Small-Town Ambition, Big-Time Career

Danna Lorch’s recent rewarding feature on rural area Princetonians brought to mind a college buddy of my dad, Rock Semmes ’44. Dad graduated among the accelerated war classes, starting active duty in 1943 and entering combat in France in June 1944. He did service in a battery of 8-inch howitzers as forward observer — a duty (often inside hostile territory) that can bring war right up close and personal. Mom later confided that it was years into the marriage before his screaming nightmares and wide-eyed waking in cold sweats finally stopped. Dad never told us war stories, and Mom suggested (aside to us) that this was self-preservation for him.

But Dad did share college stories, including one about a good friend, a guy originally from Wyoming (the town of Gillette as I recall, but memory is not my strong suit and even the man’s name evades me now). Dad said the man’s plan was law school and a return to Wyoming, fully intending to live out his days as a simple “country” lawyer back in his hometown.

The man indeed returned to his hometown. In time he unintentionally became a national coal law authority (not by design, but by circumstance, coal being king in Wyoming). He jetted all over the country as the “go-to” attorney for legal issues involving coal. Dad loved telling us that story again and again, about the simple ambition of his humble “small-town lawyer” friend. That story beats the inherent terror of any war story hands down, and it’s still a hoot.