Welcome To Uncle
Ralph Anaya Reyes
Photo Album #2... |
Photography was a lifetime profession for Reyes
Funeral services were held Thursday morning for Ralph Reyes a longtime Pecos resident who served as the Pecos Enterprise’s darkroom technician for the past 17 years and was involved in the photography business for over 45 years in Pecos, and served as a photographer for this military unit during World War II.
Reyes was one of many native sons Pecos sent off to war during World War II.
Born on the 25th of October 1923 in Saragosa, Texas Ralph’s family moved to Pecos when he was 12 years old, where as a teen he went to work at Howard’s Studio. The work there would later play a key role in the early 1940’s, when Reyes entered active service with the United States Army on March 25, 1943 at Fort Bliss.
From Fort Bliss the Army sent him to Ft. Leonard Wood, Mo., for basic training. Ralph was trained as a rifleman and headed for New Caledonia in the Pacific Theatre.
Most of the men that arrived with Reyes at the Replacement Depot were shipped off to line companies to dig Japanese troops out of caves and bankers carved into the coral and sand of dozens of Pacific Islands.
Reyes got a different assignment.
“We had not been at the Replacement Depot that long. One day there was an announcement over the loud speaker. They were looking for men with photographic experience. I was one of two guys who knew about photography,” he said.
Instead of being shipped off to a line company, Reyes was assigned to the 13th Air Force (still a branch of the Army at the time) and transferred to the Signal Corps-Detachment 19 of the Signal Photo Mail Company.
“It sure made a difference. I had a friend I met on the ship going over to New Caledonia. His name was Albert. Anyway, he was assigned to an infantry outfit. About three months later he was on the front page of Yank in a photo taken just after his company was pulled back from the front lines.”
Yank was a magazine published by the Army during the war.
Reyes was also involved in the military’s V-Mail program designed to make it easier and faster to get mail to and from the front lines, it kept his unit busy around the clock.
We ran two shifts, almost constantly,“ he said.” I think it really helped.
“Boy, you really looked forward to getting a letter,” he said.
Not long after being transferred to the signal Corps Reyes was promoted to corporal and he was a Tech-Sgt. before he had been in the Army a full year.
When the war was over, Reyes was honorably discharged on Jan. 9, 1946. He was married to Ramona on June 7, 1947, went on to work as a photographer for 30 years for Howard’s Studio.
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Ralph and Ramona then had their own business known as Ralph’s Drug after doing this for about six years. They moved to San Fernando, Calif. In the 1970’s, where once again a photo studio employed him When they moved back to Texas Ralph went to work for the Pecos Enterprise in 1991.
Reyes loved to play golf and fish. “Something that most people don’t know is that he was an excellent dog trainer,” said his daughter, Liz Rodriguez. “He also loved to watch football and baseball.”
Rodriguez said that a dog he once had was trained so well that her dad was on top of the roof working on the air conditioner when he called his dog to come up on the roof with him. “The dog went up the ladder one step at a time until he got on the roof,” said Rodriguez. “The funny part is that my dad had to carry the dog down the ladder,” she said.
Reyes made friends everywhere he went. He was friendly and he enjoyed his life to the fullest.
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Ralph Anaya Reyes
PECOS Ralph Reyes, 85, of Pecos, a retired photographer, died Monday, Jan. 5, 2009, at Pecos Nursing Home.
Services will be at 11 a.m. Thursday at Peaceful Garden Funeral Home Chapel. Burial will be at Greenwood Cemetery. Arrangements are by Peaceful Garden Funeral Home of Pecos.
He was born in Saragosa and was a Catholic.
He was an Army veteran of World War II.
SURVIVORS Wife, Ramona O. Reyes of Pecos; sons, Tony Reyes of El Paso, Ralph Reyes Jr. of Dallas, Raul Reyes of San Angelo and Ruben Reyes of Pecos; daughters, Theresa Nieto of Midland and Liz Rodriguez of Pecos; brothers, Ramon Reyes of El Paso and Pedro Reyes and Manuel Reyes, both of Pecos; sister, Lucy Suchil of Odessa; 12 grandchildren; and 14 great-grandchildren.
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Pagina Diseñada por |
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Herbert Saenz |
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