... we discovered the birth date on his driver license didn't match his military record, which didn't match his social security, which didn't match other family records. He was a bit free with his names too which is still a family tradition. I remember being very confused as a child. One summer's family reunion you'd be calling a relative this, and the next summer they'd be somebody else. My two siblings who worked in Hollywood both have different screen names than they use today. Nobody is going to find them on IMDB.
In the days before computers you were as old or as young as you claimed to be, especially in the Wild West.
My grandpa was vain at times. Sometimes he'd ask me to tell people I was his son, not his grandson. Mostly to women he'd met after my grandma died. His girlfriends had no idea how old he was.
I'm sure the record-keeping in England was better, but I figure my grandpa was about the same age as Alfred Hitchcock, which was close enough. During World War Two he was a captain and then a major in the Army Air Force. He wanted to fly but they put him to work keeping people deemed essential to the war effort out of jail.
If a crazy mathematician, rocket scientist, or celebrity selling war bonds goes amok and runs down the street naked and is picked up by the local police, or is caught up in a sweep of local gay bars, then my grandpa had a big black government car with a driver and a "Get out of Jail Free" card to impress the local authorities.
He wanted to fly, but in the military you've got no choice. You do what they tell you to do.
During his military service, some of which probably involved sketchy activities, he somehow learned everything that was known about titanium. After the war he switched careers from handsome Air Force fixer-officer to civilian engineer. He was most proud of the work he did for the Apollo project. A few of the titanium parts in those moon exploration machines are his. He made them. He touched them. Some of his metal parts are on the moon and in the Smithsonian.
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