Word: forrester
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...Right from the beginning," said his Annapolis roommate, Merton ("Sticks") Wade, "he knew precisely what he wanted. He wanted to get to the top." And right from the beginning, as a boy, Forrest Sherman had wanted to go to sea. Before he could read, he was fascinated by woodcuts of sailing ships in an old history book. The high-school class prophet predicted confidently that he would be an admiral. His singleminded intentness was the kind that wins admiration, but seldom popularity. "You can't get good marks if you're popular," he once told his sister...
...second of a family of six sons-and a daughter, Forrest Percival Sherman was born to the headmaster of a small school in Reeds Ferry, N.H. (pop. 265) and to a mother whose forebears were John and Priscilla Alden. Shermans had fought with the colonists against the Dutch, gone with Benedict Arnold to Quebec...
...Forrest grew up in a big, comfortable Victorian house in Melrose, outside Boston. He built model ships, and with his pals re-enacted the charge of San Juan Hill in the wood behind the house, using cordwood for cannon...
...sailor's knots and to eat salt pork (anyone planning to follow the sea for a living had to learn to like salt pork, the old man told him). One day, far out on Buzzards Bay, the old man died of a heart attack. Twelve-year-old Forrest was not rattled. He lowered the ensign to half-mast as stipulated by naval custom, sailed the catboat safely back to harbor...
...When a classmate asked a difficult question, the instructor would have Sherman stand up and reel off the answer. Sherman stood second in the wartime Class of 1918, which graduated a year ahead of its time. As the new ensign hurried off to war, the Lucky Bag summarized: "Forrest Percival has been the object of ridicule in some quarters and an envied example in others. He is our most convincing argument for the theory that 'brains is king...