Military legacy continues for local family
Matriarch ‘war bride’ turns 100
Sometimes war has legacies with a positive loving side. That’s the case with Josephine and Harold Dean of Pontiac, who met at a Naples, Italy, telephone company. Harold — an American soldier — was doing telephone work for the U.S. Army at the company where Josephine worked.
“They met while he was working on the cables outside the company,” says Josephine’s daughter Rita Hupka, who shared a cherished photo of her parents when they were first featured in the Oakland Press in June of 1946.
After that meeting, and subsequent dates, the couple was married in Italy October 14, 1945, surrounded by her family. Then in May, 1946, Josephine (Giuseppina Descloux) Dean became the first American War Bride to arrive in Pontiac, Mich, according to her daughter.
Josephine and Harold enjoyed 60 years of marriage, being active in the St. Michael’s Parish Church in Pontiac, until Harold’s passing 15 years ago.
But the military legacy doesn’t end there. Years later Josephine’s daughter, Rita, married Frank Hupka and they settled in Waterford. Frank also served in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam era. Eventually, Frank and Rita had a daughter, Teresa, a graduate of Waterford Mott High School and Michigan State University.
Teresa chose to enter the military as well and was recently promoted to Lieutenant Colonel (LTC) in the U.S. Army.
At Teresa’s pinning ceremony, her grandmother pinned on her new rank, while her father placed her rank on her patrol cap. It’s an honor Josephine — who turned 100 years old on Sept. 19 of this year — cherishes deeply.
And rightly so. With an impressive military career underway, Teresa’s accomplishments and service would surely awe her grandfather as well.
Now stationed at Fort Gordon in Augusta, Ga., Teresa earned a doctorate in physical therapy at Georgia Southern Armstrong University and works in the Veterans Administration Hospital in Augusta.
“And when COVID hit,” her mother Rita said, “Teresa was assigned to the 807 Medical Command in San Antonio, Texas, and assisted the mission of command of the medical teams who were deployed throughout the US.”
From that first meeting at a telephone company in Naples, Italy, during war torn years, to assisting in medical efforts during the U.S.’s first pandemic in more than 100 years, the legacy of military service in this one local family is certainly something to commend.