Marriage and Family Life
Following his appearances at the last bond tour, John Bradley married his childhood sweetheart, Betty Van Gorp, settled down in Antigo, had eight children, and was active in numerous civic clubs. He rarely took part in ceremonies celebrating the flag raising, and by the 1960s avoided them altogether. He fulfilled his lifelong dream by buying and managing his own funeral parlor, but was tormented by memories of the war. Betty says he wept in his sleep for the first four years of their marriage and kept a large knife in a dresser drawer for "protection". He also had many flashbacks of his best friend Iggy, Ralph Ignatowski, who was captured and tortured by Japanese soldiers. Bradley never could forgive himself for not being there to try and save his friend's life.
Read more about this topic: John Bradley (Navy)
Famous quotes containing the words marriage, family and/or life:
“And what if my descendants lose the flower
Through natural declension of the soul,
Through too much business with the passing hour,
Through too much play, or marriage with a fool?”
—William Butler Yeats (18651939)
“Of all the vices, lewdness is the worst; of all the virtues, family duty is the first.”
—Chinese proverb.
Rhyme.
“Innocence is lovely in the child, because in harmony with its nature; but our path in life is not backward but onward, and virtue can never be the offspring of mere innocence. If we are to progress in the knowledge of good, we must also progress in the knowledge of evil. Every experience of evil brings its own temptation and according to the degree in which the evil is recognized and the temptations resisted, will be the value of the character into which the individual will develop.”
—Mrs. H. O. Ward (18241899)