Back on the home front
For three generations of veterans in one family, returning to the US meant something different
As we prepare to mark Veterans Day Nov. 11, it is easy to forget that US servicemen and women returning home from wars have not always received a warm welcome.
If the public is divided over the conflict — bitterly so, as in the case of the Vietnam War or to a lesser degree, the war in Iraq — there may be no parades or celebrations such as those the nation bestowed on returning veterans from World Wars I and II.
My father, the late Thomas J. Fahey Jr., was a staff sergeant in the Army and a gunner on a B-17 bomber during World War II.
His son, my older brother Thomas J. Fahey III, served in the Air Force starting at the end of the Vietnam War. His daughter, Mikaela (Fahey) Felcher, served in the Army and the National Guard in Iraq and Kuwait at various times during the 2003-2011 conflict. Coming home was a different experience for all of them.
Thomas J. Fahey Jr., who passed away in 2017 at the age of 91, enlisted after graduating from Milton High and was a member of the 342nd Bomb Squadron, 97th Bomb Group, of the 15th Army Air Force. He was shot down during a mission over Croatia but survived, and the partisans in the area rescued him and got him back to his unit in Italy.
Flying missions in the B-17 — nicknamed by its crew “The Flying Flak Hole” — was a harrowing experience. “We cruised at altitudes between 27,000 and 30,000 feet,” he wrote in his self-published book, “and the temperatures in the plane got down to 60 below — and lower, since that’s as low as the gauge went.”
Fahey felt the warm embrace of a grateful nation in several ways when he returned to the US. One was using the expanded GI Bill to get a mortgage that allowed him to move his growing family into a new home in Randolph.
He recalled both small and large gestures of gratitude that came his way, including the times he entered bars in uniform while still under 21 and was not questioned. “The owner would say if you were old enough to wear a uniform and fight and die for your country, you were old enough to drink a beer,” he said.
He worked for the MBTA for many years and on weekends delivered a truckload of Sunday Globes to cities and towns all over New England.
We spent our summers in a cottage near a lake in Hanson, and he loved the water.
My dad was a celebrated storyteller and decided to preserve his war experience. My siblings and I eventually helped him turn his story into “One Man’s World War II Journal” — a book coordinated by my daughter, Meredith Fahey — as a gift to our family. He went on cable TV and spoke to veterans’ groups, and to the day of his death, he felt appreciated.
His son, Thomas J. Fahey III, 73, grew up in Randolph and was a longtime Stoughton resident who now lives in Hawaii. He chose to enlist in the Air Force after being drafted in 1972, and as a staff sergeant spent a year in Thailand and
three two-month deployments in Okinawa.
“We were sent into the war zone right out of tech school, the first class since World War II to do that,” he said. That meant learning a lot of things on the fly.
While in Thailand, he and his crew supported US military aerial operations that included Operation Linebacker II, a large-scale bombing of North Vietnam in December 1972.
“We worked 12-hour shifts seven days a week during it,” he said.
When returning home to his unit’s base in California between deployments, he was warned to lay low.
Three Massachusetts veterans and one National Guardsman are among those on Quincy College’s inaugural hockey team, which joined the Collegiate Hockey Federation’s New England Independent Conference this season.
Greg Simeone, 27, of Milton, Brendan Cabey, 26, from Westwood, and Robbie Cameron, 26, and John Early, 22 — both from Quincy — are among 21 members of the school’s newest team, the Granite. After a slow start, the team nabbed its first win Oct. 30, taking down Nichols College, 7-6.
Quincy College tapped longtime junior hockey coach Kyle Robertson to lead its new team. Matt Gibbons, varsity coach at North Quincy High School, came on as assistant coach.
Robertson said the team’s military men have taken a natural leadership position among their teammates, some of whom are first-year students fresh out of high school.
“They’re providing the young guys great leadership and, I’m sure, some great stories in the locker room,” Robertson said. “There’s definitely a lot of character on the team.”
He recalled a pep talk given by Simeone, a former Marine, during a hard-fought game against Babson College.
“The boys just needed a little bump. I was just getting them fired up,” Simeone said. “I told them we need to keep our heads up.”
Simeone said he and his teammates developed a strong rapport during preseason training, despite the nearly 10-year age difference between the oldest and youngest players.
He said his biggest hurdle has been just getting back into the mind-set of playing competitive hockey. When Simeone graduated high school in 2014, he assumed that was the last time he’d lace up his skates.
“It was a huge culture shock going back into all the drills and stuff,” Simeone said. “After about a week of figuring out how to actually run drills, how to be a player, and how to actually practice as a team, we started getting it down and it started jelling a lot better.”
Cabey said he holds onto the high values of collaboration and communication instilled by his time as a Marine.
“What I said when I enlisted was ‘Oh, it’s like being on the hockey team again,’” Cabey said, laughing. “And now that I’m out and playing hockey again, it’s like being in the military again.”
For National Guardsman Early, the season is something of a homecoming. A Quincy native, Early grew up playing for the city’s youth hockey teams — cutting up the same ice he does with the college team.
“All the memories come up from the past, and it’s good to be back there,” Early said. “I love that rink.”
In high school, he played under Gibbons, who personally invited him to join the new college team. Fitting another activity into his tight schedule was a “long shot” at first, Early said, but the opportunity to play competitively again was enough motivation to make it work.
Cameron, another Quincy local who served in the Navy, said he was proud to play hockey in his city again. Cameron also played under Gibbons before enlisting and said that connection is part of what drew him to the Granite.
“I woke up to a text from him, probably like six months ago, and he was like ‘Hey, do you want to play college hockey?’” Cameron said. “Yeah, of course.”