About the Book
Marine Wife, Lyn is the simple, yet uniquely different story of one Marine wife, Linda “Lyn” Gale Bates, the wife of and lifelong partner to a United States Marine. During her lifetime, she loved and honored the Corps of Marines as much, if not more intently-focused than many Marines and Marine wives have in the past, present, and perhaps the future. Her husband, too, loved his Corps, but it was she who most often unnoticeably accomplished a myriad of tasks and initiated numerous actions simply because of her unique abilities, insight, and desire to focus on the Corps and those who served it. From the time she first set foot on a Marine Corps installation (Parris Island) until the day she died, her love and admiration for the Marine Corps and its spirit never faltered. In her life as a Marine wife, she never allowed what she did or why she initiated these various acts of kindness to draw attention to herself or to garner praise from others.
About the Author
This book was written by Major Ralph Stoney Bates, USMC (Ret) about his wife, Lyn, who died on 12 September 2022 after a long battle against cancer. They were married for sixty-three years while he served in the Marines as enlisted, warrant, and commissioned officer for twenty-six years, and after retiring from the Corps, was a deputy sheriff in two sheriff’s agencies. Bates recently became an author, only because of the assistance and encouragement from his Marine Wife. She assisted him in writing and publishing several books about the Marines, including two anthologies, a historical novel about John Archer Lejeune, and a book with a setting in Guam during and after World War II, several articles published in both Leatherneck, and Marine Corps Gazette, plus numerous local newspaper opinions over the span of the last forty or so years.
