Lehi Veterans of World War II 1941-1945

Stanley E. Abbott Darrell S. Adams Franklin B. Adams Ralph W. Adams Howard R. Adamson Dorald M. Allred H. Don Allred James Darrell Allred Markland E. Allred Rulon B. Allred R. Chase Allred Ralph H. Allred Reed T. Allred Sherwin R. Allred Wayne H. Allred Charles G. Anderson Don Anderson Ralph Evans Anderson Theo Anderson C. Grant Ash Don J. Austin Lowell D. Austin Robert H. Austin Boyd J. Babcock Max E. Babcock Jay O. Barnhart Rolland J. Barnhart Willard D. Barnhurst Allen C. Barnes Van Allen Barnes Elwin Barnes Don Fletcher Barnes C. Jack Barnes Lynn Barnes Raymond E. Barnes B. LaVar Bateman Ralph H. Bateman Burlin D. Bates B. J. Beck Ray Beveridge Eugene Ray Bone John Lloyd Bone L. Richard Bone Russell P. Bone T.J. Bone Glen A. Boren Joseph K. Bourne Merlin G. Bourne Warren Bernard Bradshaw Harris Axel Bradshaw Mark J. Bradshaw Blain Brokaw Charles Roberts Brooks R. Lynn Brooks Gail A. Brown Ferres D. Brown Howard B. Brown Richard A. Brown George W. Buchanan James W. Buchanan G. Dale Burgess Myron H. Burgess H. Keith Bushman Boyd Wilson Calton Keith W. Calton Robert Grant Calton Alma Kay Candland Harry Candland Leo Carlton Lloyd R. Carlton Harold J. Carson John R. Carson Junior D. Carson Wayne Carson Vivian Ray Carter Edgar Allen Case Ernest R, Cedarstrom Harold J. Chapman Lowell W. Chapman Roy S. Chapman A Kelsey Chatfield Jr. *Spencer K. Chatfield Edward L. Chestnut Glen B. Chilton Allen Chipman *David W. Christofferson Dean D. Christofferson Paul V. Christofferson Allen L. Clark Asa Elden Clark Duane S. Clark Keith Clark George N Clover Donald J. Coates Donald L. Colledge Evan L. Colledge Jr. Evan Joseph Colledge Evan M. Colledge George Harold Colledge Ivor Colledge John A. Colledge L. Dee Colledge Ralph Colledge Edward F. Comer La Grand Comer Sherman Fjeld Cook Don R. Coombs H. Eugene Cooper Perry J. Corbridge J. Theron Corbridge Sheral R. Covington Jay Taylor Cox Craig C. Crabb Jeanette M. Crabb Kirkham V. Crabb Bernard F. Cude Claud L. Curtis Darrell K. Curtis Paul L. Curtis Robert S. Curtis La Mar P. Dahl Maurice J. Dahl Glen La Mar Davis George E. Davis John Evans Davis Merlin C. Degelbeck Irvin C. Dickerson La Drue B. Dorton Robert Dorton James F. Doyle John W. Doyle A. Spencer Dransfield Paul C. Draper Jack K. Dunn Jefferson N. Eastmond E. Keith Eddington Richard H. Eddington E Eugene Erickson Floyd J. Erickson John R. Erickson Donald N. Evans M. Duane Evans E. Glenn Evans Glen T. Evans Grant S. Evans Howard C. Evans Junior Evans *Keith G. Evans Mrs. Mary Ellen Evans E. Paul Evans Sherman R. Evans R. Sterling Evans Elvin B. Frandsen Reed A. Frandsen Evan Fenn Harold Fenn Lester Fenn Terry Fenn Ronald N. Flygare Donald C. Fotheringham Jack Fotheringham Edmund Dale Fowler Milan P. Fowler Delbert L. Fox Earl K. Fox Franklin D. Fox Harold L. Fox La Mar Fox Lowell G. Fox Milo P. Fox *Morris O. Fox Earl B. Gaisford Richard D. Gaisford Donald Gale Elden Gale A. Rex Gardner E. Merlo Gardner Wallace B. Gardner E. Thornton Garrett Richard W. Gilchrist Stanford L. Giles Lawrence O. Glathar Howard D. Glover J. Ralph Goates Wayne A. Goates Clarence R. Godfrey Jr. David Godfrey J. Ernest Gough Gale G. Gough A. LaVar Grace Joshua Grace Myrten F. Grant Calvin Gray Earl Gray John J. Gray Joseph R. Gray Lynn H. Gray Owen L. Gray Robert A. Gray Albert H. Green Lloyd F. Gunther Donald Gurney Earl W. Gurney M Dean Gurney Lynn Gurney Richard K. Gurney Marvin Hall Mason W. Hall Lane P. Hall Virgil Hall Oral D. Hansen Don T. Hansen Sherman O. Hansen Darrell Hansen Isaac L. Hardman William F. Hardman Carl E. Harris James Hartshorn Arvo V. Havilla Roy Haycock *Waldon I. Hayden Ralph J. Haws Charles O. Holquist Francis B. Herron Charles Hickman Durward J. Hicks Jay B. Higginson Harvard Roy Hinton William B. Hitchcock Ambrose R. Holmes Don C. Holmstead Edward C. Hunt Elwood Hunt Lynn O. Hunter Harold C. Hutchings J. LaMar Hutchings E. Russell Innes Harold W. Ivers