Our family is spread out all across the United States these days, and have been for years, but I can tell you the children and grandchildren of John M. "Windy" Betts are toasting his 110th Birthday today from Virginia, Utah, Idaho and California.
Born in a house just across the street from the Executive Mansion in Raleigh on Independence Day in 1906, he was a happy feller every one of the nearly 48 years I spent as his boy -- but none happier, in my memory, than when we were out in the middle of nowhere camping in a pine forest or on the water somewhere, hauling in halyards and flying along at, oh, 6 or 7 miles an hour tops. He left us in 1994, at age 88, having never uttered a complaint, and rarely an angry word.
You can see the joy this man carried with him in this photo from, I would guess, about 1913 or so -- future sailor, but already a splendid person. Happy Birthday, B.
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