Tributes Index - Avenue of Flags

John Krofcheck

Krofcheck

Hermitage. PA

U.S. Army – World War II

It may be unorthodox, but John Krofcheck is proud to be called an “S.O.B.” He was with the 100th Infantry Division in France when they captured the heavily fortified Fortress de Bitche on March 16, 1945, after a bitter three-month siege. From that, the division got the nickname “Sons of Bitche.”

That was just part of John’s unorthodox military career. When the 17-year-old enlisted in December, 1942, he became a military policeman in Washington, DC. His most dangerous assignment was directing traffic at the entrance to Arlington National Cemetery. But he wanted to get into the action, so he volunteered for the infantry.

He definitely got his wish for action. With the 100th Division during an intense battle in the Vosges Mountains, his company commander called him forward.

“I was loaded down with the BAR and ammunition, running forward like a dog,” John said. “I’m not ashamed to admit that I was scared.”

He turned to see if his assistant gunner was behind him. He fell into a large shell crater, severely injuring his leg. But he faced his fear and continued on without going to the medics.

John witnessed both the worst and the best that men do under fire. His assistant gunner shot himself in the leg to get out of combat. And John saw Lt. Edward Silk single-handedly assault a German unit that had the Americans pinned down with machine gun fire. According to his Medal of Honor citation, Lt. Silk ran across an open field through intense machine gun fire, took out the gunners by lobbing grenades into an open window, then attacked a second building. When he ran out of grenades, he started throwing rocks. Twelve Germans surrendered to him.

John adds a detail that the citation omits. Lt. Silk’s courage may have been enhanced by some of the contents of his two canteens full of cognac.

In December, 1945, John got out of the army, but that was 18 years before the end of his military career. In 1946, he re-enlisted with the Military Police. He got out again on a hardship discharge in 1948. He helped establish a National Guard unit in Sharon and became its First Sergeant. When the Korean War started, he volunteered for reactivation and went to Korea, where his unit provided security for a quartermaster installation in Ascom City.

After Korea, John served in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas until he retired in 1963.

Michael Kolesar

Kolesar, Michael

Farrell/Greenville, PA

U.S. Army – World War II

“However my country wants me to serve, that’s how I’ll serve.”

That was the response of Farrell native and current Greenville resident Michael Kolesar to every assignment he received in World War II – including ones for which he had neither experience nor inclination.

After joining the army on March 20, 1942, at the age of 26, he was assigned to the training section of the 2nd Convalescent Hospital at Camp Langdon, in New Hampshire. There he became detachment clerk and helped with the training. Because of his excellent job performance, he was selected for assignment with General Eisenhower’s First Army Headquarters in Shrivenham, England, where a Medical Field Service School was being established. But as sometimes happens in the army, his initial assignment didn’t make much sense.

“I was a medic, and I found out I was limited service because I had a punctured ear drum,” Kolesar said. “But I was assigned to the weapons section. I had never fired a gun in my life.”

Rather than complain, Kolesar learned about the weapons by reading manuals. His initiative, as well as his attitude and clerical experience, earned him a job as the section’s clerk, then a spot in Officer Candidate School.

When he was commissioned a second lieutenant on April 14, 1943, Kolesar trained doctors and nurses right there at the Medical Field Service School in courses such as field sanitation and chemical warfare.

After the D-Day invasions, Kolesar was sent to France.

“When I crossed the channel, there was a new group of soldiers,” Kolesar said. “At least I had lived a little bit, for me it wouldn’t be so bad. But hey were only kids, just out of high school.”

In France, Lt. Kolesar helped establish a Medical Field Service School at the Chateau Le Marais, a beautiful estate complete with a moat, satin-finished walls, and beautiful floors.

After the war Kolesar used the GI Bill to attend Thiel College. He finished in three years and got a job teaching Social Studies, American Government, and Problems of Democracy in the Greenville schools.

“I say with great pride that I was a professional teacher. I got my Master’s Degree in 1951, and earned the equivalence of two other Master’s Degrees, so I had enough for a doctor’s degree.”

Throughout his teaching career, he displayed the same dynamic attitude he had as a soldier and military officer – a willingness to serve others in whatever way he could.

Emil Koledin

Koledin, Emil

West Middlesex, PA

U.S. Marine Corps – Korean War

Leadership is a matter of getting your subordinates to want to do what they need to do to accomplish the mission. That happens when you gain their respect by not only to striving to accomplish the mission, but also to look out for their well-being. Emil Koledin was that kind of Marine Corps officer because he was that kind of a man.

