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John "Jake" Gaudino

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Our grandparents came from the northern part of Italy. They came here about 1915, and they had two sons, my dad and his brother Pete. They were wine people so they bought a home in La Crescenta [Calif.] and had a few vines and made their own wine. My dad got married to a young […]
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Both of our parents were very discipline-oriented. Not to the point where we feared them, but to the point where we knew if we did something wrong–and yes we were taught right from wrong–that we would be subject to retaliation. And, yes, we were put under the strap once in a while, but not real […]
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I was born a jaundiced baby and the doctor said “Well, you’re going to have to get some more red corpuscles in him.” And he said, “You’re not going to like this, but the only way I can recommend that is you’ve got to get some red wine in him.” That was the prescription. So […]
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He was a rascal. When we were young, my mother, if she wanted to make a dessert she’d bake a cake, a one-egg white cake with white frosting. So she got to the point with my sister, “Gloria, you’ve got to learn how to bake. I’ll show you how to make a one-egg cake.” Well, […]
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This was Depression time. And both my mom and dad were Catholic and they wanted to raise the kids Catholic, and they felt the best way to do that and was to put us into a parochial school. So at that time Mary Star of the Sea didn’t have a kindergarten, so we went to […]
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You know when you take your driver’s license test you get an exam, and if you miss more than three you’ve got to come back? I think he had to come back once at 16. The only way I found out about it was my mother, as I remember, happened to mention it one time. […]
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Bob and I were thrown into an interesting situation. In the service, I ended up flying B-29s and he ended up a navigator on B-29s. I wanted as many people and as many propellers around me that I could get, and so I opted for multi-engine. I went to Fort Sumter, New Mexico, and spent […]
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After the service, Bob had another good friend locally by the name of Richie Taylor. Richie Taylor was a policeman, he went into law enforcement, and before Richie finally got started Bob bought a Jeep — we were attached to Jeeps in the service. After he got discharged, he got a Jeep and said, “Richie, […]
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When they asked me, “Do you want to be discharged?” “How soon?” I enjoyed my time in the service but I wanted to go to college. And all of my friends, most of them had gone to USC, and I got into the discharge center and found out that I could go to college and […]
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We didn’t communicate that much. My parents just said that Bob likes it back there and what he’s doing. And then when he got some kind of a degree, which is tenure or something? He told his mother about that. He just said, “Well, I’ve been granted tenure” and so on. I don’t think she […]
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CHAPTERS

Introduction
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Final Note
credits