Beyond the grand staircase and through a pair of doors lies Lt. Col. Robert Boone’s office in Crowder Hall, the ROTC building next to Stankowski Field. He teaches four classes, as well as recruits and trains future soldiers.

Behind Boone, professor of Military Science and Leadership, are bookcases — six of them. They hold more than 400 books about history that Boone has read and collected over the last 23 years in the Army. There are so many that they’re piled in every direction, nearly spilling from the shelves.

Boone is clean cut, wearing a bright green flannel tucked into familiar blue jeans. He sits at his desk and there are a few documents on it; it’s Veterans Day information he has prepared. One is the copy of a letter from 1954, sent by then-President Dwight D. Eisenhower to Harvey V. Highley, establishing Nov. 11 as Veterans Day. The second document is a copy of the proclamation itself.

Boone rushed to grab fast food for lunch today, something he rarely does. When he drove to pay at the window, the employee surprised him.

“Don’t worry, the guy in front of you bought your lunch,” she said.

Boone figured the customer before him must have seen the Operation Iraqi Freedom Veteran sticker on his windshield. That marked the fourth time in two weeks that a stranger paid for something Boone wanted to buy.

Boone stammered, and the employee asked him what he wanted to do since he didn’t have to pay for the food.

“I’m going to buy the lunch for the person behind me,” he said.

* * *

It started with John Wayne in “The Green Berets.”

Boone, a Kentucky native, pictured himself as Wayne, and he became fascinated with joining the Army. He also loved history, which he majored in at college. He said his interests were perfect for joining the Army.

“I have a thirst for knowledge,” Boone said. “What I tell my cadets is that you have to be a student of history because, believe it or not, it’s going to affect you.”

Serving was good for him, too. Boone said he always needed to have order in his life and the Army provided that. There’s a rank of command in the Army; there are instructions and procedures.

And then there was Sonny.

He is Boone’s mother’s cousin, a retired brigadier general from the Air Force.

“Despite all the adversity and the backlash from the war, he had a very fruitful and accomplished career,” Boone says. “He stuck it out.”

When Boone was young, Sonny was promoted to a one-star general, and a local newspaper wrote a story about it. Boone saw the article and folded it. He kept it.

In 2010, more than three decades later, Boone was promoted to his current rank of lieutenant colonel. He invited Sonny to his promotion ceremony. When Boone spoke about his influences at the ceremony, he unfolded a piece of paper and showed it to the crowd.

It was the article.

* * *

After receiving commission from Sam Houston State University in 1992, Boone was first deployed to the Sinai peninsula in Egypt to oversee peaceful transitioning at Camp David.

As time passed, he managed leaving home fairly well — the Army has a sturdy family readiness system, and he had sturdy family support of his own.

“Knowing that (my wife) is fully committed to what I do made things much easier,” Boone said.

After Egypt, it was Operation Uphold Democracy in Haiti, and then a mission in Tunisia, Africa, where Boone, a third-degree Black Belt, opened his own dojo. A dojo in the desert, he said, where a couple of guys gathered and learned karate for three hours a night, six nights a week.

“It was a great way for soldiers to decompress,” Boone says. “We’re not soldiers. We’re not Kenyans or Ugandans. We’re just martial artists that want to get together and train. “

After a brief hiatus from the Army, Boone was deployed to Iraq twice. There, he said he endured grief when he lost two soldiers under his command.

“You take a moment of silence and just try to move on,” Boone said. “You know that they died doing what they love — serving the country.”

Boone has moved on, and his work has resulted in many accolades: two Bronze Stars, two Army Achievement Medals, a pair of Global War on Terrorism medals, three Meritorious Service Medals and a United Nations Medal. But for him, they’re just byproducts of reaching his real goal.

“It’s great to have them, to strive for, but you don’t join the military to seek awards,” he said. “You join the military to serve your country.”

* * *

Boone is in his office at the desk in front of the bookcases. His reading has expanded his knowledge; his experiences have expanded his wisdom.

“I think it’s changed me to not be so much black-and-white, to have a gray area,” he said. “The older I’ve gotten, I’ve been able to look at perspectives and analyze.”

Boone, who’s still in active duty, said he thinks he will return to combat one last time before he retires. Over time, the meaning of Nov. 11 has developed for him, and it has matured.

“You may not be somebody who has been in the military, but you probably know somebody,” he said. “A simple thanks and recognition is all we want, (although) most veterans are really humble.”

Boone says that anyone can do that any day, especially Monday. Monday is Veterans Day.

On Monday, he’ll be working.