Dan L Kenny

Stories about Dan L Kenny

My Uncle Phil told me this story about my dad, on how he made up new words and names for everyone. It is actually, "Bosco to YOU, Pasquale"! (accent on the word You) As I recall, we would respond to one of our brothers that way when he tried to make me do a job HE was supposed to do. My mother would never let us swear, or say vulgar words ("vulgarity is the door to impurity", as she would say). So, we had to make up our own little sayings to substitute for the use of "bad" words. I'm not sure where "Pasquale" came from, but, there could have been some comic book, or some movie, that had that character's name, and my brothers or sisters picked up on it. I coined "piggy dogs" or "doggie pigs" - from the German word Swinehunt. To this day, I say those words when something goes wrong.

Phil

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My Uncle Jerry told me this story about my dad....

It was during WW2. My dad was stationed in near Naples, Italy at that time. His brother David was stationed in Paris, and his brother, Jerry was just north of London. Jerry had mentioned to my dad that he had a pass for a few days, so my dad said lets all meet in Paris to spend the time with David. My dad ended up talking to his commanding officer and got a furlough, but the problem was, he had no way to get to Paris. Somehow or another, he was able to forge an officers signature for the round trip flight, for that period of time.

They all did manage to get together in Paris, and Jerry told me how totally impressed he was with Dan on how well he could speak with the locals in Paris. They met a couple somewhere and were even invited to their home for dinner who had a daughter and lets just say that they were ALL very impressed with Dan and his ability to communicate with them, through he wasn't fluent, he defiantly got by just fine.

When Dan got back, he ended up getting away with his escapades with no problems.

Back home, my mom's brother Danny was talking "smack" about Dan and even fixed my mom up with someone one else. She actually wrote Dan a "dear John" letter breaking off their engagement.

But while speaking of languages, my dad could also speak Italian with no problems and got along quite well with the Italian people and maybe got along with them too good. In fact, while stationed in Rome, he met a girl there and they fell in love. I am not fully sure what happened, but my guess is that he did some soul searching and he stopped seeing the Italian girl.

All ended well though, cause when my dad returned, they were engaged again and my dad ended up punching Danny out.

And while on this subject, my son and I were in Rome a few years back, as Nick was just completing his 2 year mission there. We were on a bus to the catacombs and I happened to look out the window and thought I saw my oldest sister, Susan, but an Italian version of her. This lady really looked similar to her. I quickly said to Nick, "Look at that lady, who does that look like?" His response was aunt Susan. This lady would have been about the right age, but what are the odds of this? I dismissed it from my mind.......for the most part.

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Another story that my mother told me, while he was serving in Europe, my dad was commanded to do a task that was senseless, it had something to do with marching his men across the marsh, or through some mud. Many of Dan's men already had foot rot, from previous marches and battles. My dad refused to order his men to do this and was bucked back to Private, but later, his rank of Staff Sergeant was returned.

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There was another little story Phil told about Dan. Their brother Jerry was poor-mouthing to Dan on how he could afford only one TV and how many clothes he had to buy for his children, etc. Unbeknownst to Jerry, Dan had arranged for the St. Vincent de Paul Society to bring a complete Thanksgiving dinner to be delivered to Jerry's house --very embarrassing.

This story and more coming soon...