Immigrating from Scotland, centenarian Mary Waddington helped in WWII war effort
The longtime Michigan Avenue resident will turn 100 years old on Monday and she's not the only one in her family who has reached the milestone. Her mother was 99 when she passed away and her two younger sisters Elenor and Janet will be 97 and 94, respectively, this year. She also had a cousin who lived to be 100 years old.
'We're hoping all the rest of us have all those good genes,' said daughter Penny Schultz.
Born in Glasgow, Scotland, as Mary Dickson, her father Matthew immigrated to the United States in 1926 to find work, bringing his parents, brother, wife and sister with him. They first settled in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, where Matthew worked as a gardener, with Mary and her mother following to America when she was two and a half years old.
After graduating high school in 1942, with the U.S. in the thick of World War II, she took a job at the Quonset Point Naval Air Station, located south of Providence along the Narragansett Bay. Working as one of its 'Rosie the Riveters,' she built parts for the wings, tails, and bodies of Navy aircraft stationed on aircraft carriers.
'I needed a job,' Waddington said, still possessing her job application. 'My mother heard of them needing workers. I went up and applied and got the job.'
Working nine-hour days, six days a week, Waddington would cut the plane parts from 10- to 12-foot sheets of metal. During her three years as a civilian worker, she had the highest efficiency rate in her shop.
It was also in the shop where she met her first husband, Niagara Falls native William Colling.
A graduate of the old Niagara Falls High School, Colling got involved with the war effort while in college in Chicago. He joined the Navy and worked at the Bell Aircraft plant in Wheatfield before being reassigned to Quonset Point. He worked with Mary in that shop until the war ended in 1945.
'He was here in Niagara Falls, I was there (in Rhode Island) and we missed each other,' Mary said.
They got married in Rhode Island in 1946 and moved back to Niagara Falls, living in the same Michigan Avenue house his grandparents built — and she still lives in. He went to the University of Buffalo to be an engineer while she became a full-time housewife for their five children, Bob, Sue, Penny, Claudia, and Mark.
As the kids were growing up, Mary was involved with the PTA, drove for Meals on Wheels, served as an elder and deacon of Pierce Avenue Presbyterian Church where she taught Sunday school for 35 years. After the church burned down in 2011, she started attending Lewiston Presbyterian Church and has not missed a Sunday Mass.
Only when Mary's children were old enough to take care of themselves did she get a job as a housecleaner.
Matt passed away at the age of 62. Seven years later, Mary was remarried to Tom Waddington, bringing three new stepchildren into the family. That marriage lasted for 23 years until he passed in 2013.
Those five children and three great-grandchildren have given her 11 grandchildren and 12 great-grandchildren, the majority still living in Niagara County and Western New York.
While Mary never dreamed of making it to 100, her eating habits and active lifestyle certainly helped. She was able to kayak and serve Meals on Wheels until the age of 93.
Still, Bob lives with his mother to take care of her, with Sue and Penny visiting frequently to help.
'I thank God every day for another day added to my life,' Mary said.
For Mary's birthday, the family and close friends will have a get-together at Lewiston Presbyterian Church today, also expecting a cake during the coffee hour that follows Sunday service. She already was recognized at the Robert Burns dinner held Jan. 25 at Frontier Fire Hall, with 'Happy Birthday' played on the bagpipes.
'That's what she likes most is having family around,' Schultz said. 'We'll let her rest on her birthday.'