He graduated in 1947 from Brown University in Providence with a degree in electrical engineering and a commission in the Marine Corps Reserves. He came back to Sharon to work as an electrical engineer at Sharon Steel. In 1950, he founded his own E. Koledin Electric.

When he was called to active duty in 1951 to serve in the Korean War, he closed up his business. He served as an engineering officer in the 1st Marine Division’s Shore Party Battalion, which was responsible for construction, road building, and other combat engineering functions. He wrote home about how cold it was – sometimes 20 degrees below zero.

After the war, he told his children about how much he loved and respected his fellow soldiers and everyone underneath him. When he had the chance to go to Hawaii on R&R, all of his men wanted him to go, but he would not leave. He insisted on staying with his men.

“That’s how he was his whole life,” said his daughter, Tanya. “It speaks really as to how he was as a man.”

As he sailed back home from Korea in May, 1954, he knew he would have to start up his business again, but didn’t have the capital to do it. So he played poker, and won enough to restart his business.

War on Terror Veterans Memorial

After reestablishing his electrical business, he opened Wesex Corporation as a general construction firm. Since then, Wesex has constructed many commercial buildings throughout the Shenango Valley and beyond. One of his favorite projects was the design and construction of the War on Terror Veterans Memorial in America’s Cemetery (formerly Hillcrest Memorial Park).

His love for his community and his country was expressed through his active involvement on many boards of directors, many civic organizations, and the Republican Party.

Through all this, he raised two families. He and his first wife, Claire, had two daughters, Janice and Kathleen, and one son, Emil (Butch). With his second wife, Kathy, he also had two daughters and a son: Teresa, Tanya, and Greg.

Emil passed away on May 24, 2o1o. He is buried in a place of honor near the War on Terror Veterans Memorial.

Ed Kochis

Ed Kochis

Greenville

U.S. Army – World War II

For Ed Kochis and his quartermaster unit in North Africa, the major threat to survival wasn’t enemy attack. It was meeting the ordinary needs of everyday life, such as food, water, and shelter.

They had c-rations – at least, when the supply ships weren’t sunk. They had to scrounge food any way they could, and buy it from the locals. One staple was a hard bread that the Arabs soaked in wine.

“We didn’t have any wine,” Kochis said. “We seeped it in onions and water. I went from 225 pounds down to 185. We had one canteen of water a day to bathe and drink.”

For a year and a half, the 76 men in his unit slept in pup tents. Each soldier had a shelter half, so two had to get together to make up a tent. Kochis and his tent mate were both over six feet tall. When it rained, they had to put their duffle bags outside to keep our feet dry.

The unit’s living conditions improved after they moved to Italy, near Foggia. Some of his friends managed to “requisition” cots and some walled tents that could sleep five or six.

The closest Kochis got to the front lines was about ten miles.

“But that was close enough,” he said, “because the ground would shake when big bombs would go off. We had a few bombs dropped near our air field. But we were pretty lucky that way.”

Some of Kochis’s friends were not as lucky. On a day off in Foggia, he went to the movies. “While I was in the movies, I heard this fellow laughing. I said to my buddy who was with me, ‘That sounds like a fellow from Greenville.’ I hollered, ‘Hey, Bill Doyle!’ He said, ‘Who is it?’ I said, ‘Ed Kochis.’

Doyle was a B-17 pilot stationed about ten miles from Kochis. They saw each other a couple of times a week for several months. Then he didn’t show up. He had been fatally shot down over Czechoslovakia.

Kochis’s last few months in the army were nothing like his years overseas. As a PT instructor in Texas, he led calisthenics, played softball twice a day, and had the rest of the day off.

Returning home in 1945, Kochis got a job at the Greenville Motor Club, which became the Mercer County Motor Club. He remained as head of that organization for 41 years.

Gus Kefurt

Greenville, PA

U.S. Army, World War II

It’s impossible to understand the strength and courage that enables one to perform in such a way as to merit the Medal of Honor. You might get a glimpse of it by considering the actions of Greenville native Gus Kefurt.

