I SQUEALED in excitement when Joseph was finally identified. I thought he may never be identified since it had already been 65 years, there was no way they could get any DNA from him. He was dead with a capital D. That DNA is long gone. So glad they got enough from him to identify him. He was just four, a young life taken way too soon. He had his whole life ahead of him, he could’ve started school, then graduated, gone to college, gotten a job, got married, had a family, he could’ve been an astronaut, an engineer, a firefighter, a lawyer, a doctor, a teacher. That is just so, so sad. Just 30 pounds too! Tiny, tiny boy. He endured so much in his short life. I wonder if his parents couldn’t care for him or had a sort of grudge against him because he had special needs or medical issues? He has some evidence of having health problems. He had scars on his groin, leg, and chest from surgery and IVs. I heard somewhere his groin scar is from a hernia.
Maybe he was born prematurely? I’ve heard of premature babies having inguinal hernias. In fact I myself have a similar scar from an inguinal hernia. I was just 12 weeks old when I had the surgery. I was born early at 33 weeks. I do think his parents probably had anger or resentment towards him because of his health problems. They couldn’t care for him, so they just shut down and gave up. This was 1957 so healthcare wasn’t that advanced. There wasn’t much they could do. I wonder how his siblings were treated growing up.