Ephraim W. Jackson Calvin R. Jacobs Chester E. Jacobs Ralph B. Jacobs Richard J. Jacobs Gordon S. Jensen John L. Job *Don U. Johnson E. Paul Johnson Earl C. Johnson H. Boyd Johnson Harold T. Johnson Irvan W. Johnson Ivan E. Johnson Richard W. Johnson Robert O. Johnson Blaine L. Jones David J. Jones Daniel H. Jones Harold S. Jones *La Var Jones Marlin R. Jones Melvin T. Jones Nile D. Jones Robert W. Jones Victor W. Jones William D. Jones Paul S. Julian Kenneth J. Kearney Dale B. Kirkham Dean A. Kirkham Gene W. Kirkham Sherman B. Kirkham Joseph I. Kolan George R. Lamb Ross V. Lamb Anton H. Lambert Clyde E. Lambert E. Jay Lambert Boyd J. Larsen Keith Larsen Ralph E. Larsen Rex N. Larson George C. Leany Benjamin A Lewis Jack D. Lewis Rex Losee James L. Logsdon Wilson C. Lott Leo H. Loveridge Jerry D. Mangum Harry D. Manning Sidney L Manning Richard Marks Morris A. Martendale Paul E. Mason Lyle H. McIff Donald R. McMillan Doran Mecham Perry A. Mecham Charles E. Mercer John L. Merritt Eldon M Messersmith C. Read Miller Darwin Miner Albert D. Mitchell Benjamin Mitchell Forrest R. Mitchell John W. Mitchell Leonard G. Mitchell Robert W. Mitchell Victor Mitchell Wm Mitchell Karl Moore Roland Morford M. Lynn Norberg Bruce Nostrom C. Reed Nostrom Byron L. Orton Gordon C. Orton Delbert L. Osborne Eldon N. Otterson Delbert J. Owen Don L Peet Allen Peterson Berl Peterson Bert E. Peterson Douglas Peterson Eldon A. Peterson Glen J. Peterson LeRoy Peterson Keith L. Peterson Max Wayne Peterson Nels R. Peterson Norris G. Peterson Orrin C. Peterson Ronald C. Peterson Valno W. Peterson Robert R. Phillips Wayne R. Phillips Arnold D. Powell Dean J. Powell *Glenn S. Powell Lorin H. Powell Ralph H. Powell Shirlee L. Powell Wayne S. Powell Karl E. Price *Paul J. Price Leo Pulley *Vernon R. Radmall Wesley Rasmussen Max Ray Dale H. Ricks Dale D. Roberts Glen C. Roberts John D. Roberts Lee Ray Roberts Ralph S. Roberts Reed C. Roberts Richard S. Roberts Virgil K. Roberts Howard W. Robinson LeGrande G. Robinson Leland L. Rockwell Athol D. Ross Earl L. Ross Lee L. Ross Royal Dean Rothe Glenn R. Roundy Hyrum W. Roundy La Mar Roundy Raymond Roundy Howard Glen Royle Arland L. Russon Dale L Russon Glen R. Russon Leo W. Russon Maynard B. Russon Milton W. Russon Stanford D. Russon Ernest G. Rutledge Soren G. Sabey Alvin G. Schow Clifton P. Schow Harold B. Schow Morris R. Schow Orien J. Schow Randall Dee Schow Russell S. Schow Wesley S. Schow Paul Schuman Vern Scott Norman D. Scown Vincent F. Scown Max W. Sharp Glen E. Shelley Stanford J. Shelley Donald A. Sherwood J. R. Sherwood William T. Sherwood Elmer Sims George A. Sims Wallace I. Skinner Glen E. Smith Grant J. Smith Leland E. Smith S. Glenn Smith *Victor Smith John O. Smuin Carlton Southwick Ray N. Southwick Joseph L. Southworth Joseph Edward Stein Charles M. Stephenson W. Bramwall De St. Jeor William De St. Jeor G. Wilson Stoddert R. M. Stokes Reed L. Stone Allen R. Strasburg Eugene Strasburg Lloyd Strasburg Don C. Street Howard B. Street Leo J. Street Lloyd P. Street T. Wayne Sunderland Howard R. Taylor Stanley Maurice Taylor Jr. Earl L. Thomas Howard S. Thomas E. Dee Thrasher Keith S. Trane Ralph A. Trane Homer J. Trinnaman Arvin A. Turner A. Gerald Turner Henry Turner L. Jay Turner H. Kenneth Turner Merlin A. Turner Newel B. Turner Wayne E. Turner Ernest P Urry Raymond Urry Donald G. Wager Joseph Ross Watkins Val R. Watkins Elmo J. Wanlass Kenneth N. Wanlass *Lelan D. Wardle Miss Claire T. Wells Allen K. Webb B. Richard Webb John Wayne Webb Marshall J. Webb Harold D. Westring Fred D. Whipple Vern G. Whipple Robert Boyd White Boyd Dave Wilkin Jay Wilkin Jerry S. Wilkin Dean S. Willes Paul S. Willes Alva Ralph Wing Marvin M. Wing George C. Winslow Gaylon Wilson *Gene L. Wilson Robert S. Wilson Glen M. Woffinden Howe M. Woodhouse Daniel C. Worlton Ernest D. Wright Don Wright Frank R. Wright Robert W. Wright Carl Zerold Cecil J. Zimmerman Glen R. Zimmerman S. Rex Zimmerman