His excellence as a soldier is evident from the fact that barely four months after he joined the army in August, 1944, he was already a staff sergeant in Company K, 15th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division in France. That excellence is confirmed by his Medal of Honor citation:

“He distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty on 23 and 24 December 1944, near Bennwihr, France. Early in the attack S/Sgt. Kefurt jumped through an opening in a wall to be confronted by about 15 Germans. Although outnumbered he opened fire, killing 10 and capturing the others. During a seesaw battle which developed he effectively adjusted artillery fire on an enemy tank close to his position although exposed to small arms fire. When night fell he maintained a 3-man outpost in the center of the town in the middle of the German positions and successfully fought off several hostile patrols attempting to penetrate our lines. Assuming command of his platoon the following morning he led it in hand-to-hand fighting through the town until blocked by a tank. Using rifle grenades he forced surrender of its crew and some supporting infantry. He then continued his attack from house to house against heavy machinegun and rifle fire. Advancing against a strongpoint that was holding up the company, his platoon was subjected to a strong counterattack and infiltration to its rear. Suffering heavy casualties in their exposed position the men remained there due to S/Sgt. Kefurt’s personal example of bravery, determination and leadership. He constantly exposed himself to fire by going from man to man to direct fire. During this time he killed approximately 15 of the enemy at close range. Although severely wounded in the leg he refused first aid and immediately resumed fighting. When the forces to his rear were pushed back 3 hours later, he refused to be evacuated, but, during several more counterattacks moved painfully about under intense small arms and mortar fire, stiffening the resistance of his platoon by encouraging individual men and by his own fire until he was killed. As a result of S/Sgt. Kefurt’s gallantry the position was maintained.”

Binnwhir after the battle

Jaunary, 1945

S/Sgt. Kefurt was buried at the American Cemetery and Memorial in Épinal, France.

American Cemetery and Memorial, Epinal, France

Gus Kefurt’s marker at Epinal

Harry Jones

Jones, Harry

Sharon, PA

U.S. Navy – World War II

The men close to her called her by the sweet and simple name Sara, but she was anything but sweet or simple. Although she was only 16 years old when the war started, Tokyo Rose called her the old lady. She survived nearly fatal wounds at Iwo Jima on February 21, 1945, only to die a most inglorious death after the war at the tender age of 21.

She was the USS Saratoga (CV3). The New York Shipbuilding Company laid her keel in 1920 as a battle cruiser. World War I had just ended, and imaginative military minds were beginning to envision airplanes flying into combat from the deck of a ship. So in 1922 the Navy decided to convert her into an aircraft carrier.

Launched on April 7, 1925, she was impressive by any standards. Displacing 33,000 tons, measuring 888 feet in length and 106 feet at its widest point, her crew of 2,111 could guide her through the water at a speed of nearly 34 knots – that’s about 40 miles per hour.

The first planes to land on her deck were small, slow biplanes, a far cry from the fast and deadly fighters she later carried into combat. While participating in naval exercises before World War II, Sara was instrumental in developing strategies and tactics for a kind of warfare that had never been seen before.

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, Sara was in San Diego. She sailed immediately for the South Pacific, refueling in Pearl Harbor before continuing on toward Wake Island.

On January 11, 1942, the Saratoga received her first battle wounds and crew casualties. A torpedo from a Japanese submarine hit her without warning. Six of her crew were killed. She managed to limp back to Hawaii under her own power. She then headed for Bremerton, Washington, on the Puget Sound, for permanent repairs and the addition of improved anti-aircraft guns.

She entered her first intense combat operations in August, 1942, when she launched planes in support of the assault on Guadalcanal. Her planes sank the Japanese carrier Ryujo and damaged the Chitose, a seaplane tender. A week later the Saratoga had to return to Hawaii for repairs after being damaged by a Japanese torpedo.

Sailing from Pearl Harbor on November 10, Sara spent the next year and a half in combat operations in the South Pacific. She provided air support for some of the most legendary island invasions, such as Bougainville, the Marshalls, Eniwetok, and Engebi.

In November, 1943, the Saratoga left the main theaters of the war for nearly a year to participate in exercises with less experienced British and French aircraft carriers. After intensive training, the Saratoga and the British carrier HMS Illustrious conducted very successful attacks on port facilities and oil reserves on Sumatra. In June, 1944, Sara returned to the Bremerton dry docks for repairs.

That’s when Sharon native Harry Jones joined her crew. He had enlisted after completed tenth grade at Sharon High School.

“We lived on Oakland between Hall Street and Oakwood Cemetery,” he said. “When I came home from enlisting, I had to walk up Hall Street. When I turned the corner onto Oakland, my mother was standing on the porch steps. I think I could see the tears coming out of her eyes. I was full of joy yippying and hollering and she felt really bad. I never got over that. She was so sad.”

