John Babcock - After The First World War

After The First World War

With relatives in the United States, Babcock paid the $7 head tax and moved there in 1921. He received a Canadian Army pension that totaled $750 shortly after the conflict and took advantage of veteran vocational training in his native country to become an electrician. He ran a small light plant in his home neighborhood of Sydenham, and later had a career as an industrial supply salesman in the United States. He became a United States citizen in 1946 after serving in the United States Army and achieving the rank of sergeant. In so doing, he lost his Canadian citizenship, as Canadian law prior to 1977 limited dual citizenship. After the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 he attempted to sign up for active duty with the army's flying service (the United States Air Force was not formed until 1947), but was turned down for being too old. He therefore spent World War II in the United States Army and among his duty stations was Fort Lewis, located in Tacoma, Washington.

At the age of 65, Babcock became a pilot. As of 2006 he was in good mental and physical health, displayed by his ability to quickly recite the alphabet backwards, spell out his name in Morse Code, and take daily walks with his wife to keep in shape. At the age of 100 he wrote an autobiography titled Ten Decades of John Foster Babcock. It was distributed only to family and friends.

Babcock was married twice, first to Elsie, then to Dorothy, a woman nearly thirty years his junior whom he met when she was taking care of his first wife while she was dying. Babcock had one son (Jack Jr.), one daughter (Sandra), eight grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren. One grandchild, Matt, was an army dentist in Iraq during the Iraq War. John and Dorothy resided in Spokane, Washington, where Babcock lived from 1932 until his death. Babcock was not the only centenarian in his family; his younger sister Lucy died in July 2007 at the age of 102.