The subject of this project is Harvey Horace Haines, CW02 U.S. Navy (retired), and Great-Granduncle of this site's administrator. His sense of duty to his country was immense – he served in the Navy Reserves in World War I as an enlisted man, and then in 1942, having been made a Chief Warrant Officer, he volunteered to activate himself once more and boarded the USS President Adams, bound for Japan. He served in World War II until he sustained an injury, at which time he recovered in California before reporting back to his reserve post in Ossining, New York.

               

              He adopted and cared for this author’s grandfather, his namesake Harvey Wilcox, when Harvey Wilcox’s father was in a fatal sledding accident. Harvey W. and his two brothers were subsequently abandoned by their mother, at which time Harvey Haines and his wife Mabel Haines (nee Wilcox) stepped up to care for them.

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                The spirit of Harvey Haines is powerful. It endures these many years since his death in 1985, through the generational line of Harvey Wilcox, and through his own written word. Harvey Haines kept a journal from January 1st, 1929, to December 31st, 1935, in which he dutifully transcribed a note every single day. Ahead of his time, these notes often fall into Twitter-length character limits, and read like a daily feed. 

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                Harvey Wilcox kept it for many years until his death in 2017, at which time he bequeathed it to this author, his granddaughter. This author has begun the work of digitally cataloging it for her own benefit and found herself growing fonder and fonder of the memory of Harvey Haines as she lives his (frankly, often mundane) daily footsteps. 

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                What follows is the daily life of Harvey Haines, dutifully transcribed from his Great-Grandniece, Marie A. Swift, Staff Sergeant, U.S. Army (veteran).