In March of 1918 Pvt. Frank G. S. Erickson (308th Infantry - Company H) was at Camp Lewis near Tacoma, Washington training as a member of the American Expeditionary Force. He had joined with his brother, Pfc. Ernest Julius Erickson (361st Infantry) in the Summer of 1917. Ernest was called up first and Frank had awaited till March of 1918 to be called up. Both would be off to serve in France in July and August of 1918 respectively.

My grandfather Frank Gustaf Severin Erickson had left home in 1910 at the age of eighteen and headed west seeking warmer climates, adventure and work. He dreamed of buying land out along the coast. Leaving Bismarck by train bound for the Western states, he looked forward to seeing the Pacific Ocean.

North Dakota is a land locked state and Frank grew up dead center between the Pacific and the Atlantic. There was no question which direction he would choose. His cowboy instincts pointed west.

Over the next 8 years Frank would visit, live and work in British Columbia, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Oregon, Washington, Utah, Idaho. To my surprise he lived not all that far away from here in the Bay Area, somehow ending up in Daly City, California, just outside of San Francisco. It is still a mystery what he was doing there, yet the photographs taken in that period shows Frank delving into boxing.

Between visits back to North Dakota to work on the family farm in Regan, he traveled, worked and lived at an assortment of jobs. His adventurous spirit took him all over the West, Pacific Northwest and the Great Plains states. Frank worked as a railroad deputy, hunter, logger, a miner and a warehouseman. Frank loved to camp and went deer hunting when he had no work.

The letters and postcards that he wrote home have postmarks from towns and cities in Colorado, Oregon, Washington, Port Huron, Michigan, Armstead and Polaris, Montana and Phoenix, Arizona.

In early 1917 Frank and his older brother Ernest Julius Alfred Erickson had traveled by train from Wilton to Bismarck to Baker, Oregon. This time both brothers had their sites on finding some land to buy. Besides working for various lumber mills they became deputies for the Oregon Railroad out of La Grande, Oregon just before the U.S. involvement in the war.

Frank and Ernest would join the American Expeditionary Force in the Summer of 1917 and in 1918 would serve in France with the 308th and 361st Infantry respectively.