Three posts ago, I wrote about a reunion I helped facilitate between my wife and an old friend, who was also an old friend of mine. Along the same vein, but different, was something that happened over the next few days. Let me set this up.

I found the photo at the right in a box of photos at Dad’s house when he died. Dad is on the left. The other three men were mysteries. The photo was taken someplace in Europe. Once Dad was assigned to the Stars and Stripes, he was in Algiers (briefly), then Anzio beachhead, then up the boot of Italy with the mobile publishing unit, then southern France in three different places. Readers of this blog have heard all this before, at posts at this link.

I wondered who the other three men in the photo were. Most likely they were Stars and Stripes staffers, but who? And was there any way to find out?

Perhaps the most famous part of the S&S staff was cartoonist Bill Mauldin. Dad was at the same location Bill was on V-E Day (May 8, 1945), but how long they served together and in what locations was a mystery. Dad told me that Bill sometimes had him model for some of the Willie & Joe “Up-Front” cartoons.

Bill is so famous that from time to time a post about him shows up in my Facebook newsfeed. I always comment on them about Dad’s connection to Bill, hoping someone will respond. Not that I think any of the men in the photo are still alive (unlikely) but hoping that someone would say something to me that might help me either identify the men in the photo or hear something that might bear on Dad’s war service.

One of those posts came up this week. A post by Grand Comics Database, showing a Bill Mauldin cartoon of Willie and Joe, the two sad-sack soldiers featured in his “Up Front” cartoon series. A number of people posted to it, and I added this comment:

My dad was a typesetter for the “Stars and Stripes”, in N. Africa, Italy, and So. France. He knew Bill Mauldin and was friends with him. Dad told me Mauldin often had him pose for the cartoons.

One woman answered with the following comment:

Your dad must have been in the same group as my dad, same countries, same background. Bill Maudlin drew this picture of my Dad on an index card, in pencil.

She added the cartoon.

I then took this to Messenger and sent her four photos of Dad with other men, including the one above. There was a delay of some hours, when she messaged back:

The man on the right third pic…is my Dad! what a shock to see him in your pictures. It is a small world.

later adding:

just could not believe I was looking at my dad’s picture, when you sent that one. I only had a few of him during the service and unfortunately he passed when I was only 13, so not enough years to know too much about the war….

His name is Fred R. Unwin. Born in London, he made his way to America (part of the story I still need to learn) and was indeed with the S&S in Europe. After the war he stayed in printing (as Dad did), as a pressman and later a supervisor, in Chicago and Phoenix. I’ll get some more info about him as our conversations continue.

Robyn sent me some photos of her dad, and I said to Robyn:

So, shall we call ourselves Stars and Stripes cousins?

She, of course, said yes. Thus now we are cousins.

When I made that post, I had hopes but no expectations that anything would come of it. But two men in the photo are now identified, Norman Todd on the left, Fred Unwin on the right. Will the two men in the middle ever be identified? Possibly not, but I feel good about having one more known, against the likely odds.