Jones was supposed complete six weeks of training at Great Lakes Naval Station, but the Navy was so short of men that he spent only three weeks there. After a week’s leave at home, he headed for Bremerton to join the crew of the Saratoga. While the carrier was being repaired, Jones trained to be a plane captain at the naval air station in Arlington, Washington.

When Sara left Washington in September, 1944, headed for Pearl Harbor, Jones found himself in a different world – one with incredible highs and lows.

USS Saratoga underway

“I was out at sea for nine months,” he said, “never saw a pebble, never saw a tree. I’ve been an outdoorsman all of my life. I couldn’t stand it down in the hold. I slept up on the deck right beside the plane. Not all the time, but quite a bit of time. The best time of my life was to see that sun go down in the water and see that moon come up. I tell you, there is nothing in this world could beat that. I enjoyed that every day and every night.”

Well, almost every day and night. There were times when the weather turned a little ugly.

“In a typhoon, I’ve seen that ship roll over to where the side of the ship was running right along the water. I don’t know why it didn’t go right over. That bow would go down under the waves, and the propellers would come up clear out of the water. It was like you were on a roller coaster.”

As plane captain, Harry was assigned to one plane. His job was to maintain it and prepare it for combat operations.

“I spent all my time up on deck with my plane,” he said. “I had to inspect it every day. The checklist had 58 items on it. You couldn’t skip any of them. If that plane just sput when it was taking off, it went right down into the water. Then they only have three minutes to get out of that cockpit before she went down.”

To make sure the plane wouldn’t sput while taking off, he had to get into the pilot’s seat and start it up every day.

“The spark to start it came from something like a shotgun shell,” he said. “You had to rev it up to 1500 rpm to see if it would spit or sputter. Sometimes the plane was real close to the edge of the deck. You would look down and all you would see is water. That thing would be bouncing up and down. You’d look over and think you’re going to take off or fall into the ocean. It scared the hell out of me.”

Harry and his pilot, H. C. Palmatos, weren’t the best of friends.

“He came in one day and said this plane is slowing down. He had me scrub it all down with diesel oil. He said it made it go a couple of knots faster.”

For several months at Pearl Harbor, the Saratoga trained night fighter squadrons and developed the techniques and tactics of night flying. Then on January 29, 1945, she headed out with the USS Enterprise to provide day and night aerial support for the invasion of Iwo Jima.

Jones was thrilled by the sight of the fleet.

“We were in the middle of a fleet of 500 ships,” he said. “Being on top, looking north, south, east, west, all I could see was ships.”

But Jones wasn’t the only one watching the fleet in general, and the Saratoga in particular. The Japanese were watching it, with a focus on the USS Saratoga..

“Tokyo Rose would come on the radio every night and they would play it over the public address system. She would say, ‘We’re looking for you, old lady. We know where the old lady is at. We’re going to get you.’”

On the fateful day of February 21, 1945, Tokyo Rose’s compatriots made good on her prediction. Jones prepared his plane for combat. The pilot, H. C. Palmatos, took off to attack the island. Then, at 1700 hours (5 pm), all hell broke loose. The Japanese hit the Saratoga with the most intense assault of the war against a warship. Within three minutes, they hit the Saratoga with five bombs.

“The first thing they dropped was a skip bomb, then a suicide plane came right after. It made a hole you could drive a semi through, right at the water line. The Saratoga had a closed-in hangar deck. They put a bomb right in there.”

During the fight, which lasted two hours, Sara was strafed with machine guns and hit with seven bombs. Five Kamikaze suicide planes dove into her, their bombs causing huge explosions. Somehow Sara managed to keep afloat and sail away from the battle zone.

The attacks killed 123 men and wounded scores more, including Jones, whose duties required him to be on deck.

“During any attack, most of the crew were assigned to antiaircraft guns,” Jones said. But the aircraft crews were assigned to the fire department.”

While fighting the many fires, Jones remembers running with the bullets from Japanese fighters tearing up the deck on both sides of him. He was hit in the back with a piece of shrapnel.

Two days later, U.S. Marines raised the flag on the top of Mount Suribachi. That is forever memorialized in one of the most famous war monuments in the world. When Sara’s crewmembers see it, they remember their part in the battle. Without setting foot on Iwo Jima, they helped to make that victory possible.

When Jones talks of his worst memories, he doesn’t describe the actual battle. He talks about the aftermath.

Painting of the Saratoga at Iwo Jima

“We stood on deck all day while we buried the dead at sea. That’s the worst thing I had to do in all my life was to stand up there, burying my buddies and friends.”

