Little Egypt Heritage Articles Stories of Southern Illinois © Bill Oliver 27 August 2006 Vol 5 Issue: #26 ISBN: pending Osiyo, Good Evening Ladies and Gentlemen of Little Egypt Like everyone else who suddenly realizes that s/he is the oldest, or nearly so, member of their family, I have come to realize that there is no one left to ask all the questions that are unanswered. We usually don’t think about not having answers because there was always someone we could ask. When that someone is gone then it is too late and we lament our situation. Recently I tried to find a surviving member of my Dad’s High School class. He graduated in 1928 from Libby High School, in Toledo, Ohio. Well, Dad would be 96 come this November. Back about 1992 or so, Dad went up to, maybe, San Francisco, anyway, “north” from Dana Point to a California version of the Libby Class Reunion. It would have been the 65th anniversary of their graduation. There were eight from his class at that. This is fourteen years later. <sigh> I was hopeful but not expectant and as it so happened I didn’t have any “luck” in that search. My purpose was to find someone [or more] and interview them. It would be a bonus if they knew and remembered him. I next thought about my Mother’s class of 1930 – same school. Well, I haven’t found the Alumni Association as yet. If there are any survivors I will have to do this soon or they also will become “those I could have asked”. My own 50th Class Reunion happened in 2000 some five hundred miles to the east, in a place called Arlington, Virginia. I got a report and there were more there than I imagined. My classmates were some of the early to give their “all” in Korea. They graduated and joined the Marines during the same month. I should have liked to have seen them, though I know we have lived such different lives that we could never regain the relationships we had back then. Forrest Tucker and Shirley Beaty, also graduated from my high school. Mr. Tucker many years before me and Shirley Beaty McLaine graduated two years after me. She was as funny as a high school sophomore as in any of her movies. As it so happens, all avenues seem to lead to “Rome”, or in this case, “lead to” the same subject – seeking friends who we’ve lost contact with. Friends of mine, a retired Professor and his wife spent their time recently at the reunion of his World War II military unit. Upon returning, I learned from them that he desired an obituary of a colleague from a distant city. So through a chain of friends, fellow researchers and modern technology, the obituary was obtained and delivered. The miracle really was in the timing – it took just over an hour. Sunday last, produced a newspaper article where the six remaining, “Lucky Ones,” members of the northwestern Ohio based 37th Division, 148th Infantry, 1st Battalion, Company C “regrouped” in Tiffin, Ohio. Some remaining members think they will all meet again next year, but some wonder. With the youngest of them an octogenarian I can understand the “wonder”. Dad survived World War II and the Korean “Conflict”. He was never classified as “combatant”; however, he did visit the front lines in Korean performing his duties. In my tour of duty with my “Uncle Sam” was on board the USS Iowa, BB-61. I traveled east and the only combat I saw was bringing sailors back to our ship for violations of sobriety and/or local customs. Also, Sunday last, Barb and I attended an AirForce Band Concert in the Park in Waterville, Ohio. At a certain point in the concert, the band played the military hymns of each of the branches of service. As each hymn was played, former members [veterans] from those branches were asked to stand and be recognized. As each rose he was saluted by an Airman who did as well as the actors on the TV program JAG – sharp and snappy! An article appeared in the Johnson County [Illinois] Heritage Journal [vol XVI, Aug 2006, No. 8, page 1] entitled, “An Essay by a Johnson County Boy.” The essay was presumably written by Arthur C. Benson, son of Alonzo G. Benson and Sydney A. Chapman. This made him a grandson of James Monroe Benson and Celinda Slack. This thrilled and excited me, to read these words. I do have to agree with the Societie’s President, Gary Hacker, who said pieces of the essay were missing and, “What a pity someone didn’t take more care to preserve” this piece of family and community history. As stated above, the letter [by deduction] was written by a grandson of James Monroe Benson and that makes it precious to me. James Monroe Benson was my second greatgrandfather’s brother, Charles B. Benson. Charles B. Benson is buried in a military grave in Annapolis, Maryland. He was wounded in the Battle of Brice’s Crossroads, as a member of the 120th Illinois Infantry, in June 1864. He was sent to a hospital in Mississippi and then “paroled”. It took him until December 1864 to reach the military base in Annapolis, where he was placed in the hospital there. He died in early January 1865, never reaching home to wife and family. I don’t know if “Uncle Monroe” Benson ever went to any unit reunions or not, but for sure his brother never had the opportunity. As, I stated before, the essay is priceless to me. It describes the bluffs where Grandma Oliver went on picnics with her family and friends. She and Grandpa Oliver lived with and farmed “Uncle Monroe’s” place where those bluffs were. I’m determined to find those bluffs and visit them one day. I’ll have to get the property description and plot it on a map. If there is any chance, I would like to have a picnic there. I don’t know who said it. “If you don’t know history you don’t know anything. You are like a leaf that doesn’t know that it is part of a tree.” e-la-Di-e-das-Di ha-wi nv-wa-do-hi-ya nv-wa-to-hi-ya-da. (May you walk in peace and harmony) and Wado, Bill -=- PostScript: Other sites worth visiting: PostScript: = = = = http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/index/SOIL http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/index/ILMASSAC http://www.usgennet.org/usa/ne/state/BillsArticles/LittleEgypt/intro.html