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In 1932, the year he was appointed sheriff, Eugene Biscailuz was referred to as the most popular man in Los Angeles County. In the program for the party honoring his fifty-one years of service in law enforcement in 1958, he was called “Mr. California.” As his retirement approached in December of that year, the county board of supervisors, unable to imagine Los Angeles County without Eugene Biscailuz serving in some capacity, attempted to create a position for him as the official county greeter.

At a Firestone Station, Old Timers luncheon, retired Undersheriff Ted von Minden made mention of a fellow 1949 Academy Class graduate and friend who had spent his entire career at what was then Wayside Honor Ranch. Ted’s friend liked working there so much that he never sought a transfer or filed for a promotional examination. He was satisfied performing the jobs available to Deputy Sheriffs at that facility and wanted nothing else.

I recently read, for the second time, Tom Brokaw’s “Greatest Generation”, a best seller, profiling a number of truly great Americans, that he described thusly, “They came of age during the Great Depression and the Second World War and went on to build modern America – men and women whose everyday lives of duty, honor, achievement, and courage gave us the world we have today”.