This Memorial Day, I'm remembering not just my uncle, Lt. Frank Ebner Gartz, WWII B-17 navigator, but the memories of his service (300+ WWII letters to and from him, 1943-1945). Last week I donated those letters, along with 50+ bankers' boxes of memories, our family archives, to the Newberry Library. Here's how it came about.
Chauvin's conviction on three counts, two for murder and one for manslaughter, account for a 1 in 2000 chance that a police officer will be convicted. We must work and support truth-telling among police for African Americans to gain any real trust in policing.
I posted this essay last year on Martin Luther King Day. What I write about still stands today, but what a difference a year makes in our greater understanding of Black Lives Matter and the inequities wrought by the coronavirus.
My father wrote to Frank, who was more like a best friend to him. Ten years older than Frank/Ebner, my dad had changed Frank's diapers as a baby, fed him, and entertained him with walks to the park when his mom was busy working on the buildings and the never-ending housework of era.
The two Franks (Von Arx and Gartz), 18-year-old high school buddies, were so close, they called each other's parents "Mom and Pop," as here. This letter indicates that Frank "Ebner" Gartz is now in Santa Ana, CA. Frank Von Arx-"Somewhere in the Aleutians."