His name was Conrad G. Tolladay, and he was my uncle, though I never met the man. He was also a second lieutenant in the United States Army Air Corps. Before today if you had told me his name I would have said, “Conrad who?” Nobody in the family used his first name, everyone called him Jimmy. I only found out about his “real” first name by searching the internet for a photo. That’s also how I learned that on January 17, 1945, flying a P-38 named “Oh Kay” over Burma, he was shot down and never seen again. He was 24 years old.

But that is the end of his story.

Jimmy’s story begins on the 18th of September, 1919, in Madera California. He was the first born son of George and Selma Tolladay, and by all accounts was a bit of a joker. On family gatherings his name came up often enough, but the stories about him were always colored with sadness. He was well loved, and deeply missed.

Jimmy was brave, fun-loving, and at times a little reckless. He was raised to be a cowboy on a working cattle ranch, like my father and my uncle. Among other things this meant he could ride hard and shoot straight; the perfect thing for a fledgling Army Air Corps in need of fighter pilots. He had just turned 22 when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. He must have signed up for the service immediately afterwards, like a lot of other brave men and woman.

When I was a kid I used to always think that Uncle Jim would one day show up at our house full of epic stories of survival, telling us how he clawed his way out of the jungle to come back and be with his family. Now that I’m older I can see that he must have been very lonely in India, fighting an enemy he barely understood, for a country (China) he barely liked, in an airplane that was at times both thrilling and terrifying to fly.

Now, when I think of Jim, or any of the other 404,000 Americans who died for our country in that horrible war, I often wonder what they would have said if they had known what we have purchased with their sacrifice. Would they marvel at pro Football on color television sets? Would they stand up and cheer at the civil right movement, or would it fill them with anger and disdain? What would they think of rock and roll, the Vietnam War, or President Nixon’s criminal acts? Would they love Elvis, the Beatles? What would they think of the atomic bomb, or the British New Wave? Would they think the cost of their lives was too high a price for such trivial things, or would they be proud of what we have done with their payment?

Short of heaven, these things are lost to us, like their very lives. We’ll never know what they would think of the coming world because for them it stopped the day they stepped into their plane, or their ship, or their foxhole. All we have to carry their memories forward a few photographs, and family stories.

Thus it is fitting that one day a year we raise a flag and take the time to remember the price that they paid. These brave American souls paid a heavy price so that we can sit, sipping our coffees and browsing the internet. Try to remember in the coming days that your life, your livelihood, and your lifestyle are not free; they were paid for by somebody else, at a great personal cost.

Thank you Uncle Jimmy for your life, your stories, and your service.