Keillor & Smith Military Heritage
It all started simply enough. My mother had sent me an envelope of copies of old family pictures. I filed it "for future reference", and piled it in my office. Several months later, while cleaning the office I came across them and determined to really deal with them. One of the pictures was of my grandfather's eldest brother, Edward Aloysius "Ned" Wenz. He was standing in full military uniform, which looked like WWI era. His "cover", or cap, looked like a Marine Corps dress cover. When I looked closer, I could see aviator's wings over his breast pocket. With a little help from some friends, we learned that Uncle Ned joined the Navy in 1917 and retired as a Captain in 1953. Read his story here. As a military mom and airplane junkie, I was fascinated, and wanted to know all the details! As I learned more about his service, I thought about all of our other family members who had served in the military. I decided to recognize their achievements by including them in a book, so I scrounged up a 1" 3-ring binder and spent my winter break gathering information on about a dozen men. The website of the new WWII memorial in Washington, D.C., www.wwiimemorial.com, and the Navy Log at www.lonesailor.org provided a lot of information on some of them. However, many of the men in my book, particularly those who had served from "The Greatest Generation", have passed away without any mention of their sacrifices. I kept digging. Before Spring Break was over, my project had grown from the 1" inch binder to three 2" binders. Everyone included in this website is related to my husband or myself, either by blood, marriage or surname - with the exception of Smith!
My motivation for creating this website is twofold: To memorialize all those who have given so much, many of them the ultimate sacrifice; and to reach out to those of you who may have more information on those whom I know little about. So:
You may search by surname, time period, locality or branch of service. Also, please learn more about the women from our family who have served our country.
If you contact me, I'll be happy to share a GEDCOM file.