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All's fair in love and war for Loyd and Ruby Lee Nesbitt
Photograph by Skye Dunlap
Veterans Days
World War II veterans Loyd and Ruby Lee Nesbitt are members of Willow Glen's American Legion Post 318
By Sarah Gaffney
When Loyd and Ruby Lee Nesbitt celebrate Veterans Day each year, they not only honor America's war heroes, but also revel in their own personal victory. The couple, both members of American Legion Post 318, served--and met--in World War II.
"I was in the Air Force, and she was in the Navy, and we met in Miami," recalls Loyd.
"I don't know whether it's safe to tell you how I met her," Loyd hesitates, acting a little nervous in his brown Naugahyde recliner.
Ruby Lee quickly interjects: "Well, if you told the truth, it wouldn't matter so much."
The truth be told, Loyd, then 21, spotted Ruby Lee, then 28, strolling the streets of downtown Miami while he was on weekend leave from his station in Boca Raton. Ruby Lee served in the Navy's WAVS--an acronym for Women Appointed for Volunteer Service--monitoring hurricanes in its Miami communications department.
Loyd followed Ruby Lee and her friends until he mustered the courage to introduce himself. After dating for two months, Loyd left for the South Pacific and Japan. Ruby Lee remained in Miami. The couple continued their courtship via airmail, and two years later, in 1946, they married in Ruby Lee's native Alabama.
"She robbed the cradle there," Loyd quips.
"Oh, right!" Ruby Lee replies.
Photograph by Skye Dunlap
Legion Heirs: Members of American Legion Post 318 proudly lead the 1999 Founders Day parade down Lincoln Avenue.
Loyd on Thursday will join veterans from the Willow Glen post in downtown San Jose's annual Veterans Day parade.
"I'm getting old and lazy," says the 75-year-old, who still reports two days a week at General Electric, where he has worked since 1951. "I'll probably be in the locomotive."
Although he can't march in the parade, and 82-year-old Ruby Lee is sidelined by two recent hip surgeries, Loyd is quick to emphasize the importance of Veterans Day.
"It is important to recognize the fact that many of us did disrupt our lives, and many people endangered their lives in the service, to defend the country," Loyd says. "At least, that's what we thought we were doing and we were."
Ruby Lee adds, "Not everybody came back alive."
"Why look at me when you say that?" Loyd teases. "Honest to goodness, Lee!"
Ruby Lee Nesbitt
Photograph by Skye Dunlap
The Nesbitts began their married life in New Jersey, where they both attended Rutgers University. He studied physics, and she studied library science. His work took the couple and their three children to New York and then later to Willow Glen, where they've lived in the same home since 1968.
For the past five years, the couple has participated in activities at the American Legion Post 318. Loyd teaches shooting and marksmanship to children and socializes with the post's other veterans. Yet war is something he rarely talks about or believes in.
"It's a horrible thing. It's a stupid way to settle arguments," Loyd says. "The war has lost its interest. I don't particularly like to think of it."
Loyd Nesbitt
Photograph by Skye Dunlap
But what Loyd values about his war experience were the lessons he learned about tolerance and diversity.
"At the time, I was a young man from North Dakota," Loyd recalls. "I ended up in a training place with a barracks full of black students from all over the country. Half of them had more education than I did. If it hadn't been beaten out of me already, any prejudices that I had were obviously stupid. People were smarter than I was."
When they aren't engaged in activities as Legionnaires, the Nesbitts enjoy reading the piles of books strewn about their Willow Glen living room. They also still enjoy each other's company.
So, how do a Southern girl and a Northern boy get along?
"Well, you know what they call the combination," Loyd says. "The Civil War."
And the secret to their 53 years of marriage?
"Being hard of hearing," Loyd teases fondly, bestowing a smile on Ruby Lee.
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Willow Glen, California Since 1992
