You Never Know Growing Up Who You Know

I find it fascinating to see how people find my blog. I frequently look to see what searches have led them to me. The other day a search was made for a  Fay Upthegrove. I went looking to see where I had mentioned him and found him among the list of graduates of the 1922 Bradford Area High School that I had listed in the story of my grandmother’s Washington D.C. senior trip.

What I then began to learn about was the man that my grandmother had gone to school with. The articles on line boast of his prowess in the military field. He made his mark in World War II and there are many articles on him to be found. He was the son of Frank Ellis and Cora Jane Upthegrove, born in Port Alleghany, Pennsylvania. Many of the articles were when he was a Colonel. He would eventually be made a Major General by President Eisenhower.

What they don’t have is what I found in grandma’s senior yearbook the “Barker.”  Major General Upthegrove was known to his friends in high school as “Uppie.” He was a member of the basketball, football and track teams. I wonder if there was a young lady in his life because the yearbook crew teased him with a quote below his name that read, “Hasn’t your training in athletics taught you that it is against the rule to hold hands?”

He and his family would hunt the local forest in Bradford. A local paper in 1949 carried a note about his father, brother and nephews luck at deer hunting and the Major General’s luck with getting a deer and an elk in Germany. The Major General and his wife could be found among the list of attendees at his BAHS class reunion every five years.