Edward Franklin Baker

Edward Franklin Baker was born in 2248 to a wealthy family of Ranchers in Oregon. He spent the first few years of his life being raised on the ranch, and learning his way around it. He proved a strong, able, and bright lad. However, his father wanted more for him. What's more, he wanted his son to go places. Edward was sent to School in the New California Republic at the age of fourteen to learn from the schools there, rather than be home schooled by his parents like most kids in Oregon were. His father wanted his son to become a lawyer of some sort one day, or a politician. He did well in school like he had on the ranch, being sucked into his studies. He worked hard, studied hard, and as a result became an excellent student well versed in the history and law of the NCR.

At the age of eighteen, he joined an officer cadet program in the New California Republic, deciding to pursue a career in the military despite his fathers wishes to be a law student. The young Edward Baker was enlisted as 'Cadet Baker', and sent through the rigorous training and education required to be a career officer of the NCR. He earned top scores in history, mathematics, and the more military related areas of education such as leadership and general military education. He performed poorly in marksmanship classes compared to his peers, leading one instructor to observe that he'd be better suited to a desk job than a field job.

The insult hurt Ed more than it should have. And he worked hard. He brought his marksmanship up to his peers at an average. By no means was he a qualified sniper with his pistol, but he silenced the ones who thought that the rancher from Oregon was going to be labelled as a 'Hick Desk Jockey', like some of his fellow students from the city area's of the NCR had taken to calling him. He resented a majority of his peers greatly, and the animosity was returned two fold by the upper classmen. Edward was always the last one to be told he could stop running, was always told to run the most laps, and was always the one who had some sand in his rifle during drills.

But, he stuck through the entire thing, all the while having the big three drilled into him: "Duty, Honor, Country". Edward graduated from the Cadet Corps and was commissioned as a First Lieutenant in the Army of the Republic of California at the age of twenty-one. He served admirably in conflict against the raiders and Caesars Legion, earning a few medals for meritorious service.

His finest moment in the service of the NCR came during the preparation days leading up to the Second Battle of Hoover Dam.

Commanding a small squad of seven soldiers, the thirty-one year old Lieutenant Baker was lounging down on the ground at the makeshift observation outpost they had set up. A pair of binoculars hanged down from around his neck, and he was was focused on a map held onto his knees. The other soldiers were primarily lounging about by the scrap metal fortifications they had set up by looting a nearby convoy of destroyed cars. The metal wasn't great, and it wasn't a mighty fortress, but it'd keep them safe. Mostly.

A group of Powder Gangers, having seen the small, isolated NCR patrol, had decided to try their luck. Right before Bakers eyes, a stick of dynamite landed in one of the tin cups of his soldiers, just as the man was raising it to his lips. The NCR trooper froze, as did the rest of his men. The man wore a shocked look of confusion at first, that quickly turned to one of terror.

"THROW IT!" Baker screamed, and the man hastily complied, throwing his tin cup as far as he could. It exploded mid air, and at the explosion, gunshots began to hiss through the air as the Powder Gangers launched their raid.

Baker took command of the situation, crawling through the sand and tugging on the legs of his Troopers to pull them down. "KEEP YOUR HEADS DOWN!" He shouted to be heard above the gunfire and pinging of the bullets as they hit into the scrap metal. One man suddenly began to scream as a round pierced the metal barricade and sliced open his leg before landing into the dirt. The gunfire took a momentary reprieve in one direction as the advancing Powder Gangers took a moment to reload, and that's when Baker took his chance. "Now! Up!" He hissed, smacking his men on the back of their legs to get them moving.

Three of the NCR soldiers scooted back, risking it. They returned fire with their heavier service rifles, and two Powder Gangers fell into the ground, killed immediately in the unexpected hailstorm of bullets. A third and fourth tumbled to the ground wounded, and the rest on that side ducked into cover, relying on their companions to begin suppressing. Baker crawled over to the other side of the barricade, and reached into a box that they had brought along with them, removing the three grenades inside and handing one to the two men next to him. He gave them a look, and mimed throwing the grenade. The two soldiers, one of whom was as young as sixteen, the other in his twenties, nodded. Baker pulled the pin on his grenade, and then scrambled to his feet, throwing. The two troopers followed his example. The grenades landed behind the advancing powder gangers, and there was a single loud pop, not as loud as Baker had been expecting from three grenades- and three puffs of smoke. The Powder Gangers were tugged in different directions by the three differing blasts, as if they were puppets and they were being tugged upon by some invisible wires leading to a cruel puppet master before being discarded in the dirt. The surviving powder gangers began making a run for it, but fire brought them down.

