Friday, 5/25

It should be a fun weekend. We all have an extra day off, the temperatures should be warm, and when it's not raining we should continue our trek directly from winter to summer, bypassing spring this year.

Plus the lilacs should finally come out.

However, there one other thing you may want to do this weekend, and that's take a few minutes to reflect on just why we have that extra day off. As you know, I’m married to someone who’s working to keep alive the memories of the men & women from Marquette and Alger Counties who were killed during World War II. She’s doing it because those memories, like all memories, would eventually disappear as the years wear on, and the people who gave their lives for this country deserve better than that.

As an example of how those memories can slowly disappear, I’d like to introduce you to a young man from Marquette named Morgan Mowick--

A couple of years ago we were walking through Park Cemetery and came across Morgan’s grave. It simply says that he died on March 27^th, 1918 while serving with the 174^th Aero Squadron of the U.S. Allied Expeditionary Force during World War I. That’s it. So I decided to see if I could find out anything about him. And that’s when I realized that memories can disappear over time.

Thanks to Loraine, I know how to look up things on soldiers who died while in service. I know where to look in newspapers, I know which websites have the best information. It’s just one of the many benefits to being married to a very remarkable woman. But when I looked into those newspapers and searched those websites, I realized that information from a war, even a World War, from 100 years ago is sketchy at best.

All I could find out about Morgan is that he grew up at 421 East Hewitt Avenue in Marquette, was a member of what’s now the First United Methodist Church, contracted pneumonia while on the way over to Europe, was left at a hospital when his ship docked, and died soon afterward. His body was then sent back to Marquette for burial, where he still lies next to his parents. I was actually able to find out more about his dad, who was a Marquette house painter of some repute, than I was about Morgan himself.

That’s it. All I found were two newspaper articles from just after he died, one with a letter sent to his father by his commander right after his death, and the other a reprint of a sermon given by his church’s minister for several members of the church who had died in the conflict. Those two articles seem to represent the entire legacy of a young man who left his home to fight for a better world and died while doing it.

I’d like to think that people like Morgan deserve better.

So, like I said, spend a few minutes this weekend honoring, visiting, or just thinking about the people who have made that sacrifice, the one that allows you to have an extra day off. And if you have someone in your family who fits into that category, make sure that you do whatever you can to help preserve their legacy. They sure deserve it.

On that note, have yourself a great weekend. See you Tuesday!

(jim@wmqt.com)