Michelle 'Mace' Curran

My grandpa, my dad's dad, had been a lieutenant in World War II in the Navy.

And so there was a small exposure there.

He passed away when I was two years old, so I don't have any memories of him.

But his trunk, his military green metal trunk,

with Lieutenant Kern stenciled on the end of it, was at my grandma's house growing up.

And I used to open it, take out all his stuff.

There were letters that he had written to my grandma.

There were black and white photos from him in like the Pacific during World War II.

He was in the thick of it and his uniforms were in there.

And I would actually try them on and put on his spectacles and his wooden pipe was in there.

And it was just like this treasure trove of what felt like adventure.

coming from a small town in Wisconsin.

And so I think that was in the back of my mind.

And fast forward to high school, where I need a way to pay for college.

And I'm a good student, but my parents don't have a college fund for me.

I start talking to my dad about this.

And he had gone to UW Madison for a while.

And he had seen all of the ROTC cadets running around.

He wasn't in ROTC, but he was just like familiar that it existed.

So we start talking about that.