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Monty's first dance recital in 1923 |
Monty graduates from high school in 1935 |
EDWARD (MONTY) THOMAS MONTAGUE, Sr.
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Edward (Monty) Thomas Montague, Sr., was born in Stonington, Connecticut in 1918. His Father, Edward Aloysius Montague, worked for the U.S. Postal Service. Monty was an only-child.
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Monty's first dance recital in 1923 |
Monty graduates from high school in 1935 |
Monty grew up in Westerly, Rhode Island. After graduating from the University of Rhode Island with a degree in chemical engineering in 1938, he entered the U.S. Army with an officer's commission as a 2nd-Lieutenant. Monty served during World War II as company commander in a motor platoon in the 1st-Division (the "Big Red One") under General George Patton. He participated in the 1942 North Africa campaign and the 1943 Sicily invasion. On 4 August 1943 he was badly wounded in combat near Turin, Sicily, and spent most of the next two years recovering in various military hospitals. Monty was awarded the Purple Heart and promoted to Captain, but he endured numerous surgeries, disability and crippling leg problems to the end of his days.
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Monty in 1941 |
Monty gets a ride in the Meat Wagon: leg wounds at Turin, Sicily in 1943 |
Monty met Mary O'Donnell in Lovell General Hospital at Fort Devens in 1944. According to O'Donnell Legend, Captain Montague complained loudly one day about the hospital food and demanded to speak with someone in authority. The person in authority just happened to be the dietetics student-intern, Mary O'Donnell. It was, as they always say, love at first sight. Mary went on listening (more or less patiently) to another 53 years of Monty's commentary.
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Monty and Mary in 1945 with Monty's parents (Edward Aloysius Montague and Katherine Holmes Montague) |
Monty worked in a number of professional positions from 1946 through 1965, before settling into social work and a twenty-year career as a supervisor in the Onondaga County Probation Department (1965-1985). After his 1985 retirement from County employment Monty continued his informal work in counseling and editorial-letter writing. And he traveled extensively, mainly to Ireland. Monty passed on in 1997.
In the final years of his life, Monty wrote his memories, and we are fortunate to have these available:
Click here to read Monty's Memories
Click here to return to the Montague Page
