Tuesday, November 12 — “I certainly would have loved to get across the pond. We had orders to leave before December 15, but I guess it’s all off now. I do know that I’m beginning to like the game and intend to stick as long as they will keep me now. It’s a great sport. Love—James, Jr.” The following day, November 13, 1918, James Russell Ristine, Jr., was killed in an aeroplane accident in Miami, Florida. He was flying at a height of 200 feet when his plane went into a spin and crashed to the ground. To avoid a collision with another plane, James attempted a nose dive from too low a position.
James was one of four students from the University of Washington to pass the stiff marine aviation examination. James enlisted on June 5, 1918, in the Aviation Corps and was sent to the Presidio, and then to Boston, where, at the Boston Institute of Technology, he finished with high honors in his ground instruction training. From there he was transferred to the flying field at Miami. News of his coveted commission as a lieutenant in the marine aviation corps arrived just three days after his death.
James was the youngest of ten children – five girls and five boys – born to James Richard Ristine and his wife, Augusta Henrietta Beegle. He was a freshman at the UW when he enlisted. He was a member of Phi Kappa Psi Fraternity and had been selected for the freshman football squad. He was just twenty years old when he died and is buried in Joplin, Missouri. (bit.ly/uw_ristine)