In Somewhere Geese Are Flying, A son (in the often anthologized "Sleepy Time Gal") competes with his parents to tell "a simple story" about a poor boy/rich girl romance that "happened many years ago in the woods by a lake in Northern Michigan"... and the song he wrote her that became famous.
A champion pole-vaulter jumps out of an airplane in France on D-Day, wearing a parachute that fails to open; he survives but, as his son says, "Imagine...