Merritt as Child

These two pictures were taken in Thebes, IL. from 1920 to 1926. Merritt sitting on a calf with John Brown standing by. Merritt when he is about 7 years old.
This picture of mom and Merritt taken in the winter of 1928 and 1934, at a observation station and bunker, and a small three room living quarters, called West Secondery at Port Townsend, WA.
This is a picture of John, Merritt and mom taken beside a 1930 Chevy, quite possibly when they were on the way to visit dad's sister Mable Sprott in KS.
This is a picture of the children of Jesse A. Sprott/Mable Catherine Dale children ABT 1930 in Elko, KS. Merritt is the boy holding my brother John. Mable is my dads sister. On the corners there is a name "ELKO" so I'm assuming that this is a name of a place in KS and not the name of a photo studio.

The Army at Fort Warden, Port Townsend, WA., had a policy where their enlisted men that had a family could live and work there for a period of two years at a time. At the end of two years the living quarters was given to another solder that submitted a bid to live there. My folks lived there on two separate occasions. From information I can obtain the years were from 1928 to 1930 and 1934 to 1936. When their tour was up they had to find housing in the public housing sector. So from 1928 to 1936 my parents lived in six different houses, including the two times that they were able to live at West Secondery rent free. Have no fear though, the Army had a housing allowance that paid a portion of the rent, they had to pay in the public housing sector, they called it "Separate Rations.".

So Merritt is about eleven years old in this picture. Two other brothers were born there, Lloyd, 26 April 1934, and Glen, 8 July 1936. No such luck for me though, they say I was born in an apartment house. My birth certificates states the name of the place was called "The Jerry La Flore Apartments" on East 1st Street, Port Townsend, WA. I did have the opportunity to live there though. I was about three or four years old, and that would of been in 1934 or 1936, dads second tour of residence there. I recall throwing those round fire works off the side of that building behind Merritt where they would explode on contact. I don’t believe any of my tosses made it to the building. This building was a recon center where they had phones set up to bunkers closer to the cliffs where they had their coastal guns set up. These buildings were off limits to us kids, and there was always someone on duty to enforce that rule. I can not remember any instance of anyone of us getting into trouble.

Collage of Merritt S. Sanders Pictures from 1920 to 1936

Others can be seen on the Dale Kids Aging Photos