A military love story remembered in letters

BY NOELLE OLSON SHOREVIEW PRESS EDITOR

Imagine looking through your parent’s attic and finding a stack of love letters your dad wrote to your mom when he was serving in the U.S. Navy.

That’s what Greg and Suzanne’s Tardiff’s daughter Megan discovered, and she decided to put all of the letters into a book called, “Letters from the Saratoga.”

Greg wrote the letters to Suzanne when he was a parachute rigger on the USS Saratoga aircraft carrier.

“The letters are from the nine months he was on the ship,”

Suzanne said. “I just liked the fact that there was so much to learn about the war in the letters. The thing that really got me was that he was on this huge aircraft carrier for nine months and yet he found something to write every day.”

One of Suzanne’s favorite excerpts from the book: “That’s all the new news I have. The ship’s schedule is still the same. The war is still the same. Everything is still the same. Sure will be glad when things start being different. I love you, Greg.”

Greg grew up in White Bear Lake and Suzanne lived in Highland Park when they first met in the winter of 1970.

“A friend of mine from work had convinced me to attend a blind date of sorts — it was really a skating/broomball party with lots of people attending, and Greg was to be one of them,” Suzanne said. “At the time, my friend’s husband was driving a school bus for work and I needed a ride. So, I was picked up for our first date on a school bus standing on a snowy corner with a broom in my hand. When Greg walked in, he had his arm around another girl and I said to my friend, ‘What kind of a date is this? He has a girlfriend!’ It was his sister.”

Suzanne said the night turned

SEE LETTERS, PAGE 3

Milashius, a machinist by trade with a passion for crafting entire brass instruments, as well as components, is current commander of the White Bear Lake American Legion Post 168. A veteran of the Army National Guard, he got the idea to build the bugles a few years back with the intention of donating one to the Legion and one to VFW Post 1782.

“I’m not someone who just decided to build some horns. I have a strong background in this,” said Milashius, who holds a music degree major and manufacturing minor from St. Cloud State. He also credits mentors who have helped him in his quest to create instruments suitable for the most discerning