Atomic Vets

[BLUEHAWK]

Guys -

I need some help to learn about my dad. Information about him that has been requested from his widow, my stepmother, has been asked for countless times (usually nicely) but never received... and I don't see it on the horizon.

My father served with you from 1944-46, best I can figure. He was stateside the whole time, bass drummer in military bands at West Point and Los Alamos. At Los Alamos he also drove the 9-passenger Checker limo up the old dirt road from Santa Fe (where my folks were married) to The Hill, carrying visitors between the two places. He volunteered as a conscientious objector, went to Fort Leonard Wood, then Camp Crowder (Neosho, MO, where he met my mother), then Los Alamos, then West Point, serving honorably.

His highest rank was a patch that showed a letter "T", with two stripes. I don't know what that means. What does it mean?

Dad got hooked up with an organization called, I think, "Atomic Vets". He was sent down to White Sands for that first explosion test of the Manhattan Project, and maybe some others. He went with the group because he kept having very bizarre medical problems his whole life not common in our family blood. He had two brain tumour surgeries, a couple of major gastro-intestinal catastrophies, some other serious stuff he never explained to me, and finally a triple by-pass. Only the heart trouble is expected in our family diseases.

I'm not getting anywhere asking family to share or tell me anything, am gettin' a lot older way too fast, and want to tell my own four kids about their grandfather's military service.

Can ya help me out here? Even a little something would be better than what I have. His name was Vernon Leigh Bell, so if anybody knew my dad, that would be a treasured bonus. He went on to become a Methodist minister, following what his father had done. I lost him in 1995.

Thanks, and thank YOU, so deeply, for what you did in that justifiable war. I know my dad was not a fighter, but he served and did what he could. I hope you won't hold it against me or him.