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San Francisco Chronicle
4 hours ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
US military chaplaincy marks 250 years of providing spiritual support to service members
(RNS) — In 1775, a year before there was a United States and six weeks after the Continental Army was formed, George Washington made a declaration that has shaped the military ever since. 'We need chaplains,' he reportedly remarked, prompting action by the Continental Congress near the start of the Revolutionary War. The U.S. military chaplaincy marked 250 years on July 29 as the national military marked its own 250th anniversary in June. A week of celebrations includes a golf tournament at Fort Jackson in South Carolina, hosted by an organization raising funds for scholarships for family members of chaplains, and a sold-out ball nearby in Columbia. Meanwhile, across the globe, thousands of clergy in uniform continue to provide counsel and care to military members of a range of faiths or no faith. 'In times of peace and war, our chaplains have held fast as beacons of hope and resilience for our troops, whether enduring the brutal winter of Valley Forge, comforting the wounded and dying on the battlefields during the Civil War, braving trench warfare in World War I, storming the beaches of Normandy during World War II, marching the frozen mountains during the Korean War, slogging through the rice paddies and jungle battlefields of Vietnam or traveling the bomb-filled roads of Iraq and Afghanistan,' said retired Chaplain (Major General) Doug Carver, a former Army chief of chaplains in charge of the Southern Baptist Convention's chaplaincy ministries, at the denomination's June annual meeting in Dallas. A month later at the annual session of the Progressive National Baptist Convention in Chicago, Navy Chaplain J.M. Smith, the grandson of a former PNBC president, stood before delegates and described his just-completed tour as a Marine Corps command chaplain in Okinawa, Japan, and his plans to report to a ship in Norfolk, Virginia, to begin a tour of Europe and the Middle East and be promoted to lieutenant commander. 'My team and I have ministered to thousands of Marines, sailors, civilians and Japanese,' he said. 'We increased our chapel's membership from eight to 100. We incorporated spiritual readiness into our base's core curriculum.'' ___ Chaplains serve in hospitals, hospices and manufacturing plants, and while chaplaincy researchers see commonalities among them, there are also key differences in the military. All are involved in gaining the trust of people who are in their particular milieu, enabling them to think and sometimes pray through their times of greatest need and day-to-day struggles. An example of both the danger and the dedication of military service chaplaincy is the 1943 death of four chaplains — two Protestant, one Catholic and one Jewish — who helped save some of those aboard a World War II ship, turning over their life jackets and praying and singing hymns before it sank. All four were trained at Harvard University, then the site of the Army's chaplain training school, during a two-year wartime period. "It was a real defining moment,' said retired Gen. Steve Schaick, who served as Air Force chief of chaplains from 2018 to 2021, and in the same role for the Space Force from 2019 to 2021. 'The stories that came from that really kind of highlighted chaplains at their best.' The Army's chaplaincy corps also includes religious affairs specialists and religious education directors. Some service members provide armed protection to unarmed chaplains and set up worship spaces in on-base chapels or makeshift altars on truck hoods in the field. For example, Berry Gordy, who later founded Motown Records, served as a private in the Korean War and played a portable organ and was known as a chaplain assistant, notes ' Sacred Duty,' a new comic book posted on the Army's website to mark the anniversary. While 218 chaplains served in the Revolutionary War, 9,117 chaplains served in World War II, according to the Army. Currently, the Army has 1,500 chaplains on active duty. The Navy Chaplain Corps, which began on Nov. 18, 1775, had 24 chaplains during the Civil War; 203 by the end of World War I; 1,158 at its height in 1990; and currently has 898 on active duty, according to the Navy. 