How about 82nd, as that's the patch that my grandmother had at home (grandpa died in 54, a year before I was born).
Why did grandma have an 82nd patch? She never said......... but, after she passed away in the late 60's, we found out that grandma was quite the hottie when she was younger. During the war, she was an air raid warden in San Anselmo in northern Ca..
Weird story - (as long as I'm sitting here, typing)...

My cousin, Hans Peter from Switzerland and I were traveling across the country in 1972 in a white 1966 Mustang convertible.
We were in a little diner in Louisiana - only one older lady across the diner, the cook, me and my cousin were there.

We sat.
She kinda waddled (she was big) over and made herself our neighbor.
 

She asks, Where are you from?
California.
Me, too.
Where in Ca?
Northern.
Oh... Me too.
Where in northern Ca?
Near San Francisco.
Me, too.
Where near San Francisco?
In San Anselmo.
Oh! Me too.
(Now.... I've done this to other people myself and it wasn't THAT funny!)
She says, Where in San Anselmo?
I say, On San Francisco Blvd.
"Oh, she says, me, too."
(Riiight! <snicker!>)
"Where?" I ask, "By the dairy?" (it was at the far end of the street)
"Yes" she says.
(Riiight! Sure!!)
She says she moved away in 1959, after her husband was killed by a falling tree branch.
(Riiight!! Good story!!!)
 

"Maybe you knew my grandparents? They lived there."  I said.

"Their last name was Heiden and they were the block's air raid wardens during "The War".

She thinks for a minute, then, there in the "middle of nowhere", Louisiana, just her and us in the diner.....

"Ahh! Yes!" she says, "I remember.... Alfred and Zinnia - they lived in the middle of the block......."

That was 100% correct.  Eerie!

Marc Salvisberg

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