Autobiography of Michael George Markulis (eBook)

Michael George Markulis (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2021 | 1. Auflage
298 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
978-1-6678-1245-8 (ISBN)

Infos

This autobiography is a compilation of many adventures true stories of the author 90 year journey of life. He takes you on an adventurous journey of his life as a police office, as a soldier in the U.S. Army during the Korean War. As an educator in colleges and an exciting life of a husband, father, grandfather to his beloved family. You will not be disappointed.

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Michael George Markulis is a 90 year old author and invites you to join him on his life's journey spanning over nine decades. From the great depression to the present. His autobiography are stories where he experienced joy, happiness, heartaches, hardships and sadness. But most of all stories of his love of family, love of life, that the Lord allowed him to experience. Born in 1931 in Mutual Utah to immigrant Greek parents moving to several states where his father could find employment. The depression years created many hardships for the family. His autobiography includes moving to California, attending schools, several colleges earning an Associate of Arts and a Bachelor of Arts Degrees in Police Science and Public Administration. His autobiography includes a beautiful love story marrying his childhood sweetheart and raising two beautiful children. A thirty-seven year career with the Los Angeles Police Department, working many assignments such as patrol, vice, narcotics, gangs, homicide and community relations. While working full time on the LAPD, he taught as a prat time instructor for 30 years in several community colleges in Los Angeles. Upon retirement from LAPD he was hired by the university of Southern California as the Director of the prestigious Delinquency Control Institute under the School of Public Administration. His book reiterates many firsts in law enforcement. There are several stories in his book about his service in the Army during the Korean War.

Textauszug

CHAPTER 1:

THE BEGINNING

Adventure, Wonderful Life: Legacy for My Family. This is my story.

I was encouraged to write this Legacy by my son, Mark Michael Markulis, as he believed I had a story to tell.

The story begins when I was born on October 18, 1931, to Terpsihori and George Markulis. I was born in a coal-mining shantytown of Mutual, Utah. My father was a coal miner who came to the United States in 1912 to work the coal mines of Utah. Through a contractual marriage arrangement between his family, Marcoulakis and my mother’s family, the Galanis family, my father being in the United States and my mother living in Greece, was arranged. The marriage was decided upon and set in concrete. My father went back to Greece in 1929 where he met his wife to-be for the first time. After a short courtship, they were married on June 29, 1929, on the island of Crete.

The Galanis family was well off with servants to do all the chores. My mother was pretty spoiled as she did little if any chores at all. She didn’t even know how to cook. She believed that she was marrying a rich Greek coal miner from America.

After a short honeymoon, they left Greece for her new land, the United States. Upon arriving they traveled by bus and train to Sunnyside, Utah. My mother was totally disillusioned upon seeing the Rocky Mountains and barren land that was to be her new home. She gave up her beautiful home and family in Greece to live in, what she believed, to be a godforsaken land. She would no longer be able to see the beautiful Aegean Sea and talk to her family. My mother had two sisters and a brother whom she loved very much, and not to be able to talk to them anymore was unimaginable.

Coal mining was a dangerous occupation, as the miners would work from sun-up to dusk and run the risk of getting black-lung disease, as well as getting hurt or killed in a mine disaster of some sort.

My brother John was born on March 29, 1930 in Sunnyside. I was born in October 1931. I had three other brothers, Nick born in 1933, Chuck born in 1937, and James born in 1947. Nick was also born in Utah. Chuck was born in Pennsylvania and James was born in California.

We grew up as kids during the Depression years moving from one coal mining town to another. My brother John and I, being only a year and a half apart in age, were inseparable. I would tag along with John wherever he went. We were mischievous kids getting in to all kinds of trouble. We had the Rocky Mountains in our backyard and were constantly playing in the mountains or in the river that flowed through our town of Helper.

In our childhood years and living in these small towns where there was a strong Greek influence, our parents spoke to us in Greek. We communicated in Greek and slowly started picking up English as we got older. We were more fluent in the Greek language. Of course, in our later years and after the death of our parents where there was no need to converse in Greek, we began to forget our Greek. I can still speak Greek if I have to and the language does seem to come back. In 2012, I took my family to Greece for two weeks and talking to the Greeks there, my Greek started coming back to me.

There were many times that we almost drove our mother to a nervous breakdown. John being the oldest got the blunt of our scolding’s and whippings as my mother and father blamed him for us getting into trouble. There are many stories which can be told about those early years. I am talking about being four, five, six years old and older. With the Rocky Mountains in our backyard, a river running through our town, we always had things to do. In Pennsylvania, there was a large pond full of quicksand that we would find ourselves going to, playing or fishing there.

