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Administrator finds family photo in archives file

  • Published
  • By Master Sgt. Mitch Gettle
  • Secretary of the Air Force Public Affairs
COLLEGE PARK, Md. (AFPN) --  Of all the files in all the towns in all the world, he ended up in hers.

For Mary Grabulis, a records declassification analyst for the Air Force Declassification Office at the National Archives and Records Administration here, it was quite a surprise finding an old newspaper article about her husband as a young boy.

"I couldn't believe it," she said. "Of all the millions of pages and thousands of boxes to review, I was lucky enough to get the box that had my husband's picture in it."

Since Mrs. Grabulis' job requires her to review classified historic Air Force documents for declassification or further disposition, she was reviewing a box of old documents when she came across a letter with the newspaper attached to it.

The title of the newspaper was the Ramstein Ramjet, and dated Feb. 3, 1961. Since she was stationed at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, during her husband's Air Force career, she was curious to see what the base was like back then.

As she turned to the last page, she looked at a picture of a couple of kids and discovered one boy was, in fact, her husband, Gary.

"It was like winning the lottery," she said of the surprise.

Her husband lived in Germany when the picture was taken for the base newspaper article. His father was an Air Force civilian working at Ramstein AB, and the newspaper article was about the local Parents and Teachers Association donating books to Ramstein Elementary School. Mr. Grabulis was selected along with three others to be in the picture, reading the new books.

"I don't remember them taking the picture," Mr. Grabulis said. "It was a long time ago."

Nevertheless, Mrs. Grabulis said she was very excited about her discovery.

"The Air Force declassification office is an amazing place to work," she said. "Digging through boxes of old, historic papers, it's like Christmas every day. I really enjoy it. You never know what you will find digging through all those old documents." 

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