He also remembers the long voyage back to the United States for repairs.

“You could never get rid of that smell, burnt flesh. You remember it for the rest of your life.”

That was the end of combat for Sara, but not the end of her service. Fully repaired by May 22, she sailed back to Pearl Harbor and resumed pilot training until the Japanese surrendered on August 16. She was then transformed from an aircraft carrier into a magic carpet, bringing veterans back to the United States from the South Pacific. Before the end of Operation Magic Carpet, she had brought 29,204 veterans home, more than any other ship.

After the war, the USS Saratoga was rendered obsolete by larger, more modern carriers. She had one more bit of service to perform, however – not as a hero, but as a victim. In 1946, the United States conducted nuclear bomb tests at Bikini Atoll. They sacrificed Sara to determine the effects of the atomic bomb on naval vessels. She was sunk by an underwater bomb detonated 500 yards away.

To those conducting the testing, the USS Saratoga was an inanimate floating conglomeration of metal that deserved nothing more than to be sacrificed in the name of progress. But to the sailors and airmen who served on Sara, she was a very personal friend and fellow combatant.

Plane Talk, the Saratoga’s newspaper, described that crew on Thanksgiving, 1943: “Aboard the Saratoga we have the gol’darndest collection of farmers, bakers, saxophone players, carpenters, machinists, lawyers, school teachers, insurance men and Texas cowboys that ever assembled aboard a flat-top.”

The paper also summarized their respect for Sara herself: “The Saratoga is more than a ship; it is an idea and a dream. . . . Since the day when the Saratoga first hit the waves until now, it has existed but for one purpose: to protect the freedom to which we as a nation are pledged.”

Sara is at the bottom of the Bikini Atoll, and most of her crew are gone, but her dream, her legacy, deserves to endure. The next time you look at the Iwo Jima memorial, pay tribute not only to those Marines who raised the flag, but also to Sara, her crew, and all the sailors, airmen, and soldiers who helped make that possible.

Ann (Deluchie) Jarocki

Farrell, PA

U.S. Army – World War II

A humanitarian at heart, Ann (Deluchie) Jarocki went into nursing after graduating from Farrell High School in 1936. After completing her training, she joined the Red Cross “because they would send nurses to flood areas and hurricanes and tornadoes and I always wanted adventures.”

In 1941, she jumped at the chance to join the army, despite strong objections from her family. Lt. Deluchie served as a nurse in military hospitals in Ft. Lee, VA, and Ft. Benning, GA. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, she was among the first to volunteer for overseas service.

On March 1, she and her fellow nurses boarded a 17 ship convoy in New York without knowing where they was headed. When they arrived at the Panama Canal, they knew they were going to the Pacific. Six weeks later they were setting up hospitals on the northeastern coast of Australia.

The American army was fighting the enemy who occupied most of New Guinea, less than 100 miles to the north. Casualties were flown in to the hospitals in Australia. Then, as U.S. forces advanced, Lt. Deluchie volunteered for transfer to a hospital on New Guinea. Although the enemy was being pushed back, they still had the capability of conducting air raids – sometimes even at night when the moon was full.

“The moon was so bright that when we were on night duty we would sit outside the tent and make our notes out there. I never saw such a beautiful moon in all my life.”

But because it was so brilliant, it made targets easily visible for air raids, so they called it the Bombers’ Moon.

After two and a half years in Australia and New Guinea, Lt. Deluchie was discharged from the army. Return from the war brought an end to her military service, but it didn’t diminish her commitment to humanitarian service. She became involved in the Mercer County Association of the Retarded (MCAR), serving as its first president, as well as a member of many committees.

She also volunteered continually wherever she was needed. She did blood pressure screenings at various locations in the Shenango Valley; was a ‘Polio Volunteer’ in 1954 with Dr. Jonas Salk, administering vaccinations and medications to control polio; was a school aide at Monsignor Geno Monti Elementary School, Farrell; and was a camp nurse for many years at summer camps for the mentally challenged.

Tom Hodge

Greenville, PA

U.S. Navy – World War II, Korean War

One fine spring day in 1944, Greenville High School senior Tom Hodge became one of the 10,110, 104 men who received “Greetings” from the Selective Service System during World War II. He was sent to Erie for a physical and initial processing.

“I went to a table manned by a lieutenant commander in the Navy and a major in the Army,” Tom said. “As you put your papers on the table, they stamped one ARMY, the next one NAVY, next one ARMY, and so on. By chance I got into the Navy. I was with a boyhood friend of mine. He wanted to be in the Navy so bad he could taste it. I said I don’t care that much. We decided to talk to the officers thinking maybe they would switch it. They wouldn’t even listen to us. Later on, I was glad I was in the Navy because it worked out better for me,” he said.