Sherwin Allred’s Service in World War II

That’s when we joined the American Legion. I guess other than the Lehi National Guard, the buddies that we had in the army…we never did see again hardly. There were three of us from Lehi, maybe four of us that were kind of friendly except for Morris Fox. Alan Webb worked for a jeweler in Provo who was an officer in the National Guard. We knew that the draft was coming and we were trying to decide what to do…whether to join the National Guard or be drafted. Alan came home one day and said that he decided that we should join the National Guard. That same day I received my notice from the government that I was drafted. So I couldn’t go to the guard. Mac Davis, another fellow here in Lehi volunteered for the draft and another fellow by the name of Morris Fox was drafted with me the same day. We had to go to Fort Douglas to ship out. Morris and I went to Fort Lewis, Washington. Mac got to stay in Salt Lake. And I felt kind of bad because I had a girlfriend here and if I got to stay in Salt Lake I would have got to see her some more. But I got shipped for Fort Lewis. And eventually Mac got sent to California and eventually to the Pacific. And he was captured and taken prisoner and put on a ship to go to Japan. And the ship was sunk by a United States destroyer. That’s how he lost his life. Alan Webb, of course, went with the National Guard and all those fellows came back. Morris and I were sent to the 15th infantry in the 3rd infantry division and when Pearl Harbor came we were sent down to a marine base in California. And then we shipped to Camp Pickett in Virginia and then shipped out and made our initial landing in Africa, in French Morocco. When we went to Salt Lake they gave you a chance to sign up for insurance, anywhere from $1,000 to $10,000. We both elected to go for a $1,000. Of course, $1,000 back then was quite a bit, . We were shipped overseas to French Morocco and we were the first troops to land on foreign soil. And as we progressed through the country to Sicily and Tunisia, they changed the rules and allowed us to up our insurance if we didn’t opt for the $10,000, we now could go for $10,000. I remember that Morris didn’t want to sign up for the $10,000. He says, “What if I get killed, it won’t make any difference.” I said, “What do you think it will do for your parents.” So I finally convinced him that he should sign up for it. And he was eventually killed. He was shot by a sniper and I know his mother and father got a check every month until they died. I often wonder how much anxiety she had every time she went to the mail box and got that check. We fought with Patton. We fought under him in Sicily and Italy. We had been assigned to attack and overtake an observation post in Italy. We sent out a patrol to find a way to approach the observation post. We didn’t want to go up the road because it would be too obvious so we went a round about way. So we sent a patrol out to find a place to cross the river. The patrol went out one night and found a place that we could cross. But that very day, the enemy had blown up the bridge that crossed the river so we couldn’t get up the road with our equipment and we didn’t realize it until we went the next night to start the attack. We left our bivwack area about 2:00 a.m. And when we got to the spot, the river had backed up because of the debris and we couldn’t cross there. So we had to send a patrol out further up the river and in the meantime, we pulled back around the hill. They have terraces over there in height from 15 to 20 feet high. They then flattened them out and they then had a big steel bank and another terrace. And we pulled back on one of these terraces to be out of the sight of enemy. While we were there we heard a plane come and we could see when it got in range that it was an enemy plane and it had been on a bombing run in back of our lines. Apparently it had been hit because one of the engines was smoking. He was low and coming along the river because that was the lowest place in the valley and he was trying to keep his elevation and he spotted us…the troops there. So he veered his plane and started towards us. We knew that we were in for a strafing, so we all ran to get in a ditch that was at the foot of the precipice to take cover from the bullets.We all escaped his strafing, but he didn’t have quite enough elevation to get over the precipice and his plane hit the very top of the precipice and the momentum catapulted the plane up onto the next terrace with the exception of the engine that was on fire which rolled down the hill in a ball of flame and landed right on top of the battalion commander that had come up to see why we weren’t making the attack. It killed him, but you have to put those things behind you, because you have the war to fight. So finally, the patrol found a place to cross and we went up and made our attack but we had lost the benefit of surprise. We supposed that we would be up there and attack at the break of dawn so we had lost the element of surprise and the cover of darkness. The fact that the plane had acted that way it did gave them an idea that something was up, so they were ready for us. We lost a lot of men, having high casualties so we called for air support. You are not always sure that you will get air support because they may not have a plane available. We waited some time and nothing came, so we decided that we better go because we had been ordered to take it regardless of the cost. So we had our attack and were finally able to root them out with mortars and machine guns and hand grenades and finally overtake their positions. It was on a little high hill that had a little path that had been worn down over the years with wagons and stuff running over the top and the rain had washed it down a little and there was a little bank on both sides of the road. One side was the mountain. The enemy had dug holes in the mountains and in the bank down below the road which is what made it so hard to get them out. And we had just barely secured the positions and we heard another plane coming. This time we recognized it as our own plane that had come to give us the support that we needed. We hadn’t called back to tell them that we had taken the position and they had no way of knowing that we had taken the position. So we knew that we were in for a bombing so we all ran and got in some of these fox holes that the enemy had built along the bank. We got in those fox holes and I had no sooner got in, something told me to get out. I don’t know how much religion people have, but t I felt like something greater than me told me to get out of that fox hole. So I got out and I just gained my feet when the bomb hit. I could hear a muffled shout from one of the men still in the fox hole that I had just exited say “Oh, my God we are buried alive. Everybody start digging.” I could feel them scratching on my legs. But it was too late. The bomb had broke loose part of the hill and it had all slid down over them and buried 16 alive. We were able to dig one out on each end before they suffocated. And that’s when Morris Fox escaped the burial but he got shot by a sniper. I’ve always had kind of a feeling of guilt that I was able to come back and he wasn’t. Out of about a hundred and forty some odd men in the company that went out, when we were relieved later that day by another company, there was only 29 of us left. There was a lot of things that happened that I can look back on now and I don’t know whether they were things of promptings. I remember that we had a new commander assigned to our unit and he wanted to be able to lead an infantry company which we were part of. This was in Sicily and we had been assigned to cut a highway that the Germans were using to transport equipment and troops. And we made an amphibious landing and finally got our objective and we had stopped in a little village that had some houses. And we were holed up in the houses and barns and sheds to keep out of sight of the enemy. At that time I was the company operations sergeant. And the commander said, “Sergeant, have the troops assemble in the streets.” And I said, “Captain, don’t you think that that will draw enemy fire. Shouldn’t we wait until it gets dark?” And I guess he didn’t like an enlisted man telling him what to do so he said, “Sergeant, have the troops assemble in the streets.”So I went and told them to get into the streets. And I decided that I would leave. So I pulled away from the company about 50 yards and sure enough it drew enemy fire. When I joined the company later that night after it got dark, there had been eight killed and several wounded. So I don’t know… I was there three years and eight months. Well, we landed in French Morocco and we went over two or three different areas. I can’t remember the names of them now and finally ended up in Tunisia. They made a commando battalion out of one of our infantry regiments, and we were sent to Tunisia. We got in on the tail end of the battle that they had there with the Desert Fox and the English troops. And then we made an amphibious landing on Sicily and made another amphibious landing at Anzio and Salerno. No, I got to come home. (before the war was over). They came up with a plan where I was…it was called a rotation plan. The first soldiers over there could be replaced and sent back to the United States, and I was one of those because I was one of the first ones to land on foreign soil. I could have come home six months earlier….they had it that it was only about every six months, but I had a different job then, a kind of important job and they asked me to stay until I trained someone else. So I told them that I would. So I didn’t get to come home until six months later. Our unit got called up and went to southern France and they made the main invasion on France when I was coming home. Of course, I wasn’t over there then, but I guess there was jubilation that it was over. I don’t remember, really. I don’t remember what went on. We talked about it in veterans meeting one night, that these people that are coming back from these wars are given a big hooray and I don’t remember anything like that when I came home nor did any of the other fellows. They just came home and took their old place in society. Oh, there was a lot of men that served from Lehi. But we were in the first draft That was the only time I was ever lucky, that my name was drawn out first. A lot of men went from Lehi. But some of them went in the National Guard and some were drafted later. I don’t know just what happened. You can see the list out there. I guess there must be several hundred there. Well, some didn’t have to go to war. They worked in the mine and they were exempt. I felt that it was my duty. I was the right age and I was single and I felt it an obligation. Had I not been drafted I would have volunteered. But that was just a way of life then and it isn’t that I liked it, but I felt that it was my obligation and duty and we went to see what we could do. And I think for the most part, most people in the war were that way. We had some people that thought that they ought to be home. No, and Truman had been criticized for dropping the bomb on Japan but I think that it was the best thing that ever happened. I’d like to shake his hand for it, because I think that it saved a lot of soldiers lives. It’s a sad thing to have to kill so many people but in a sense they asked for it. They were the ones that started the war by bombing Pearl Harbor. So I don’t have any resentment for him dropping the bomb on them. It’s a sad thing, but that’s the way it is Ralph Anderson WWII Experiences

