Edward Keesler received his diploma from West Hartford’s Hall High School on Oct. 4 – 71 years after he left the school.

By Alicia B. Smith, West Hartford Press Staff Writer

There was a moment’s hesitation before Edward Keesler got up out of his seat.

“It’s what you’ve been waiting for, go and get it,” Keesler’s daughter, Donna Vaslet, encouraged him.

Keesler got up out of his chair and reached for a blue bound book handed to him by Dan Zittoun, principal of Hall High School. It took 71 years, but Keesler finally received his high school diploma Wednesday, Oct. 4.

While in high school, like so many of his classmates, Keesler was an active student, a member of the student council, the Athletic Association, and he played football and ran track. He worked as a motion picture operator.

Keesler, now 89 years old, was a senior in high school when, in March 1946, he was drafted into the United States Army. He opted to join the Marines instead.

His call to service interrupted his high school education.

A few months later, in June, when the rest of his class enjoyed the pomp and circumstance of the commencement ceremony for the class of ’46, Keesler was a private first class with Casual Company with the Marine Barracks at the Marine Corps School in Quantico, VA. From November 1946 to March 1947, he was stationed in China where U.S. troops were overseeing the removal of Japanese and Soviet forces there after the war, which ended in August 1945 after the United States dropped two atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan.

Keesler earned his honorable discharge in September 1947.

During his service, Keesler was awarded the Good Conduct Medal, the Connecticut Wartime Service Medal and the Honorable Service Label Button, as well as the Marine Corps Discharge Button.

Following the war, Keesler returned to his native West Hartford — to Elmwood — where he had grown up on New Britain Avenue. He joined a veterans’ football team, taking up the sport he had played in his school days. He married and had two children, Edward Keesler Jr. and Vaslet.

Keesler became an employee of Royal Typewriter until the company moved out of state. Keesler worked briefly in Scotland for the company before accepting a severance offer. He went on to purchase a liquor store in South Windsor. For 24 years he owned Kanco Spirits on Main Street.

“I never had that piece of paper,” Keesler said at his personal graduation ceremony, held at Town Hall, which had been the original home of Hall High School when Keesler was a student.

“I felt that small,” Keesler said, holding up two fingers close together. “I felt so embarrassed to have these good jobs and no education.”

Vaslet was inspired to help her father earn that elusive diploma after reading an article about a WWII veteran in Pennsylvania, who, like her father, had his high school education interrupted due to the war and who recently received his diploma.

She made some phone calls to West Hartford Public Schools officials, and Assistant Superintendent of Schools Paul Vicinus decided it was time Keesler received his diploma.

Family, friends and well-wishers from the town, the school system and the police department gathered for the ceremony.

Roszena Haskins, director of Diversity Advancement, gave the invocation, in which she said, “We are thankful for the many gifts we have, which include our freedoms, the benefit of a free public education, and the fellowship of friends, family and community.”

“As I think of Mr. Keesler’s service and sacrifice, I am reminded of the meaning of the call to arms,” Vicinus said. He, too, headed the call following the terrorist attack on 9/11.

“I knew then, and understand today, what it means to feel the call to put aside everything in order to protect and fight for the very values upon which this country is founded,” he said. “In March 1946, only three months prior to his graduation, Edward Keesler put aside everything that he knew to answer the call to arms and defend his country.”

“After 71 years, it is a distinct privilege and honor to be able to celebrate him today with the award of his high school diploma,” Vicinus said.

“I have nothing but admiration and thanks to the boy who answered the call [to service],” Superintendent of Schools Tom Moore said. “It is my honor as superintendent to recognize him today for the work he did to earn his diploma.”

Zittoun did the honors, announcing to the superintendent that he had reviewed all the records and found Keesler met all the graduation requirements.

“I am crying now,” Keesler said. “This is more important than winning at the casino,” adding that he was on his way there to celebrate.

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