Gregory “Jack” Elsken was born in Subiaco, Logan County, Arkansas, on August 8, 1916, the seventh child of Conrad and Gretchen Elsken. He graduated from Subiaco Academy in 1936 and moved to Little Rock where he worked for the Railway Express Agency. He was drafted in July 1941 and inducted into the U.S. Army on September 30, 1941. He was trained as an enlisted man at Camp Wolters, Texas. He received further instruction at Fort Ord, California, before being transported by ship to Hawaii where he underwent Ranger training, after which he participated in several island campaigns, the most significant as a communications sergeant in the Battle of Saipan from June 15, 1944, until July 9, 1944. Elsken served with the 165th Infantry Division, and was awarded a Purple Heart for a shrapnel wound he received on Saipan. After the war, Elsken returned to Little Rock and worked for Railway Express until he retired in 1975. He then operated a feed store in western Pulaski County for twenty-seven additional years. He married Catherine Minden of Fort Smith in 1971. They raised four daughters and one have one grandchild. The couple live at the time of this writing in Pleasant Hills Retirement Living Center in Little Rock.