'Today's Chaplain Corps includes Chaplains representing a multitude of faith groups, and the Chaplain Corps recruiting team is actively working to increase the Corps' diversity, with a special focus on increasing the number of women Chaplains in the Corps and the number of Chaplains representing low-density faith groups,' reads an Army historical booklet marking the Chaplain Corps' 250 years. Initially, U.S. military chaplains were Protestants. The first Catholic chaplains served in the Mexican-American War in 1846, and the first rabbi was commissioned in 1862 and served in the Civil War. The first Muslim chaplains were commissioned in the Army in 1993. The first Buddhist Army chaplain was named in 2008, followed by the first Hindu chaplain in 2011. Chaplain Margaret Kibben, acting chaplain of the House of Representatives and former chief of chaplains of the Navy — the first woman in that role — said the isolation and the immediacy of ethical decisions faced by military members, as well as a high level of confidentially, can make the work of military chaplaincy teams different from other settings where chaplains work. 'It's the one place that people can go where there's essentially a sanctuary around them, wherever they find themselves, a safe place to have somebody to talk to about a whole host of issues,' she said, adding that topics can include anything from supporting their families to handling combat responsibilities. 'How do you deal with those issues in a place where you're not going to look stupid, you're not going to look weak or unreliable because you have these doubts and you have these concerns — to have a place that you can go to ensure that you can get that off your chest?' Those private conversations often are not faith-filled, added Kibben, reflecting on her military career that began in 1986. 'What I realized later, 20, 30 years later, was that many service members have never learned the language of faith,' she said, citing terms like confession and forgiveness. 'So as a chaplain, we had to figure out our way around the lack of a lexicon of faith. How do you speak about grace to someone who doesn't have a clue how powerful grace is?' Another change, sparked by the efforts of Julie Moore, the wife of a military officer who served in the Vietnam War, was the Army's method for notifying the next of kin when a soldier died. Soon after a 1960s battle in that war, a chaplain and a uniformed officer began teaming up to knock on families' doors; prior to that time, the news arrived in a telegram delivered by a cab driver. The work of chaplains has sometimes been the source of church-state debates. For example, Michael 'Mikey' Weinstein of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, a nonprofit that advocates for separation of church and state in the U.S. military, has questioned what he viewed as proselytism in the chaplains' ranks. Meanwhile, conservative Christian organizations have voiced concerns about an antipathy against some Christians in military ranks. Karen Diefendorf, a two-time Army chaplain and a board member of the U.S. Army Chaplain Corps Regimental Association, which supports chaplains and their families, said the primary goal for chaplains is 'to provide for the free exercise rights of every soldier, sailor, airman, Marine, Coast Guardsman.' She currently is an interim minister of an independent Methodist church in South Carolina, after serving as a chaplain at Tysons Foods and in hospice care. 'I had soldiers who were practitioners of Wiccan faith, and my job is not to say to them, 'Hey, wouldn't you like to love Jesus?'' she said, recalling how she assisted a Wiccan Army member serving in Korea. 'My job was to help that young soldier find where his particular group of folks met and where he could practice his faith.' Also during her service in Korea in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Diefendorf said she provided cassette tapes of sermons to soldiers and entrusted one with Communion elements because she knew she wouldn't be able to reach their location often. 'So far, the courts have upheld that you certainly have two competing clauses within the First Amendment, establishment and free exercise,' she said. 'And at this point, certainly chaplains have to walk that fine line not to create establishment in the midst of trying to also enable people to practice their beliefs.' Schaick recalled being deployed overseas in the Air Force when a new rabbi joined his staff. On arrival, the rabbi described himself as 'first and foremost a chaplain and secondarily a rabbi' — an order of priorities that Schaick said applies to chaplains to this day, regardless of their faith perspective. 'The longer you serve in the chaplaincy, I think the closer you get to really believing that — and therefore, religious affiliation becomes secondary,' he said. 'It's 'How're you doing today?' and 'I'd love to hear what's on your heart' and 'How can I be able to help you today?' Those kind of questions, quite frankly, are impervious to religious distinctions.'
