Republic of Letters

My father’s angel mother:Mary Munro

My father was educated in Scotland up to age 12 1/2. When my father finished the sixth grade in Scotland in 1927 his mother was told he had only two choices “the Army or the docks.” She was so horrified at this news that she reportedly answered angrily, “Och no, there is a third choice, America!.” So she decided finally to immigrate in October 1927 and they came on the SS Transylvania via Ellis Island. My father said, “All that I am or ever hope to be, I owe to America and to my angel mother.” Love wins out and endures.

I like to think if Mary Munro were looking down from heaven would see my wife and my daughter and daughter in law and say,:


    “Love conquers all. Faith never dies.
    One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh; but the earth abideth forever… The sun also ariseth….”

Mrs. Munro (Mary Munro) circa 1915 in Glasgow Scotland. She volunteered to work in a munitions factory after her two broths and brother in law were killed on the Western Front serving with the Highland Light Infantry.
Mary Munro circa 1920’s
family portrait March 17, 1915 St. Anthony’s. Her husband THOMAS MUNRO, SR was served in the trenches at Ypres. My grandfather had been listed as missing in action when my father was born on March 10. Mary Munro held off the baptism a few days until she heard the news her husband had been saved by Indian soldiers and his friend American Johnny Robertson.