Archive for the 'Marine Legends' Category

A low-carbohydrate diet may have health benefits that go beyond weight loss.

A new study shows that a low-carbohydrate diet was equally good as the weight loss drug orlistat (the active ingredient in Alli and Xenical) at helping overweight and obese people lose weight, but people who followed the low-carb diet also experienced a healthy drop in their blood pressure levels.

Read the entire article here on WebMD

A Dog Fit For The Pentagon

We need more marines like this in Washington to sort out the mess we have gotten ourselves into in the middle east. Posted with the greatest respect for the Marine Corps and our Armed Forces this picture signifies the kind of message that we at home are tired of all the BS from our government and want these wars to end.

Our country has gone to the dogs and maybe they can do a better job!

Image: my chocolate lab Duke by: Pets In Uniform

There are no such things as ex-marines as this article would have you believe, there are only "former active duty" marines. Once a marine always a marine.

Anyway, this guy was out in the wilderness with his wife and youngsters cutting firewood when a seriously starving mountain lion tried to make this marine a quick snack.

What this guy did to defend himself, with a chain saw no less, is the stuff marine legends are made of.

Semper Fi

Life Lessons From A Dog Named Lava

This dog is amazing – and marines are particular suckers for dogs and kids – in that order! 

"Hap" Hadley, born Alvan Cordell Hadley in 1895, was an American artist who gained world-wide acclaim specializing in pen and ink representations of popular subjects – he was especially adept at movie poster art in the 1930's. But if you asked him what was more memorable to him than a career in the movie industry he would modestly say it was his service in the United States Marine Corps during WWI that meant the most. He enlisted in the same place I did, St. Louis, MO, 51 years ealier in 1917. He was just 22 years old.

I have spoken in this blog many times about my uncle, SSgt Jack Rice, USMC, deceased. It was while arciving some of his Marine memorabilia that I discovered a rare gem, hidden away in Jack's personal papers a cartoon drawn by Hapley while enlisting in the USMC at age 22. Although Jack didn't get to know "Hap" Hapley until the late 60's, he followed his career as a movie poster artist and often spoke with him on the phone from his home in Los Angeles.

Jack and "Hap" finally met just before his death in 1976 and it wasn't until Jack's death in 1982 that I was made responsible (Jack's sister was my Mother) for putting his affairs in order. Among his most valued possessions I was amazed to find this cartoon rendering of the Marine Corps Recruiting Station in St. Louis reproduced in the August 5th, 1917 St. Louis Post Dispatch, Sunday Magazine Section, the place where Hap enlisted as a private in the Marine Corps during WWI. I was even more amazed to discover the artist of this little bit of cartoon mischief was none other than Alvan "Hap" Hapley himself!

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