Shortly after high school on June 11, 1945, Ralph took the Inter Urban1 to Fort Douglas in Salt Lake City and reported for induction into the army. He was turned down because he had albumin poisoning2 in his liver. This touch of albumin poisoning was what kept Ralph out of combat. It wasn’t until August 14th that Japan finally surrendered.

Ralph would possibly have been one of the troops that were scheduled to invade Japan in 1946. Military analysts projected that the invasion would be extremely difficult with a tremendous loss of life on both sides once the Allies set foot on Japan, but the dropping of the atomic bombs made the planned invasion unnecessary. It is estimated that millions of lives were saved as a result. Ralph had to report again for induction on November 9th. This time he was accepted into the army and had to report to Fort Douglas in Salt Lake two days later and was shipped out to Camp Joseph T. Robinson in Little Rock Arkansas for basic training.

Basic training was very difficult for most of the new recruits but it didn’t compare to life on the farm that Ralph was accustomed to. He said, “When I went into Basic Training I weighed 155 pounds, and when I got out (since I got all the food I wanted to eat and plenty of exercise) I weighed over 200 pounds. After working the way we had been, Basic Training was like a vacation. I remember two guys hung themselves because it was so tough. There was a lot of belly aching and crying, but really it wasn't that hard.”

Ralph learned to shoot from his mother. He said, “My mother learned how to shoot by shooting rats in the chicken coop. She was a good shot. She learned that the further away she was, the higher she had to aim. She also learned how to compensate for the wind. When I was in the army, of course it was kind of luck shooting at 500 yards, but using what she taught me about the wind and things, I could hit the target. She also taught me that once you hit the bulls eye, stop shooting.”

Ralph was very good on the firing range. He made sharpshooter. At 500 yards he could hit the bulls eye nearly every time. He was so good that they shut the range down and brought everyone over to watch him shoot. When Ralph realized that the army was very impressed with his shooting he realized that maybe it wasn’t such a good idea. He thought, “What in the world am I doing? With the war going on they might have me behind the enemy lines picking off some general. So I started missing some after that.”

It wasn’t all that easy to shoot at a target 500 yards away to make it even harder, it was winter in Arkansas and it was very cold. They were on the firing line freezing to death and they were so cold that they could hardly manipulate the bolt action on their rifle when the sergeant would holler, “WE COLD? NO! WE’RE NEVER COLD!”

One thing that the new recruits were taught was how to fight. Ralph talked of one experience, “The Drill Sergeant was training us in hand-to-hand combat. He was showing us

1 The Inter Urban railroad was a commuter train that ran from Provo to Ogden.

2 Albumin is a protein that is found in the human body. Low Albumin levels can be a sign of many diseases but it also can be caused by something as normal as dehydration. The doctors wanted to give Ralph some time to see if his body could fix the problem naturally. how to get out of certain holds. He told me to put him in a Full Nelson3 and no matter what, not to let him go. So I put a Full Nelson on him and about a half-hour later he said, "Would you please let me go"? He tried everything under the sun to get out of it, but it didn't work.”

After basic training Ralph was stationed at Camp Kearns (located in Kearns, Utah) and was able to come home for short visits. He transferred from the infantry to the Army Air Corp and was scheduled to be shipped overseas to become one of the first occupation troops in Japan. (The Army Air Corp was the precursor to the US Air Force.)

On March 5th 1946 Ralph was transferred to Camp Stoneman which is near Pittsburg, California, (about 40 miles northeast of San Francisco.) Camp Stoneman was the principal “jumping off point” for American soldiers destined for military operations in the Second World War’s Pacific Theater. This is where soldiers received complete physicals and a battery of inoculations to prevent diseases peculiar to Pacific destinations.

