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Fifty years ago this week, five young Boy Scouts and their scout master strode out onto Route 30 from the trail that led to Mt. Morris. The trail in those days was located across from the Waukesha Cabins, now owned by Jim and Mary Radimer. The scouts were returning from an overnight encampment at a rustic log camp somewhat removed from the main trail and close to the Mt. Morris Summit.

The scout master was a wonderful fellow by the name of Jack Alexander. In 1893 Jack’s grandfather, Jabez Alexander, had purchased the famous Uncle Mart Moody Hotel known as Redside Camp (after the brook that flows across Route 30 into the lake next to the new home presently being built by Gerald Landry).The Alexanders changed the name to Waukesha and successfully managed it for 56 years before selling it to Donat Richer in 1949, a sale which included 450 feet of lake frontage. The mountain cabin was owned by Percy Alexander, Jack’s father, and Jack used a trip to the cabin as part of the motivational technique, i.e. the five scouts in his troop (Lions Club Troop 23) with the best yearly advancement record got to accompany Jack on a three-day trip and the opportunity to overnight at the cabin.

I was one of these Boy Scouts on that day along with Harvey Tebo, Brainard Beausoleil, Howard Elilhorpe and I believe Ted Stiokas. (Both Harvey and Brainard went on to become Eagle Scouts, one of the highest ranks attainable.) That same initiative propelled both to obtain college degrees (not as common in those days) and to become highly successful in their chosen careers.

The point of all this is that as we walked down the road toward the Alexander home, we were met by Jack’s mother, Aurore. I remember so well that she was totally distraught and blurted out that Pearl Harbor had been attacked by the Japanese and that most of our naval fleet had been destroyed and many Americans killed and wounded. I remember that we Boy Scouts in our naivete couldn’t comprehend their concern. In fact, I remember clearly Howard Elilhorpe saying, “Pearl Harbor? Where is that? We’ll wipe out those Japs in a week!” That week turned into four years. All four scouts would enlist to “fight in this righteous war against an evil enemy” as they turned 17 years of age (Harvey even missed his graduation ceremony being called up just before his senior academic year ended).

If we weren’t aware of the seriousness of Mrs. Alexander’s shocking news, several Tupper men were painfully aware of the gravity of the situation. Two, Frank McLear and John Parent, were aboard the USS West Virginia and the USS Pennsylvania sunk in the harbor by successive waves of Jap bombers. Sgt. George Goff was in the Philippines. He fought through the siege of Corrigidor, somehow survived the grim death march from Bataan and spent nearly four years in a Japanese prison camp. “Nearly a thousand Tupper Lake men and women were to serve with the armed forces during the fours years of World War II. They suffered nearly 10 percent casualties in killed, wounded, missing in action and prisoners of war.”

This next Saturday, Dec. 7, 1996, marks that “Day of Infamy.” It is a day that we should give pause and remember the remarkable generation that fought in that war, that defeated the Nazis and Fascists and saved the world for democracy, fueled a postwar economic boom, outlasted Communism and ventured into space. That generation born roughly between 1907 and 1927 is now 69 to 89 years old. They must now be judged as parents, for their offspring have grabbed the reins of the community and the nation and will determine its future direction. However briefly, remember that heroic and historic generation when this Saturday, Dec. 7, appears on your calendar.