During boot camp at Sampson, New York, everyone took placement tests, including one on the ability to understand Morse Code.

“I had learned Morse Code in Boy Scouts, so I got a good mark on the test,” he said.

While many from his boot camp class were sent to amphibious forces preparing for the D-Day invasion of Europe, Tom completed a five-month radio school course right there in Sampson. Along with two of his buddies, he was assigned to the radio station at the headquarters of the Fifth Naval District in Norfolk, Virginia.

“We were seaman first class at this point,” he said. “The first three months all we did was make coffee for everybody else. It was good duty. It was mostly all WAVES there and they were excellent operators and knew their business. I had a second class WAVE supervisor. She said I’m going to make a radio man out of you or know why. She did.”

After those three months, they started standing watches on the radios. For two days, they were on from 7 a.m. to 3 pm. The next two, from 3 to 11; and then two from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m.

“You were sleepy all the time because you never caught up on your sleep,” he said. “We had to type out all of the incoming messages and key the outgoing messages.”

The radio operators had to type the incoming messages and key in the outgoing. All messages were encoded in groups of five letters. Some were one-to-one ship to shore transmissions, while others were broadcast to all of the ships and land bases in the navy through two transmitters, one in Washington, DC, and the other in Hawaii.

“The only excitement I ever had on the radio was one evening when I was sitting on a ship to shore circuit. All of a sudden I heard this loud message come through – a repeated O O O O meaning ‘urgent.’ The ship was trying to reach Charleston, South Carolina, but they weren’t answering. I broke in and said I could forward their message to Charleston. He sent me a message in plain language, which threw me because I wasn’t used to copying plain language. They said they were being attacked by a submarine. German submarines were cruising up along the Atlantic shore, sinking a lot of ships. So I gave message to my supervisor who sent it by land line to Charleston. I never did hear what happened.”

Tom was very content with his duties there, but one of his friends wasn’t. “After about 3 or 4 months, he decided he wanted to go to sea. He requested sea duty on the part of all of us, against my will. We were sent to a receiving station at Norfolk where we sat around for three or four months. Finally our orders came through. We were being sent to be sent to the Azores.”

They sailed on a troop ship to Oran, in North Africa.

“That’s where the British early in the war had sunk the whole French fleet to prevent its ships from being captured and used by the Germans,” he said.

After a week there, they took a train to Port Lyautey, Morocco, then flew on a B-24 to Lajes Air Base on Terciera Island in the Azores. It’s a small island, only about nine miles long and six miles wide, with two small towns, Praia de Vitoria and Angra do Heroismo.

“I remember them well,” Tom said. “I use to go to them on liberty.”

Tom manned radios with a “split circuit” controlled with a toggle switch. One ear heard messages from Bermuda, New York, Norfolk, and Agentia, Newfoundland; the other from Londonderry (North Ireland), Paris, and Port Lyautey, Morocco. Besides the international messages, they handled a lot of air-sea traffic with ships in the area.

“So I encompassed the entire North Atlantic on those two circuits,” Tom said. “When traffic came in, I flipped the toggle switch so I could only hear with one ear to keep from being confused.”

One night he heard a message from Norfolk.

“I knew all the WAVES at radio station there. I sent a message, ‘What is your call sign?’ It turned out that I knew her. So I started asking her questions in Morse Code: what’s so and so doing, how are things in Norfolk, blah blah blah. This was during the war. That was strictly forbidden. A Long Island station captured all this on the log, so the captain of our base got a notice that someone was doing unauthorized transmission. They looked back and sure enough there were my initials on the log. I got a Captain’s Mast, a low-level disciplinary action – basically, a reprimand.”

When the war was over the “point system” was used to determine eligibility to go home. As one of the youngest, Tom had the least points.

“So I was one of the last to leave,” he said. “I had option to go back on B-24 as its radio operator. We landed in Argentia, and were socked in about a week. Then on to New York City. I had never been there. You could go anywhere on the subway for a nickle.”

When Tom was processed out of the Navy at Bainbridge, Maryland, he was receptive to the pitch they gave about joining the inactive reserves.

“It sounded good. We wouldn’t be called up unless there was a war,” he said. “Then in late forties, there was trouble with Russians, so I signed up for active duty. I didn’t hear anything for several years. During that time I graduated from Thiel College with bachelor’s degree, got married, and had two children.”