On the morning of the 14th Ralph left from Camp Stoneman and traveled down the Sacramento River to San Francisco where they got on the boat that was to take them to Japan. The ship they put them on was a Liberty Ship.

Liberty ships were cargo ships that were cheap and relatively easy to build. They were designed to be put together quickly (the average around 42 days per ship,) to replace the ships that were constantly being sunk by the German U-boats. These ships were not built for comfort. They were built to get all types of cargo, including human, to their destination.

The bunks where they put the troops were down in the hold. Typically there were several hundred men in the same hold with canvas cots stacked four to five high. Space aboard the ship was precious. No one was ever more than 6 feet from someone else. Sanitary conditions got worse as the trip wore on. Water was precious on a ship so they used seawater to shower with. This would be bad enough but it was made worse by the fact that nearly everyone on board got seasick after a couple of days and couldn’t keep anything down.

Ralph recalled, “We left at night and I slept good, but when I got up the next morning, every soldier on that ship was seasick and was puking all over; from the top bunk down to the bottom.” I can only imagine the smell of that crowded hold. One soldier recalled, “The captain had the crew remove the hatch cover of our hold, and I swear the birds fell out of the sky from the stench.”

Ralph was one of the lucky ones that didn’t get sick but because everyone else was, they didn’t serve any meals for several days. Those that weren’t sick had to live on C-rations or K- rations. These were pre-made meals that were packaged so they would last without refrigeration for long periods of time. After about a week everyone started getting used to the rolling of the ship and they started serving meals again.

One night they announced over the intercom that they were 300 miles north of Hawaii. Shortly afterwards they ran into the edge of a typhoon. The winds reached 70 to 80 miles per hour and created very large waves. Every time the waves battered the ship it would shudder. Liberty ships had the reputation of coming apart so I’m sure as one soldier put it, “terror was normal.” The soldiers had to stay in the hold hanging on to whatever they could while they rode

3 A Full Nelson is a wrestling hold where you stand behind your opponent and put both arms under his and lock your hands behind your opponent’s neck. the storm out. Ralph said, “I remember they would face the ship into the storm. You could feel the front end come out of the ocean, then it would come down with a BOOM! Then the rear end would come out and you could hear the propellers swirling for a minute, then they would go back in. Then the front end would come out again and go BOOM! It lasted for a couple of days.”

Ralph was a little reluctant to get on the ship at first but he kind of liked being on the sea. After 16 days on the Pacific Ocean Ralph was finally able to disembark in Yokohama, Japan. Then it was on board a train headed for the Itazuke Army Air Base in northern Kyushu, (which is the southern island in Japan,) a distance of over 500 miles. On the way to the base the train went right through what was once Hiroshima4.

Ralph arrived in Japan just over seven months after the atomic bomb was dropped on the city of Hiroshima. He remembered, “I got to Japan right after the Atomic Bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The railroads went right through Hiroshima. There wasn't anything left there except in the distance there were some steel girders sticking up in the air.”

The Itazuke Army Air Base is located on the northern tip of Kyushu near the city of Fukuoka. The base was built just two years earlier by the Japanese Army Air Force and was known as Mushiroda. The base was used by the Japanese 6th Fighter Wing as an air defense base. In April 1945, the base was used by Japanese bombers and was very active until late in the war when it was destroyed by American B-29’s.

In October 1945 the first Americans arrived at the base. The base needed a lot of work done to make it usable again. The runway was marked with bomb craters and the only building that survived the American bombing was one aircraft hangar. The base commander used local Japanese men and women to rebuild the base. It gave them work and a chance to earn money to improve their lives.

There was very little housing on the base. Ralph and the rest of the men were bussed to and from the base each day from the Kyushu Airplane Company, that was nearby and had been converted into a barracks. It had escaped wartime destruction. Ralph lived in a warehouse that had half of it converted into a barracks by adding cubicles. Ralph lived in his cubicle with 8 other men. Seven of the men were non-commissioned officers, but Ralph said, “They’re all pretty good guys though, so I don’t hold their rank against them.”

The main thing everyone seemed to have a problem with was the rats. They seemed to be everywhere. Ralph remembered, “All I can really remember were the rats. There were rats everywhere. They would scare you to death. The guy who was the Branch President was the exterminator, and it was his job to poison the rats. He had one guy who stayed with him steady. His name was Kuman Modo. The rest of the guys with him, as soon as they would find out they were poisoning rats, would quit because they were Buddhists. They didn't believe in killing animals.

4 At 8:15 the morning of August 6, 1945 a B29 bomber nicknamed Enola Gay dropped the first operational atomic bomb. Nicknamed “Little Boy”, the bomb was 9’-9” long and weighed nearly 8,000 pounds. Dropped by parachute the bomb exploded about 1,885 feet above the city. The resulting fireball and blast shock waves reduced an area of 5 square miles to ashes and destroyed countless others further away. It is estimated that nearly 200,000 people lost their lives. Countless others suffered from the effects of the bomb. You would be on guard duty and the rats would be running across in front of you. We lived in what used to be an airplane factory. They had built cubicles about 12 feet by 12 feet and they had walls on them about 8 feet high. At night, you could lay and watch the rats running along the tops of the walls. I remember one night hearing a rat running and then SPLAT! It had jumped right in the first sergeants face. Everyone had a bed and a footlocker. You wouldn't leave your footlocker open unless you were right there watching it. If you did, a rat would get in it. I hung my mackinaw (winter coat) up for about an hour or two, and when I reached up to get it, there was a rat making a nest in it.”

Ralph was part of the 38th Air Engineer Squadron. He said, “I was kind of a firefighter on the air base. I was also an armament technician. I repaired 50 caliber machine guns that went on the airplanes. The only fire I can remember was a transport plane hauling liquor, and it burned up big time. We lived a ways from the air base in an airplane factory and traveled back and forth by bus. Then they kind of shipped everyone out5, and me and a guy named Ursenbach from Mt. Pleasant stayed behind. I was a Teletype operator with him until I came home.”

