The closing paragraph of General Douglas MacArthur’s April 19, 1951 address to Congress: “I still remember the refrain of one of the most popular barracks ballads of the day which proclaimed most proudly that old soldiers never die; they just fade away. And like the old soldier in the ballad, I now close my military career and just fade away, an old soldier who tried to do his duty as God gave him the light to see that duty.” Fitting words for a general, equally fitting for an impoverished sergeant in WWII who after the war earned two degrees from Georgia Tech and a Master’s Degree from