Then came the Korean War. Tom was activated. After refresher training, he was assigned to the reconditioned USS Wasp aircraft carrier.

“During re-commissioning, Eleanor Roosevelt and Bernard Baruch came aboard and spoke,” he said. “Captain McCafferty, the ship’s captain, said he would see to it that the Wasp would be a taut ship. And he did. He was a good captain.”

The USS Wasp had 3000 people on board, including the radio crew of 50 men. There were ten radio shacks, each with five radios.

“We weren’t too busy,” Tom said, “but during General Quarters (emergency alert), all radios were manned. I was a pretty good operator so they assigned me to radio central during GQ.”

The Wasp headed for Guantanamo Bay for a shakedown cruise. On the way, they had operational exercises.

“Landing on an aircraft carrier is very difficult,” Tom said. “The ship would be tossing backward and forward and side to side. They had to catch a cable that brought them to a halt. We lost two new pilots right out of training who missed the cables and didn’t have the power to take off.”

The carrier didn’t have the same planes all of the time. “Squadrons would come and go. We always were glad to see the squadrons leave because that meant chow lines would be a lot shorter.”

Tom was released from active duty almost exactly one year after he had been recalled. He credits the Navy with giving him discipline which made him a better person.

“I went in as an immature kid,” he said. “For the first six or eight weeks I was so homesick I could hardly stand it. But once I got into radio school and had something to learn, I enjoyed it from that time on.”

That’s not too surprising, given the nature of his duties. “I was always warm and comfortable with a mug of coffee right at hand.”

John Getway

Getway, John

Sharpsville, PA

Army Airborne – World War II

There’s a phrase that John Getway of Sharpsville, PA, never uses: “I think I’ll hang around a while.” He actually did hang around – for three days – 65 feet up in a tree in Holland during World War II. It nearly cost him his life, and only his fortitude and excellent physical conditioning enabled him to recover.

As crazy as it sounds, that means he might owe his life to milk. Not to drinking it, but to carrying it. When he was in high school, he got up very early every morning, seven days a week, and delivered milk for Brookfield Dairy (now Dean’s Dairy).

“We used to deliver milk down as far as Sharon High School. And then they would rush back to Ridge Avenue so I could jump off the truck and go into the high school. The janitor would say, ‘Hurry, John,’ and just as I got into my room he would push the button for the bell. So I was never late.”

He left high school in 1938 to work at the dairy full time – until December, 1941.

“Right after Pearl Harbor five of us decided we would go to into the service,” John said.

He was sent to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, for basic training. That was right at the time the first U.S. Army airborne units were being organized. John decided to become a paratrooper.

The training in jump school was extremely rigorous, but John found himself well prepared for it.

“In airborne training, we would go out and walk, then run. They would stop to let the men smoke. Well, I didn’t smoke. One time I said, ‘Sergeant, can I keep double timing all the way up?’ He said ‘Sure, go ahead.’ I ran way up there and sat down on a rock. When the rest of the troops got there, they tired and sweating. The sergeant came over and asked, ‘How the heck did you do it?’ I told him I peddled milk all the time, jumping off and on the truck, summer and winter.”

John was assigned to the 509th Airborne Regiment at Fort Bragg. From there he started an incredible odyssey with one of the most elite units of the army – jumping from airplanes, fighting enemy soldiers in hand to hand combat, wandering in the desert, and even witnessing the eruption of Mount Vesuvius.

It started in mid-1942 when the 509th departed Fort Bragg to go to England. They trained in Scotland, jumping from British bombers because the American planes hadn’t arrived yet. They were the only paratroopers to jump from only 250 feet, which allows barely enough time for the chute to open.

In November, 1942, the 509th spearheaded the invasion of North Africa.They flew over 1600 miles from England to conduct a parachute assault on Tafraoui Airport in Algeria. A week later they made their second combat jump on the airfield at Youks-Les-Bains near the Tunisian border. During subsequent combat operations, John was wounded in the hand while trying to fend off an enemy soldier’s bayonet.

“All we did was put sulfa drugs on it, and they gave me a tetanus shot. It was four days before they could get me to a hospital to check me out.”

From December 1942 to June 1943, the 509th trained for the invasion of Sicily. John’s company was attached to the 504th Parachute Battalion, part of the 82nd Airborne Division. On July 11, 1943, they took off to for a combat drop onto the beachhead in Sicily.