The Japanese citizens were struggling to survive after the war. Ralph wrote home to his sister Marilyn about the conditions in Japan, “A few days ago everyone around here was a scratching too. There were lice and bugs all over the place. Japan is a lot different than America. In America everybody is clean [and] gets enough to eat so they are happy. Here in Japan everything is dirty and [a lot] of people are hungry and sick and don’t have any homes to live in. America sure is a good place to live. When soldiers walk down the streets the little ‘Japs’ come out and ask them for candy and gum. They call candy and gum ‘chewing gum OK’”

Ralph remembered, “The army always wanted you to enlist. If you enlisted, you could get out of the army sooner. I wouldn't enlist, and I wouldn't join the army reserve either. If I would have, I would have gone to Korea when I got home. I remember leaving when guys who had enlisted stayed behind with tears in their eyes.”

By December 13th 1946 Ralph was all processed and was waiting for a ship to take him home. Ralph was finally able to get a ship and leave Tokyo, Japan at 3:00am on December 21, 1946. When he got to the docks there were some large ocean liners and he was thinking that he would be going home in style. Unfortunately, they marched the men right back on another Liberty ship. A little over an hour after Ralph left the dock an 8.5 magnitude earthquake struck Japan.

Thankfully Ralph had a relatively uneventful trip back to the states. While Ralph was on the ship coming home on December 31, 1946, President Truman officially declared World War II over. Ralph was sent to Camp Beale in California where he was discharged from military service.

5 The 38th air Engineer Squadron was based on the Itazuke Army Air Base until October 30, 1946 then it was transferred to the Itami army Air Base. Ralph remained behind because he was needed at Itazuki. Ralph in middle working on a .50 caliber machine gun.

Ralph on right in their cubicle Memories of World War II By Elwin Barnes Condensed from his Oral Histories

(I served in World War II. I served in) North Africa, Sicily, Italy, and France. I was off and on ships. We went on a ship over there. We landed at Casa Blanca and then went up the west coast to French Morocco and all up through there. One invasion we went on ships to invade other country landings.

No.(I was not a foot fighter) I went over with Patton into Africa—George S. Patton. We got up to Rabat—I think it was the 1st armor went up into Caserine Pass and ran into a trap. They were nearly wiped out. Then they started pulling troops from replacements out of the 2nd armored to replace those killed and equipment lost. They started splitting us up. I got into the trucking outfit. We had the trucks and we had ducks. You have heard of the ducks haven’t you? We’d make landings in the ducks. We would put troops across onto land—crossing rivers. We crossed to Po River. In fact a little while back I saw on the Oliver North’s War stories where my outfit was crossing the Po River into Italy. (I served for) Four years and four months, to be exact; From March 21, 1941 to July 21,1945.

So were you in the war when the Armistice took place?

Oh yes, when the European theater was done. In fact, I was there for a little after. I was in the trucks and we were moving refugees back and forth up from Austria and brought some back from Austria. The civilians would try to avoid the front lines, break through and go back or avoid it so there were a lot of misplaced people. We would truck them back and forth.

A lot of things(and experiences stand out in my mind.) I could tell you quite a few stories. One thing that bothered me more than anything—I was at one time a mess sergeant too. The refugees coming back were bare footed and cold and were starving. It was Naples, actually, Italy. They would come in and fight over the scraps left over from the mess kits. We would feed them and what was left was put into this can. These people would fight over that. Commanding officer told me to keep them out of there. Wouldn’t even let them have the scraps. I had to keep them out. That bothered me a great deal. On the Anzio Beach head, we had bodies stacked up in the sun—rotting in the sun. They were shelling us so much they couldn’t bury them, so they would just stack up. When you go in there you carried your body bag with you, actually a mattress cover is what they called it. When they were killed they would put them in this mattress cover. They would haul them in and stack them out there. They were rotting in the sun.

(We would carry the mattress cover on us.) Oh yes, everyone did.

(We had to wear Dog Tags.) You had to have them all the time. That’s how they identified some of them, for the bodies. That’s what they were for. They had your number, your religion, and I don’t remember what else. I still have mine at home.

Tell me about that little dent that goes in the dog tags?

I don’t have any idea of what it is. (I’m surprised you don’t know that. My husband told me that that’s where they drove that into the teeth of the victim, or the soldier that lost their life. You dig it into the teeth and bounce it in with the butt of your gun so that would identify that body.) When you got home from the war, was it a jubilant home coming and that kind of thing? Did you get greeted downtown?

The only ones who knew I was home, were my folks. I walked in on them. When it was over, it was over. Before I left over there, we flew from Pisa, Italy down to Port Renio in North Africa. From North Africa we went to South Africa, Daccra, then we flew over to Natal, Brazil. We stayed over night there. It was July. It was their winter there and it was wet—clothes just soaking wet. We flew up to Florida where they put us on a train and we came home. I thumbed a ride home.

Nobody picked us up. Someone gave me a ride. I was alone. I was the only one in this area. Some of the others went to other areas. When we went in, there were myself, Keith Davis, Ernest Goff, and Howard Robinson. We all went to Fort Knox, Kentucky, for training then. When the three-month training was over with, I think Ernest Goff and Howard Robinson went to Fort Lewis, Washington. I went to Fort Benning Georgia. Keith Davis got killed over there. Jess Fox’s son, Morris I believe, got killed over there.

I don’t know about this nowadays. I better not get into that. Sometimes we feel like that this is the only war we ever fought. I’m not looking for any glory, I did my job. We have a spoiled generation coming up. They go over there for three months or a year—they got a call and they have email and all of that stuff. When I was over there we used to get maybe five or six letters all at once and then we would go two or three months without anything. Then we would get one or two and then go a month or two or three months without getting any mail at all.

