A Policeman's Life Remembered

FOREWORD

by Linnie Miller

My husband and I have been married for almost fifty-

eight years, to the date of this writing. We were married in National City, California in May of 1960, when we were both just eighteen years old and very inexperienced in matters of life. I have grown to love my husband with all my heart and am very proud of the brave, Christian man he has become.

In addition to having served his Country and Community as a Police Officer, my husband also served in the U.S. Navy, from 1958 to 1964 and is a Disabled American Veteran. Sometime in the 1960’s while cruising through the Formosa Straights, on the U.S.S. Belle Grove, a Naval troop carrier,

a plane buzzed his ship, creating a sonic boom. The Officer of the Deck, thinking they had been fired upon, sounded General Quarters, the alarm for All hands to man their battle stations. As my husband was running for his battle station, the ship tossed in a rough sea and he fell backwards onto a steel ladder, severely injuring his

back. He was paralyzed from the waist down and was later transported to the Naval Hospital in San Diego, California, where he lay in traction, recovering from his injury, for approximately six weeks.

Some years later, my husband developed Spinal Arthritis and Degenerative Disc Disease from his service connected injuries and was given disability status by the Veteran’s Administration. Throughout his career and during his retirement years, he has had to endure the pain, discomfort and limited mobility caused by his injuries; but through it all, he has kept a cheerful, positive outlook on life, for which I am grateful.

BIOGRAPHY

I was born June 4, 1941, Ralph Theodore Miller, to Jeanne Hattie Davis and Joseph Isaiah Miller, who were joined in matrimony sometime in the year 1938. My mother was 15 years old and my father was 21 years of age. Approximately 2 years after their marriage, my only

sibling, Donna Jean was born to them. Two years after that, I was born in a four room house, located on the edge of Groveport Village, Franklin County, Ohio, which is located approximately 20 miles from Columbus.

After several years, we moved to a nice house, located behind the Groveport Creamery, just down the road from my grandparents on my father’s side, Ralph Dill Miller and the former Mattie Reid. My grandmother on my mother’s side, lived just 6 or 7 blocks away. Her name was Arvilla R. Davis and her husband was Lucius Calvin Davis, who had already passed away before I was born. I know little about him, other than he was one of the country’s first electricians and sometime during his career, helped to wire the White House in Washington, D.C.

My grandmother, Mattie Miller, died from breast cancer when I was very young and I barely have any recollection

of her. However, I do remember quite vividly the night she died, because it was the first time I had ever seen my father cry. My grandma Davis was quite another matter. I knew her intimately and loved her dearly. She was the strongest, kindest person I have ever met. She had solid white hair, which was always combed and curled, wore earrings and

high heeled shoes all the time and I never saw her when she wasn’t neatly dressed. Her husband, Lucius died of what was probably a stroke, after being bed-ridden for several years, during which time my grandmother waited on him hand and foot. In addition, they had six children that she cared for and this was during the Great Depression, when this whole country was poverty stricken. My grandma Davis worked as an insurance agent and was a Notary Public, at an office just down the street from her home. She also had the upstairs of their home remodeled into an apartment, which she rented out for additional income. As far as I

know, Gram Davis, as we all called her, never had any romantic interest, after Grandpa Davis passed on and she never remarried. She died in a nursing home in Ohio at the ripe old age of 94. I believe she was one the finest women I ever knew.

I didn’t know or spend much time with grandpa Miller. He was a contractor and a carpenter by trade and he was considered financially well off. He was a huge gruff man that everyone in the family seemed to be afraid of. He

was over six feet tall and weighed around 300 pounds. Apparently he had been a strict disciplinarian as a father and I heard many stories from my dad about him. My aunt Mildred Nelson, his only daughter and the youngest of four children, apparently had her father wrapped around her little finger as they say and it was well known that Aunt Millie could get anything she wanted from Pop, as all

his children called him. I can remember several times as

a child, my aunt Millie taking me to grandpa Miller’s house and bluntly informing him that I needed some school clothes and asked him, how much money he had. Grandpa would then take out his wallet, which appeared to be bulging with greenbacks, take out several large bills and hand them

to aunt Millie, with a big grin on his face. Aunt Millie and myself would then go downtown, shopping for school clothes.

All my memories as a child growing up in Groveport, were wonderful, save for the time I nearly died from Pneumonia. I was very young, probably 3 or 4 years old

and I have a vague memory of being high above my parent’s bed, looking down on a scene, where I was lying in their

bed, covered up and my mother was sitting in a rocking chair, watching over me. I suppose that is what would be described today, as a near death experience. I really don’t know but I was told that I nearly died.

The house that we lived in behind the Creamery had one bedroom downstairs, which was my mother and father’s

and two bedrooms upstairs for me and my sister. There was a living room, kitchen and bathroom downstairs. The house had a large yard and a barn that would be used later on, by my father and uncle Harry Miller to go into business together, building of all things, hobby horses. There was

a railroad track that ran not too far from our house and I have many memories of lying in bed and listening to the passenger trains traveling by, late at night, with their whistle blowing and the clacking sound of their wheels, piercing

the quiet night air. When they came by during the day and I was outside playing, I would run over and wave at them as they whizzed by. Sometimes I would daydream about being

on the train and traveling to faraway places and imagined myself in numerous childhood fantasies. The fact is, my memory is flooded with pleasant and momentous times, in that house I spent the first eight years of my life in and I will never forget the happy times that I experienced there.

In addition to our grandparents, there was a great number of aunts, uncles and cousins prevalent in and around Groveport and the Columbus area and Sunday afternoon gatherings at Gram Davis’ house are among my most pleasant memories. There was always lots of joking, laughing and pleasant conversation, along with the most wonderful smell of frying chicken, mixed with cool summer breezes, that filled the air outside Gram’s house, as we played, waiting to be called to dinner.

Other wonderful times I had, was playing and working on uncle Squire and aunt Millie Nelson’s farm, located just outside Groveport. They had four children, Johnny, Bobby, Richard and Joanne. They were all younger, except for Johnny, who was about the same age as me. I remember once, on the school playground, where they showed outdoor movies on Saturday night if the weather was nice,

Johnny got into a fight with a boy that was quite a bit bigger than he was. The boy had Johnny down on the ground and was getting the best of him. I ran to my cousin’s aid and grabbed the boy around the neck from behind and pulled him off of Johnny. At that time, the boy knocked me down and was on top of me and the last I saw of Johnny, he was running toward home. I learned a good lesson that day.

Looking back, I almost wish I could have spent the rest of my life in Groveport, but as fate would have it, that was not to be. My father was having difficulty finding work, which is usually the case in a small town and when I was

around eight years old, my uncle Russell Miller, who was employed by the Pennsylvania Railroad, managed to get my dad a job working with him. However, the only hitch was, naturally we had to move to Indianapolis, Indiana, where my