Hamilton Spectator
4 hours ago
- Hamilton Spectator
US military chaplaincy marks 250 years of providing spiritual support to service members
(RNS) — In 1775, a year before there was a United States and six weeks after the Continental Army was formed, George Washington made a declaration that has shaped the military ever since. 'We need chaplains,' he reportedly remarked, prompting action by the Continental Congress near the start of the Revolutionary War. The U.S. military chaplaincy marked 250 years on July 29 as the national military marked its own 250th anniversary in June. A week of celebrations includes a golf tournament at Fort Jackson in South Carolina, hosted by an organization raising funds for scholarships for family members of chaplains, and a sold-out ball nearby in Columbia. Meanwhile, across the globe, thousands of clergy in uniform continue to provide counsel and care to military members of a range of faiths or no faith. 'In times of peace and war, our chaplains have held fast as beacons of hope and resilience for our troops, whether enduring the brutal winter of Valley Forge, comforting the wounded and dying on the battlefields during the Civil War, braving trench warfare in World War I, storming the beaches of Normandy during World War II, marching the frozen mountains during the Korean War, slogging through the rice paddies and jungle battlefields of Vietnam or traveling the bomb-filled roads of Iraq and Afghanistan,' said retired Chaplain (Major General) Doug Carver, a former Army chief of chaplains in charge of the Southern Baptist Convention's chaplaincy ministries, at the denomination's June annual meeting in Dallas. A month later at the annual session of the Progressive National Baptist Convention in Chicago, Navy Chaplain J.M. Smith, the grandson of a former PNBC president, stood before delegates and described his just-completed tour as a Marine Corps command chaplain in Okinawa, Japan, and his plans to report to a ship in Norfolk, Virginia, to begin a tour of Europe and the Middle East and be promoted to lieutenant commander. 'My team and I have ministered to thousands of Marines, sailors, civilians and Japanese,' he said. 'We increased our chapel's membership from eight to 100. We incorporated spiritual readiness into our base's core curriculum.'' ___ This content is written and produced by Religion News Service and distributed by The Associated Press. RNS and AP partner on some religion news content. RNS is solely responsible for this story. ___ Chaplains serve in hospitals, hospices and manufacturing plants, and while chaplaincy researchers see commonalities among them, there are also key differences in the military. All are involved in gaining the trust of people who are in their particular milieu, enabling them to think and sometimes pray through their times of greatest need and day-to-day struggles. An example of both the danger and the dedication of military service chaplaincy is the 1943 death of four chaplains — two Protestant, one Catholic and one Jewish — who helped save some of those aboard a World War II ship, turning over their life jackets and praying and singing hymns before it sank. All four were trained at Harvard University , then the site of the Army's chaplain training school, during a two-year wartime period. 'It was a real defining moment,' said retired Gen. Steve Schaick, who served as Air Force chief of chaplains from 2018 to 2021, and in the same role for the Space Force from 2019 to 2021. 'The stories that came from that really kind of highlighted chaplains at their best.' The Army's chaplaincy corps also includes religious affairs specialists and religious education directors. Some service members provide armed protection to unarmed chaplains and set up worship spaces in on-base chapels or makeshift altars on truck hoods in the field. For example, Berry Gordy, who later founded Motown Records, served as a private in the Korean War and played a portable organ and was known as a chaplain assistant, notes ' Sacred Duty ,' a new comic book posted on the Army's website to mark the anniversary. While 218 chaplains served in the Revolutionary War, 9,117 chaplains served in World War II, according to the Army. Currently, the Army has 1,500 chaplains on active duty. The Navy Chaplain Corps, which began on Nov. 18, 1775, had 24 chaplains during the Civil War; 203 by the end of World War I; 1,158 at its height in 1990; and currently has 898 on active duty, according to the Navy. 'Today's Chaplain Corps includes Chaplains representing a multitude of faith groups, and the Chaplain Corps recruiting team is actively working to increase the Corps' diversity, with a special focus on increasing the number of women Chaplains in the Corps and the number of Chaplains representing low-density faith groups,' reads an Army historical booklet marking the Chaplain Corps' 250 years. Initially, U.S. military chaplains were Protestants. The first Catholic chaplains served in the Mexican-American War in 1846, and the first rabbi was commissioned in 1862 and served in the Civil War. The first Muslim chaplains were commissioned in the Army in 1993. The first Buddhist Army chaplain was named in 2008, followed by the first Hindu chaplain in 2011. Chaplain Margaret Kibben, acting chaplain of the House of Representatives and former chief of chaplains of the Navy — the first woman in that role — said the isolation and the immediacy of ethical decisions faced by military members, as well as a high level of confidentially, can make the work of military chaplaincy teams different from other settings where chaplains work. 