Yes, it was mid afternoon.(when I arrived home). No, they just ran out to see. They were glad to see me and I was glad to see them. Freeman J. Barnes as interviewed by Judy Hansen February 2014

I was born on the west end of town on the corner of Trinnaman Lane and 1500 North in Lehi on the 8th of August 1929. My father was Joseph Earnest Barnes and my mother was Azalia Brooks Barnes. I went to school in the Lehi Elementary school on Center and 2nd North. It has been knocked down now but was where the Legacy Center stands today. I graduated from Lehi High School and filled a mission for the LDS Church in Samoa. I was on my mission from October 1949 until May 1952 and served 2 ½ years. I had been deferred from the draft so I could fulfill my mission with the understanding that when I got home I would be subject to the draft. When I got home I had to report directly to the draft board within five days of my return.

I had been home from my mission for 2 ½ months when I married my sweetheart Anna Mae Robinson on the 16th of August 1952; on the 18th of August I was taken in at Fort Douglas in Salt Lake and from there I was then sent to Fort Ord which is located along the Monterey Bay of California. I had only been drafted so I really wasn’t assigned to any branch of service. When I got to Fort Ord they put me in the Army. I was assigned to the signal corps and sent to Camp San Luis Obispo California for training. Camp San Luis Obispo was actually just a National Guard camp but they used it during the Korean conflict for training. The signal corps is a branch of the Army that has to do with communications, telephones, switchboards, and telephone lines – at least back in those days; Today it would be a lot more high tech than what I was doing back then. There were different trades we were trained in. There was a pole lineman which was sitting poles and stringing wire in the battle field for communication purposes, or there was a telephone installer and repairman, switchboard, and so-on. I was trained as a telephone installer and repairman. I was assigned to the 303rd Signal Battalion. The 303rd was a battalion that had been deactivated after the end of WW II but it had been reactivated during the Korean conflict as a replacement unit. They took people in that were drafted, discovered what they were suitable for, and then put them on a rotating file situation. If other units in Korea or any where needed replacements for communications they could call for them from the 303rd.

When I was in basic training, I had a hernia that popped out and so they operated on it and kept me in the hospital for two weeks. After that they sent me home on convalescent leave. I went to Salt Lake for a short period of time. When I went back to San Luis Obispo I was washed back to a later basic training company. So between my medical emergency and all the other things that happened I ran out of time and my name never came up to be sent to Korea. That hernia probably saved my life. I was in California about a year.

So as it turned out I was never sent to Korea. They sent the 303rd to Fort Hood Texas and I went with them. While all the men were being held waiting for an assignment they would have us do different things to keep us busy such as clerk work, cooks helper, company carpenter, or whatever. This was just to keep us busy until we were called for. I was assigned to the S-4 section which was supply. I was a clerk-typist there along with two or three other servicemen. I stayed in Fort Hood about a year until my enlistment was up. The 303rd was moved to Fort Huachuca Arizona but I didn’t have enough time left in my enlistment so I was put in another holding company for about two weeks or so and then I was discharged from Fort Hood and came home. I hated the military. One hundred and twelve days before my discharge I started counting the days down when I would be out. I was discharge August 18, 1954. I didn’t learn a blasted thing there that I ever used or wanted to use.

My wife Anna Mae was with me during most of my military service except basic training. Before we left for Texas, Bishop Barnes said to us, “Texas has the most cattle and the least milk, the most rivers and the least water, the most trees and the least shade, and you can look the furthest and see the least of any State in the Union.” We would go into Killeen, the town by Fort Hood and there would be big cockroaches everywhere. They would crawl up walls and all over floors. There were big tarantulas that had leg spans of almost 8 – 10 inches in diameter that would run across our yard. There were horny toads, lizards, armadillos, scorpions, and skunks; you name it, Texas had it. Anna Mae was turned around the whole time she lived there. She swore the sun would come up in the south and set in the north.

After I got out of the military we moved to Richfield because that is where my wife was from. I worked there as a service station attendant, with the Sevier County road department, and with my father-in-law in the coal business for a while. Then I moved to Lehi with hopes of becoming a brick layer or builder of some sorts but that never turned out so I started driving trucks. I drove trucks all over the western United States for about five years. I wanted to be home more so I chucked that and went to work at the Utah State Prison and retired from there after 22 1/2 years of service.

I have three wonderful daughters; Camille Kay Barnes who lives here in Lehi next door to us. She was born in Texas while I was in the military and was four months old when we came home. She has one child. LeAnn Enderle who has five children and also raised her husband’s four other children; she lives in Lawton, Oklahoma. My youngest is Lora Mae Wirthlin who lives in Taylorsville, Utah. She has two children.

My parents had eight children. Three of my brothers: Elwin, Lynn, and Clinton Jack also served in the military. Bernell LaVar Bateman From his autobiography 2007

I was born to David Bernell Bateman and Hazel Charlotte Peck on February 8, 1921 in my grandfather Peck’s home in Lehi. My siblings were LaVee, Ralph, Kenneth, and Don. I graduated school at Lehi High and then attended two years at Utah State Agriculture College (now Utah State University in Logan). When I was in college, some of us roommates were playing cards one morning. One of our group was a Japanese fellow. Suddenly, it came on the radio that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor. This was December 1941. I felt so bad for my Japanese friend. He just went sick. He left school soon after this.

I received a mission call in December 1941 to the Southern States Mission, which included Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina. As soon as I returned home from my mission, I reported to the draft board, and it was only a few weeks until I was called up. Over two hundred of us gathered at Fort Douglas, and the officer said they needed nine volunteers for the Marine Corp. Not one person volunteered. The officer went into another room. When he came out he said, “These nine men just volunteered for the Marine Corp.” Well, I was the first name called.

About two weeks later, we were on a train headed for San Diego, California, where we were to have our boot camp. The first day, after we were assigned to a unit, we all lined up at the barber shop. Boy, what a laugh as each went in with a beautiful head of hair and came out completely sheared. I think that was the last good laugh we had for many weeks as we went through boot camp. After we completed boot camp, we were transferred to Camp Pendleton near Oceanside, California, where we received advanced training. I received a five-dollar a month pay increase for achieving a sharp shooter rating and was voted by our unit as the outstanding recruit.