As a result of the Depression, our family moved several times in Utah and then to Pennsylvania where we lived for several years. After learning that the coal mines there were having a difficult time, we moved back to Utah where my dad bought his own coal mine.

In 1943, my father had to have eye surgery, as he had glaucoma in his right eye and it had to be surgically removed. My father had to go to California for the eye surgery. He left with my brother John for California and stayed with a Greek family whom my parents had known for many years.

Several months after the eye surgery, my father sent for the rest of the family to join him in San Pedro, California. My father was not only an excellent coal miner but he was also an outstanding cook. He got a job being the night cook of a café owned by the Greek family that he stayed with during the surgery. At first, we had a hard time adjusting to the new life in California, especially my brothers and I as we had left all of our friends in Utah and now starting in new schools.

It didn’t take long to get re-adjusted and make new friends. My father purchased his first home in the Barton Hill area, which was in the lower economic area of San Pedro. It was the first and only time I had ever experienced discrimination because of being Greek. I was called Greaser, among other slanderous names.

The Barton Hill community was pretty much a culturally mixed area, as was the town of San Pedro. There was a strong influence of Mexican, Black, Italian, and Slavic races. There were some Greek families, but unlike the Greek influence in the towns where we grew up as kids in Utah.

My brother John went to a different grammar school from the rest of us as he continued to use the address of the Greek family where he and my father stayed for the eye surgery. John attended Cabrillo Avenue Elementary School and the rest of us attended Barton Hill Elementary School, which was only a block from our home.

For the first time, John and I were not together and soon we had different friends. I was twelve years old and John was now thirteen. It was strange not having him around during the day and we seemed to now drift apart because of this separation. We all excelled in school. We were all very athletic and got involved in sporting activities in San Pedro.

The Barton Hill Elementary School had a large playground that stayed open until 9:00 p.m. on weekdays and Saturdays. The playground was heaven-sent for us as we had some place to go after school and take part in all the activities. As the Rocky Mountains of Utah was our playground, the Barton Hill school playground substituted for those mountains. We spent many hours on this playground.

The playground director organized the Barton Hill Athletic Club, also known as the Barton Hill Cougars. I along with brothers Nick and Chuck became members as did Jimmy later on. The Director formed leagues and we played each other and even played other athletic teams in San Pedro and surrounding cities.

Over the years, Barton Hill Cougars produced some great athletes, excelling in high school and college sports.

I played baseball, basketball, and football for the Barton Hill Cougars. My best sport was baseball. When I got to San Pedro High School, I made the Junior Varsity as a tenth grader and Varsity my junior and senior years. I also played two years of Varsity Football.

My brother John was an outstanding football player. He broke his back his first year. The doctor told him that he would never be able to play football again. He went out for the Varsity team his junior and senior years, making first string right guard. John made First String All League those two years.

Brothers Nick and Chuck played football in high school also. Both made All League with Chuck making All City first string. Nick and Chuck both got football scholarships. Nick to the University of Oregon and Chuck to the University of Washington. Chuck had to attend Everett Junior College in Everett Washington. He played football there making “All American” on the Junior College level.

While going to school, I had several jobs. The first was a paper route delivering the San Pedro News Pilot. The second job I had was at Bernard’s Dress Shop in San Pedro as a stock boy. I was fourteen years old and earned ten dollars a week working an hour and a half after school and all day on Saturday. Brother John had the job at the dress shop before I did. He quit to take a job at Todd Naval Shipyard in San Pedro. The owner sold the dress shop and I was laid off. The bookkeeper at the shop told me that she was taking unemployment out of my check and told me to go the Unemployment Office. I did as she suggested and found out that I qualified for unemployment. I received fifteen dollars a week now, making five dollars more than when I was working.

After several months, I also began to work at DiCarlo’s Bakery earning one dollar an hour. DiCarlo’s bakery was a Union Shop so those of us going to school worked as Scabs. It was a good job for a fifteen-year-old. I would clean bread pans, dump flour into the flour bins, and sweep and clean up. When the Union representative would come into the bakery, we would go hide in the warehouse so we would not be seen. I worked ten, twenty, thirty hours a week while going to school. After school on weekdays and all day on Saturdays and Sundays. I was making pretty good money for being just fifteen. I believe this was around 1946. The war had just ended. The money that John...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 1.11.2021
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Biografien / Erfahrungsberichte
• ISBN-10: 1-6678-1245-9 / 1667812459
• ISBN-13: 978-1-6678-1245-8 / 9781667812458