An obituary published in the Pawtucket Times, 15 November 1926 said:

"As the body of the venerable veteran was laid to its final resting place the firing squad set off three volleys. Roger Calderwood sounded the call which comes at the end of a soldier's day - Taps."

Zophar had been active in the many Veteran's organizations that flourished at the end of the Civil War, and had served as a department commander of the G.A.R. (Grand Army of the Republic) in Rhode Island. His obituary states that "the ritual of the Grand Army of the Republic was recited by Commander Henry Clark of the Ballou Post, G.A.R."