While doing research on the Minikahda club for my book on Minnesota golf club history, I came across the lyrical byline Yale H. Squire in the archives of the Minneapolis Tribune. He was that paper's golf writer in the 1916 when the U.S. Open was played at Minikahda. Both Dan Kelly and I wondered if it was his real name, or one of those pen names golf writers of the era tended to us. A number of the Minikahda members and their sons went to Yale, so Dan suspected it might a Heffelfinger. Then I found a geneology web site that listed a Yale H. Squire, lieutenant, killed in action in World War I, and Dan found the following obituary:
"Squire, Yale H., was educated in Mazeppa, his birthplace, and at Pillsbury Academy, Owatonna. He soon engaged in journalistic work, first on the Mazeppa Journal, later as conductor of a paper in northern Michigan, and then as a reporter on the Minneapolis Daily News. After some further experience in Duluth and Atlanta, Ga., he returned to Minneapolis and in the spring of 1914 was engaged by the Minneapolis Tribune. After making a good record and scoring one of the biggest "scoops" known for
some time in the newspaper field of that city, he was transferred to the sporting news department of the paper as assistant sporting editor and qualified himself as the golf expert of the Tribune.
"When it became probable that war would be declared he offered his services to the Norton-Harjes Ambulance Corps and left Minneapolis April 15, 1917, with Joe McDermott and others. A few days later, on April 21, he sailed for France, which county he reached after his vessel had narrowly escaped being torpedoed by a German submarine. In Paris he enlisted in Section 21 of the French army and served four and a half months as an ambulance driver, donating not only his services but his expense in this work, as the French government paid the men only three cents a day.
"When American forces got to France the ambulance service was disbanded, and young Squire might have returned home, but with his friend Robert G. Browning of Minneapolis, afterwards captured by the Germans, he elected to volunteer for the aviation service, and on September 15 he began training. On February 18, 1918, he received his commission as first lieutenant. After having one narrow escape from death, from which he saved himself by his presence of mind, he finished training and was made an instructor. It was but three days later, on June 26, while instructing Norman D. Hughes of Philadelphia, that he met his death, together with his pupil, owing to the fall of his plane. He survived until 12:10 a.m., June 27, and was buried in the officers' section of the American cemetery at Tours, France. He was one of the first young men from Wabasha County to offer his services, his loyalty to the country was firm and unshakable, and he took a great pride and interest in his work. His parents and his numerous friends can take pride in the thought that he did his full duty with unflinching courage and met his fate like the brave soldier he was."
It's my belief that the world is full of people like this, though we lose too many of them this way.