Ray enlisted in the Army on February 26, 1942, and entered the Army Air Corp. His enlistment record shows his residence as George Co., Mississippi and enlistment city as Camp Shelby, Hattiesburg Mississippi. His term of enlistment was for the “term of the war, or other emergency, plus 6 months”. His civil occupation was “simiskilled linemen and servicemen, telegraph, telephone and power.” His height was 6’2″ and he weighed 175 pounds.
He went to Radio Mechanic’s School and Radar Installation and Maintenance School. He was sent to the coast of Florida to install the first radar to watch for the potential German Nazi invasion. His rank was “Aircraft Warning Officer”.
While home on leave he went to Mobile to meet a girl his sister Mary heard about through her boyfriend, Tag Lammon; who had a brother Holcomb Lammon who was dating Marie who had a sister Dorothy; the lady Ray was to meet. [That is quite a string of people to put Ray and Dorothy together but networking worked long before the 1990’s when the phrase became popular.]
Ray said once, with a bit of pride, that Dorothy had a steady guy but that relationship soon fell apart. She and Ray were to be together for many years. He had to report back to duty but was given a long leave and came back to marry Dorothy on April 28, 1945. Things happened fast in war times and the exact sequence and times of this period are not clear–at least to his son Tom. That does not really matter as at some point Ray was transferred to the San Francisco area to a school. On his way there he drove through Mobile, picked up Dorothy and they drove there via the Grand Canyon.
After the class was over he was transferred to Portland Oregon where they lived until he was shipped overseas. There is an interesting story about his glasses as he had only one pair–two were required to go overseas–and that prevented him from shipping out with his group to Africa. When he told me about that time he seemed to regret not getting to go as they saw a lot of action. As he missed that assignment he went to Iceland to install and service radar installations.
The images here of him are in settings quite different than what he would have experience in Africa. The photo of him on the cot with the picture over him was an immediate interest as zooming in perhaps it was a photo of his new wife. But, it is a mirror. He was in Iceland from August 15, 1944 to January 17, 1945.
Ray was honorably discharge from active duty on February 24, 1946. His unit, when released, was the 432nd AAF BU headquartered at the Portland Oregon Army Air Force Base.
Ray said he was a “Master Sgt”. His headstone from the VA cites him as “T. SGT. ” and his discharge form says his rank was a Tech Sgt. , His son Tom was told that “Technical Sergeant” is an Air Force rank (E-6), but was used in the Marine Corps too for a short time.