Posted on 02/23/2007 8:57:55 PM PST by lunarbicep
Howard V. Ramsey, Oregon’s last living World War I veteran, died in his sleep Thursday at the age of 108.
Sandra Linnell, one of Ramsey’s two granddaughters, said he spoke of his service with pride.
“He was a driving,” she said. “He said there wasn’t many people who drove, so that was his job. He knew how to drive.”
Ramsey, an Army corporal in France, was a truck driver who ferried officers, carried water to troops on the front lines and returned the bodies of soldiers killed in battle.
Ramsey resided in an assisted living center in southeast Portland.
As of a year ago, the U.S. Department of Veteran’s Affairs estimated there were fewer than 50 World War I veterans still alive in the U.S.
Other estimates are much lower.
Ramsey was mentioned in a 2005 speech by Vice President Dick Cheney commemorating the 75th anniversary of the United States Department of Veterans Affairs.
"I recently read the story of a gentleman from Oregon named Howard Ramsey, who when he tried to get into the Army as a youth was rejected for being underweight," Cheney said.
"But he wasn't the kind of kid who gave up easily. Instead he went out and stuffed himself with water and bananas, and then showed up to be weighed again. This time the Army took him, and before long he was in Europe fighting for his country.
"Corporal Ramsey was on the battlefield in France when word arrived of the armistice."
Ramsey was born in Rico, Colo., in 1898 and graduated from Washington High School in Portland in 1916. While in high school, he joined the Naval Militia and enlisted in the Army later that year.
He returned to Portland around 1920 and worked for Hudson-Essex (later Hudson Motor Car Company). In 1922 he went to work for Western Electric (later AT&T) and retired in 1963 at the age of 65.
He married Hilda Epling in 1923 in Los Angeles. They had one daughter.
Funeral arrangements are pending.
Just think-when he was boy the last War of 1812 vets were passing.
Wars are a way of life for humans. Peace is an illusion.
May this hero sleep well and meet his Saviour in a better place.
"Just think-when he was boy the last War of 1812 vets were passing."
And he also knew Civil War veterans, as just the older men that watched him march off to his war.
Holy smokes!
Thank you, sir, for your service to America. May God rest his soul.
Saw a heckuva lot of changes. May he rest in peace.
Shows how much things have changed. Could we imagine a world where few new how to drive? I remember in basic (15 years ago), they were looking for volunteers who could drive. Those who stepped forward were ordered to "drive" a wheelbarrow over to a pile of bricks and load them up.
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