The two remaining ones were taken prisoner, and eventually executed by hanging for their crimes against the NCR.

The action won Baker praise from his immediate superiors, and he was mentioned in dispatches for preventing a possible Powder Ganger seizure of NCR weaponry, and for keeping all his men alive. During the course of the firefight, only one man had been wounded, partly due to the positioning of the scrap metal barricades that Baker had so carefully ordered erected.

Baker continued to serve in the NCR military until the Second Battle of Hoover Dam, where he participated in a minor role.

After the battle, he retired from NCR service and went home to Oregon. He was given a hero's welcome by his aging father, and swiftly reintegrated into life on the Ranch. During his periods of Leave, the Officer had often returned home to visit his folks, and the father and son had eventually reconciled over their differences regarding his career choice, particularly when it became obvious how well Ed had done.

A year after returning home however, things became evident to Edward that things were not good. He saw the NCR big ranchers, bigger than even his father- move in and begin forcing the others off their lands. Quite a few of these men had become friends of his over the years, and plenty were NCR Veterans like himself from the war years. Edward was, quite frankly, angered. When the candidates from Oregon began preaching secession from the NCR, and were jailed, it was the final straw. Edward dived into the world of politics in Oregon.

Edward Franklin Baker had found a new passion. He became a fiery, well known speech giver in the streets of Klamath, inciting riots against the NCR there. His first riot was on a sunny (duh) day in Oregon, the heat beamed down on the crowd, and NCR troopers stood around the crowd, armed with police batons. They were there to keep order, for any big event such as this.

Events unfolded predictably. Calmly at first, and then as Edward got more heated, his crowd got heated. The NCR troopers were sent in to grab him, and the crowd erupted into a riot that left five NCR troopers wounded, and a score of civilians wounded as well.

After the small riots, and beat downs of NCR troopers, things got a bit more heated. Through a contact of his in the NCR, Edward began having weapons and armor covertly shipped to Klamath. He soon outfitted his own personal unit of rebels in Klamath, made up of a core of NCR veterans from the war years who had joined him. The uniforms were only used by his personal body guards in private, and the guards of the Oregonian Provisional Congress which met in secret. The Provisional Government was created during that troubled year before the conflicts began, when the Oregonian candidates were released from jail the first time. Seeing that a peaceful resolution was, for now, impossible, the Provisional Congress declared in their fifth meeting that only by a "Peoples armed insurrection" would the Free-State of Oregon be recognized.

Edward was appointed Minister of Intelligence, and was given charge of the war effort, commissioned as the first and only General of the Oregonian Republican Army. He found himself now facing the men and women he had trained with as a youth, and he reveled the chance privately.

He targeted the young, disenfranchised ranchers who had immigrated to Klamath, offering them a chance for change...and a chance to drive out the bastards who took their land.

People flocked to the banner in secret. Out in the hills, Edward began to train his men. They grew to respect him, and that was never more obvious than when, a few months before the year turned to 2283, the Oregonian citizens of Klamath struck out against General Proctors NCR occupational force.

Armed citizens, wearing their plainclothes, ambushed NCR patrols, gunning them down and then disappearing into the night. A dozen NCR soldiers and officers were murdered that day, and it was considered the official start of hostilities between the Rebels and the NCR.

Edward continued training his rebel force out in the hills, while his core group of rebels, christened 'The Republican Guard' drilled in more conventional warfare techniques. They were to be the shock troops of the revolution, and were to a man loyal to Edward. He sent out couriers into the wastes, and began rallying the people of the various towns and villages against the NCR. Quite a few of them, such as Tull, at this point had already formed their own militias, and begun their fight against the NCR on their own.

But now, things were changing. Becoming more organized. Edwards mysterious backer in the NCR kept the guns and armor flowing across to Oregon, and the Republican Guard grew in numbers.

Edward wasn't going to rest until the NCR were driven from his land. And with weapons, Popular support, and money...all that was stopping him were the soldiers themselves. And if Edward had learned one thing from the Academy, it was simple.

Duty, Honor, Country. But Oregon was his country now.