A. Lee Brown, a retired professor emeritus who hails from Ocean Beach, has added something new to his portfolio: A World War II-era fictional novel titled “The Varsity: America’s Underage Warriors, from End Zones to Kill Zones During World War II.”
“It’s such an outstanding story what all these kids went through and the travails they faced, even after they came home,” said Brown. “It was just a story that needed to be told.”
The subject of Brown’s WWII period piece is the Veterans of Underage Military Service (VUMS). Founded in 1991, the organization is comprised of underaged veterans, ages 12 to 16, who forged documents so they could fight overseas.
Over 100,000 youths ages 12-16 enlisted illegally to fight the Axis powers in WWII. At war’s end, they were ineligible for the GI Bill. Still in their teens, about 30,000 of them nationwide returned to high school. Of that number, 10,000 or so played varsity football, which made prep football in 1945/46 legendary, according to Brown.
“I interviewed close to 100 actual teen vets and spent an afternoon with the 1946 coach Don Giddings,” Brown said of his research. “Don’s Point Loma Pointers won the 1946 championship and were known as the Wonder Team.”
Added Brown of Giddings, “He was 93 at the time I spoke with him.”
Concerning the inspiration for his two major characters in his novel, Brown said, “One is from OB (lived on Cape May) and the other is from Tunaville (Portuguese fisherman) and lived on Emerson. The novel follows these two characters (fictional but amalgams of real vets) through the war and home where they take a perennially losing varsity squad and turn it into a championship team. To do so, they draw upon lessons learned in the Pacific and European theaters.”
Brown’s just-released tome drew praise from TV newscaster Tom Brokaw. “Lee Brown has discovered and written about an important and fascinating aspect of the Greatest Generation,” said Brokaw, author of “The Greatest Generation,” in a literary review. “Many veterans went to war by dropping out of school and enlisting underage. When they came home determined to resume their education they were older and viewed by some educators as troublesome. As Lee shows us, these vets enriched their schools, communities. It’s time they get our appreciation.”
The prologue of Brown’s novel is set in 2018 at Ft. Rosecrans Cemetery with the burying of one of the two main protagonists. “The Navy eulogy allowed me to tell the reader the back story,” said Brown, adding his novel then jumps back to 1941 and Peninsula (Point Loma) High.
“I had to write a fair amount about how these guys matured, and what lessons the learned: the core values of teamwork, sacrifice and focusing on your job,” he said.
At the end of Brown’s novel, the two protagonists return to Peninsula High and playing varsity football, where the two best friends, as co-captains, “begin to shape a perennially losing team turning it into a contender for the San Diego County playoffs.”
Of his foray into literature, Brown said: “I’m just a kid with deep roots in OB who decided to take a swing at writing a historically accurate novel, and it seems to be getting accepted.”
“It’s basically a straight Homeric odyssey about youths going away seeking adventure, and discovering a lot of things and bringing them back, some things that help you with the rest of your life,” Brown said of his novel’s plot.
One last historical tidbit by Brown: He noted the model for the Pointer sculpture in Point Loma High School’s quad was the grandfather of his current English Setter-Pointer mix. ‘The Varsity – America’s Underage Warriors, from End Zones to Kill Zones’ can be found at Amazon Books by typing The Varsity by A. Lee Brown in the search bar, or by visiting amazon.com.