'It's the one place that people can go where there's essentially a sanctuary around them, wherever they find themselves, a safe place to have somebody to talk to about a whole host of issues,' she said, adding that topics can include anything from supporting their families to handling combat responsibilities. 'How do you deal with those issues in a place where you're not going to look stupid, you're not going to look weak or unreliable because you have these doubts and you have these concerns — to have a place that you can go to ensure that you can get that off your chest?' Those private conversations often are not faith-filled, added Kibben, reflecting on her military career that began in 1986. 'What I realized later, 20, 30 years later, was that many service members have never learned the language of faith,' she said, citing terms like confession and forgiveness. 'So as a chaplain, we had to figure out our way around the lack of a lexicon of faith. How do you speak about grace to someone who doesn't have a clue how powerful grace is?' Another change, sparked by the efforts of Julie Moore, the wife of a military officer who served in the Vietnam War, was the Army's method for notifying the next of kin when a soldier died. Soon after a 1960s battle in that war, a chaplain and a uniformed officer began teaming up to knock on families' doors; prior to that time, the news arrived in a telegram delivered by a cab driver. The work of chaplains has sometimes been the source of church-state debates. For example, Michael 'Mikey' Weinstein of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, a nonprofit that advocates for separation of church and state in the U.S. military, has questioned what he viewed as proselytism in the chaplains' ranks. Meanwhile, conservative Christian organizations have voiced concerns about an antipathy against some Christians in military ranks. Karen Diefendorf, a two-time Army chaplain and a board member of the U.S. Army Chaplain Corps Regimental Association, which supports chaplains and their families, said the primary goal for chaplains is 'to provide for the free exercise rights of every soldier, sailor, airman, Marine, Coast Guardsman.' She currently is an interim minister of an independent Methodist church in South Carolina, after serving as a chaplain at Tysons Foods and in hospice care. 'I had soldiers who were practitioners of Wiccan faith, and my job is not to say to them, 'Hey, wouldn't you like to love Jesus?'' she said, recalling how she assisted a Wiccan Army member serving in Korea. 'My job was to help that young soldier find where his particular group of folks met and where he could practice his faith.' Also during her service in Korea in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Diefendorf said she provided cassette tapes of sermons to soldiers and entrusted one with Communion elements because she knew she wouldn't be able to reach their location often. 'So far, the courts have upheld that you certainly have two competing clauses within the First Amendment, establishment and free exercise,' she said. 'And at this point, certainly chaplains have to walk that fine line not to create establishment in the midst of trying to also enable people to practice their beliefs.' Schaick recalled being deployed overseas in the Air Force when a new rabbi joined his staff. On arrival, the rabbi described himself as 'first and foremost a chaplain and secondarily a rabbi' — an order of priorities that Schaick said applies to chaplains to this day, regardless of their faith perspective. 'The longer you serve in the chaplaincy, I think the closer you get to really believing that — and therefore, religious affiliation becomes secondary,' he said. 'It's 'How're you doing today?' and 'I'd love to hear what's on your heart' and 'How can I be able to help you today?' Those kind of questions, quite frankly, are impervious to religious distinctions.' Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP's collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. Error! Sorry, there was an error processing your request. There was a problem with the recaptcha. Please try again. You may unsubscribe at any time. By signing up, you agree to our terms of use and privacy policy . 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Yahoo
a day ago
- Yahoo
Navy Scraps P-8 Poseidon That Ran Off The Runway In Hawaii Two Years Ago
