GMA

I rediscovered a treasure today...my Granddaddy's old Georgia Military Academy uniform! It is in really good condition, with only a few tiny moth holes in the jacket. There was one jacket, two pairs of pants (one of which was fraying around the waistband), a white cloth belt, and a leather belt with a GMA buckle. The leather belt is stiff and would probably crack if one tried wearing it without giving it the proper oiling first. That fit me...as did the jacket; the pants were too long so I didn't even bother trying to put them on. I would rather not walk on that very nice wool... Yes, the uniform is wool.

This would be his dress belt I am guessing.

Kind of out of focus, but I wanted to show that the GMA buttons have the Georgia state seal on them.

I took a few moments to observe the jacket construction and I found three things particularly interesting. #1: The jacket has four buttons down the front, but the fourth one, which is covered by the self-fabric belt, is a dark blue/gray flat plastic button. It really makes a lot of sense, since it isn't to be seen and a shank button would have made the belt stand out weird. #2: Speaking of shank buttons, these are sewn on with a smaller, flat plastic ones backing them. Once again it makes sense, as it stiffens and holds them in place better. (Daddy told me his dress blues are like that as well.) #3: The whole jacket is lined with some slick material (polyester, perhaps? Savannah, what did they use in the late 1940's?), which did not surprise me. What interested me was that under the arms, in the arm holes in other words, the lining was the same wool fabric as the shell. 

I am not sure Granddaddy spent his entire High School 'career' at GMA, but I'm fairly certain he was there from 1947-1949, the year he graduated (as a Staff Sergeant). I now have two of his yearbooks ('48 and '49) and I enjoyed scouring through them looking for photographs of him. Both of them have been damp, but the later one really got wet. There were probably more pages stuck together than not. I was determined to try and get them apart, so I spent at least an hour over the kettle steaming pages loose and getting steam burnt in the process. However, I am glad that I took the time and effort to do so, even though a good percentage of the pages have irreparable damage. (They were already that way for the main part.)

I thought you might enjoy a peek into the past....

GMA: 1948 (I found it a bit confusing in this book because he's listed in the class of '50; but he was a Senior in '49. However, I'll just leave it at that.)

In '48, Granddaddy was the guideon bearer for Co. E

There he is, middle with the flag. :)

I was looking at each group picture carefully, and I had to take a second look at one of these guys...I took it in to Daddy and asked, "Is that your Daddy?"

He looked at it for a minute and said, "Look at that chin..." I was observing the eyebrows. I had NO IDEA he was on the swim team!

GMA: 1949: Senior year

His was one of the ruined ones...tough not as ruined as some. (I literally peeled that section of the page off the opposite one.)

I found these "prophecy" things rather amusing; it's fascinating that at 18 he was only 98 pounds...

I can hear him saying that...

I spotted him here too...

In 1949, he was in B Co...

On the right...

I was actually surprised that he wasn't on the rifle team the year before...however, he ditched the swimming his last year and picked up a rifle. (It suits him more, I think.) [Lower left hand corner.]

I really looked here because I was reminded of his love of poetry by my cousin Beth's reference of it during her eulogy.

He had a particular fondness for Robert Service's poetry. I always found it rather odd myself. (By now you probably know that that's him in the upper right hand corner. :D)

He'd be in the army within four years...sporting a different uniform than this one.

      Racheal