South Paw, Grand Pa

The service records of all Canadian soldiers who served in World War I is available on-line. I accessed my grandfather’s records. One interesting thing for me was his signature. There were samples of his handwriting, both pre-war and post-war. The reason this was interesting to me is that he lost his right arm in France. He had to learn how to write with his left hand.

There are many stories about the various antic he got into throughout his life, but just one I want to share now. Amongst his various jobs was auctioneer. I doubt he was the fast-talking sort of auctioneer we’re all familiar with. I imagine he was the sort of auctioneer hired by the Sherriff’s to help with estate sales and foreclosures.  Once, as the story goes, he was looking through a house, getting ready for the next day’s sale, when he saw a violin case. In the case was a violin and peering inside he saw the word, “Stradivarius.” With his one arm and poor penmanship he stuffed the violin and case in the boot of his car.

Needless to say, it was not a Stradivarius. It wasn’t even a decent knockoff. It was just a cheap violin that someone labeled as a Stradivarius for a joke. It is still in our families’ possession, more for the story than anything else. My dad tried to have it restored, but there’s a hairline crack in it that cannot be repaired.

My grandfather remained a poor, one armed, not- Stradivarius owning veteran who seemed to find himself in many odd and interesting adventures every day. He shared many stories with me about his adventures in France during the War. Would he have preferred to remain in Canada? You bet he would have. No matter how interesting and funny he made the war seem, every step of the way he would have preferred peace. He is just one more reason for me to pray for peace and for our political leaders to work hard for peace.