The U.S. Navy is scrapping a P-8A Poseidon that ended up in Hawaii's Kaneohe Bay back in 2023, marking the first total loss of one of these aircraft. The service was initially hopeful that the plane could be returned to service, but ultimately decided it would be too costly to do so. The P-8A in question ran off the runway at Marine Corps Air Station Kaneohe Bay, part of Marine Corps Base Hawaii, on November 20, 2023. All nine members of the crew were uninjured in the mishap and were able to return to shore. The aircraft, which was assigned to Patrol Squadron Four (VP-4) at the time, suffered significant damage, which was further compounded by the roughly two weeks it spent sitting in saltwater. A complex retrieval operation was executed to get the aircraft back on land, as you can read more about here. At the time of writing, the results of any investigation into the incident do not appear to be publicly available. 'The Navy's P-8A Fleet Support Team, Boeing (P-8A Original Equipment Manufacturer), and AAR (P-8A Airframe Maintenance Repair and Overhaul provider) conducted a comprehensive airworthiness, engineering, and repair assessment of the aircraft structure and systems,' a spokesperson for Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) told TWZ in a statement today. 'As a result of the extensive repair requirements, necessity for unique aircraft manufacturing representative support equipment, and estimated cost required to return the aircraft to service in a mission capable configuration, pursuing a repair of the aircraft was determined to be cost prohibitive.' The P-8A that crashed into the sea in 2023 has been written off and — 笑脸男人 (@lfx160219) July 23, 2025 The first sign that the P-8A was being scrapped came in the form of the video seen above, which first began circulating on social media last week. 'Following a formal aircraft strike authorization, the Navy proceeded with demilitarization and disposal of the P-8A aircraft involved in the 2023 mishap,' the NAVAIR spokesperson added. 'Those activities are currently in progress in Hawaii and expected to be complete by August 2025.' 'In order to salvage all usable equipment from the aircraft prior to disposal, the Navy identified and removed all serviceable aircraft components and mission systems, transferring those parts to the Navy's supply system for repair to logistically support other fleet aircraft,' the NAVAIR spokesperson further told TWZ. What it might have cost to return the P-8A to service is unknown, but the Navy told the AP that the price tag on the salvage operation alone might total $1.5 million back in December 2023. As TWZ previously wrote after the jet had been extracted from Kaneohe Bay: 'The Navy is hopeful that the P-8A will be able to eventually return to service, but the full extent of the damage to the jet remains unclear. Salt water, which the jet was sitting in for around two weeks, can cause serious damage through corrosion. The aircraft's engines were largely submerged the entire time, which could have led to major damage to fan blades and other internal components. The underside of the Poseidon is also lined with antennas and apertures, and it is unclear how much water may have seeped into the weapons bay or other spaces inside the aircraft. The jet's nose cone, and the radar behind it, are also missing and it is not clear what the condition of those components might be now.' 'There is clearly an interest on the part of the Navy in making this P-8A operational again. Each one of these jets, which are based on the Boeing 737 Next Generation airliner, costs just over $171 million, according to Navy budget documents. So repairing even a seriously damaged example could be cheaper than buying a brand-new one.' The P-8A unit price subsequently rose to nearly $180 million in Fiscal Year 2024, according to more recent Navy budget documents. The Navy expects to continue taking deliveries of new Poseidons into 2027, but there is no indication at present that it is planning to acquire an additional airframe to make up for the loss. The target total fleet size had previously been 128 airframes. The P-8A has now all but replaced the P-3C Orion maritime patrol plane, as well as the EP-3E Aries II intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) aircraft. Though generally described as a maritime patrol platform, the P-8A is really multi-mission with extensive ISR capabilities. The Navy is investing heavily in further expanding the capabilities of these aircraft with new munitions, podded self-protection systems, and other improvements. In June, the service took delivery of the first Poseidon with a major new upgrade package, referred to as Increment 3 Block 2. This includes 'a new combat systems suite with improved computer processing, higher security architecture, a wide band satellite communication system, an ASW signals intelligence capability, a track management system, and additional communications and acoustics systems to enhance search, detection, and targeting capabilities,' according to the Navy. Manufacturer Boeing has also seen significant success with the P-8 on the export market, with additional Poseidons in service now in Australia, India, New Zealand, Norway, South Korea, and the United Kingdom. Canada and Germany also have jets on order. The Procurement Agency for the German Armed Forces (BAAINBw) and the German Navy stopped by the #P8 finishing center to check on the progress of their first P-8A Poseidon. Hear why the service says it'll be an "awesome feeling" to receive the first sub hunter later this year. — Boeing Defense (@BoeingDefense) July 15, 2025 The Navy's P-8A fleet looks set for a long career, despite the service's final decision to write off the waterlogged P-8A in Hawaii. Contact the author: joe@ Solve the daily Crossword