During that jump John got wounded several times. Again, it was sulfa drugs, tetanus shot, and keep on fighting. In five days the division pushed forward 150 miles and captured 23,000 prisoners.

After fighting through Sicily, the division landed in Italy and fought northward through Naples. On March 18, 1944, John’s unit was bivouacked about a mile from Mount Vesuvius when it erupted.

“They moved us 20 miles away, but you could still see the smoke,” John said.

Shortly after that the 82nd moved back to England to prepare for the invasion of northern Europe. In September, 1944, they made a combat jump into Holland.

“We jumped at night time, and I landed way up in a tree. I hung there for three days and three nights. My canteen and K-rations were on my back, and I couldn’t reach them. Two little boys saw me. They went back and got their family. When they lowered me down, my legs crumbled because I had no circulation in them for three days.”

John was sent to a hospital in England, then to one in Miami. The physical therapy was difficult, but John persisted. He was there for a year and a half recovering from his ordeal. Part of his therapy involved climbing a rope hand over hand. John could do little at first, but he persisted until he could climb all the way to the high ceiling.

When John came back to Sharpsville, he got a job at Steel Fabricators. After a few years he got laid off, but quickly got a job at Sawhill Tube .

John married Ann Gray on May 28, 1955. While raising their family, Ann worked at Sharon Stationery for 20 years, and John worked at Sawhill for 30 years until he retired in 1985.

For many years John and Ann were active in the General Ridgway Chapter of the 82nd Airborne Division Association, in Dayton, Ohio. They went there two or three times a year for various events. They attended as many of the association’s annual conventions as possible, and helped put on three of them.

Since 1986, they have gone to Fort Bragg for the annual 82nd Airborne Division’s annual review. The most memorable moment for John and Ann came in 2002 at the celebration of the 60th anniversary of the airborne. One World War II veteran was selected from each 82nd Airborne unit that fought in that war. John was chosen to represent the 504th. He rode in the review with the veterans, then stood beside the commanding general on the podium as the Division marched by.

Some of the effects of John’s World War II ordeal persist to this day. He freely expresses his appreciation for the one who took good care of him for so many years, until she passed away on March 6, 2012.

“Some women would turn their back on you and walk away” he said. “But anything that happens to me, Ann knew what to do and got everything done. She was just as good as a nurse.”

John and Ann had four children: Stephen (August 1956), Edwin (August 1957), Daniel (March 1959), and Beth (September 1966).

John Getway passed away on April 11, 2014.

Tom Fiedler

Fiedler, Tom

Hermitage, PA

U.S. Army, World War II

In 1942, a project called the Army Specialized Training Program (ASTP) sent recruits to colleges and universities across the United States. The intent was to create a specialized corps of Army officers to enhance the conduct of the war and the restoration of civilian governments in Europe after the war. Tom Fiedler passed a series of tests to qualify for the program. He completed infantry basic training at Fort Benning, Georgia before being sent to Westminster College.

After just one semester, the program was terminated. Since Fiedler had infantry training, he was assigned with thousands of other soldiers from the curtailed ASTP program to the 95th Infantry Division at Indiantown Gap, PA.

By September, the Division was in Normandy preparing for a move to the front. While Tom’s unit was waiting for that advance, he participated in one of the most famous logistics operations of the war. Plans to build a pipeline from Normandy to Paris has to be scrapped because the army was advancing so rapidly, consuming 800,000 gallons of fuel a day. To keep the vehicles moving, the army put together the Red Ball Express, a continuous convoy of 2½ ton trucks hauled fuel in 5-gallon jerry cans from Normandy to Paris. There was no stopping. If a truck broke down, it was pushed off to the side of the road.

Fiedler’s driving days ended when he moved with his division to front-line combat. Only three weeks later, he was hit with shrapnel from a mortar or artillery round. Most went through, but there was still a piece left inside.

“I was going to go ahead,” he said,” but when I went to grab my rifle, I couldn’t because my hand was stiff.”

That was the day before his birthday.

“They sent me back to an aid station. About six o’clock the next morning somebody shook me awake. I looked up, and there were chickens on his collar, a colonel. He said, “Is your name Thomas Fiedler?’ I said yes. He said, ‘Here’s your Purple Heart.’ That was my ceremony, and my birthday present.”

Tom ended up in a hospital in England, where they removed the shrapnel. After several months there, he was returned to limited service at a redeployment camp in France, where they processed soldiers to return home. He got back home to his home in Harmony, PA, in March, 1946, with his Purple Heart and a Bronze Star.