Jim made new friends, joined an American Legion post and the Knights of Columbus, and became an active member of the St. Hugh Roman Catholic Church.
He never talked about his past, and his friends didn’t pry. One once said to him, “From your accent, you must be from New York.”
Jim replied, “I guess so.”
To Cheryle Sloan, a waitress at P&P, Jim was special: “He loved kids. At Christmastime, he played Santa Claus at orphanages. He grew a big white beard to make his appearance more authentic. Of course we wondered about his past. My mother decided that he had to be an ex-priest or an ex-criminal.”