As soon as we completed our training there, we were ready to be deployed somewhere overseas. First, we were placed on buses and taken into Los Angeles, where we were told we had liberty for the day. We were to return to the bus by 10:00 pm for return to camp. I was one of the first groups to come back, and I sat next to a Marine, whom I was told was L. Tom Perry. As we sat there, a Marine, who had been drinking, got on and began walking back and forth throughout the bus and making a nuisance of himself. I finally told him to sit down. He immediately socked me to the side of my head: so I jumped up and hit him a few times. Other Marines put him in the seat behind me, but he came to and hit me two different times when I wasn’t looking. I responded for the third time, and the others wanted the driver to kick him off the bus. He responded that he couldn’t do that because we were scheduled to ship out in the next few days. I

1 didn’t think he would bother me again as we headed back to camp. In fact I became quite worried about his condition, as he never made a sound. Then I noticed that my hand was swelling up. I went to sick bay the next morning, and they found I had broken my hand. They kept me there for one week, and my buddies shipped out while I was there. I was actually disappointed, but I later learned they were shipped straight to Iwo Jima, and a good number of them were killed there. In fact, I learned after the war ended that my good friend Gene Gibbs had been shot through the neck and shoulder and was shipped back to a hospital in San Diego (He recovered after a long hospital stay). That fight I was in on the bus probably saved my life.

I went through some additional training and shipped out with the next group to the island of Guam in the Mariana Islands. There I was transferred to an artillery unit. While there, I came down with Malaria Fever and was never so sick in my life. I was placed in a field hospital that consisted of a few tents. If you wanted anything to eat, you had to get out of bed and stand in the chow line and wash your own mess kits. A number of times as I was about to get to the front of the line, I was so sick I had to return to the tent. Don Devey, a friend from Alpine, Utah brought me fruits and other items at night, or I may never have survived.

While on Guam, we trained for the invasion of Japan. We were out in the field firing our artillery when word came that the United States had dropped a large bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. This was August 6, 1945. Three days later, they dropped one on Nagasaki. The feeling was that the war would soon be over, which turned out to be true. We were all happy and anxious to go home, but I lacked a few point of coming home with the first ships. Instead, I was sent with a small detachment of Marines to Peking, China where we were to guard the American Embassy and a relay station west of Peking. We docked in Trentsin, boarded a train, and proceeded toward Peking. Man, what a ride! The first day, the train jumped the track, and it took them three days to right it. We had come from the South Pacific, where it was warm, into North China in the winter season, without winter clothing. We actually tore up the wooden benches and made small fires in the train to keep warm. We were glad to finally arrive in Peking.

Peking is one of the most beautiful cities in China. The Walled City still houses some of the richest treasures of Chinese civilization. There are many famous temples, the Forbidden City, and the Imperial Palace. We were able to visit most of these famous places and to see part of the Great Wall of China.

One experience I remember very well. It was Christmas time and I was wishing I could be home. I certainly didn’t have the Christmas spirit. We woke up Christmas morning and it was snowing quite heavily. At noon (chow time) as we gathered in the mess hall, we found they had prepared us a special Christmas dinner which we enjoyed. We had to wash our trays and utensils outside in three garbage-type cans. Two were filled with hot water and the first one was for food left on our trays. It was still snowing and blowing as I came out and approached the first can. I cleaned my tray of my leftovers and noticed four or five young children behind the shrubs twenty or more yards away. As I finished washing my tray, these kids rushed up with tin cans and scooped up what they could out of the garbage can and rushed away as if they were stealing or afraid. I remember thinking, “Why couldn’t we have taken them in and treated them to some food?”

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In the afternoon my buddy, Skancky, and I were permitted to go into the main part of Peking. After we left the compound, we got into two rickshaws and rode toward the main part of the city. We were anticipating going to the most popular restaurant in town that was known for its famous Peking duck. We got off the rickshaws and started walking down the street. It didn’t seem like Christmas and we certainly wished we could be home. A small boy approached us. He looked to be about eight or nine years old. He was dressed in very light clothing and his bare stomach protruded out of his shirt. He addressed us, “Com a shaw Marine com a shaw.” He was begging for food. We took him by the hand and walked to the restaurant. As we walked inside, we noticed all the people looking at us. We all sat down and managed to give our orders to the waitress. We told her to give the boy anything he wanted. We wondered what he had ordered. The waitress set a large, covered plate in front of the boy. He readily removed the cover and there was a large dish of just plain rice. I will always remember the special feeling that came over me as we watched that small boy eat rice. That was a Christmas that I will always remember.

One of our assignments in Peking was to guard a radar relay station about twenty miles west of Peking. A small detachment would go out for a week and then return back. I only went two or three times, but I remember seeing a dead body or two lying alongside the road both coming and going. I was made supply sergeant, so I spent most of my time in our compound. It wasn’t bad duty there, but after ten months I was anxious to go home.

Sailing home, we encountered a severe storm, but I was surprised I didn’t get seasick. It was such a great feeling to arrive back in San Diego and then home.

After I returned home I was introduced to Ida Lornell Hansen who was teaching at Lehi High School. After a short courtship, I married her on June 18, 1947 in the Logan Temple. I continued to work on the family chicken ranch producing eggs and working the dry farm in Lehi. We are the parents of five beautiful daughters who we love more than anything in the world; Carol, Colleen, Barbara, Connie, and Janet.

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Vivian Carter as interviewed by Judy Hansen

Vivian Carter was born at home in Lehi, Utah. The home was located up the creek in the area known as Carterville. He was born to Ray and Irene Forbes Carter on March 2, 1926. He had three sisters and one brother; Katherine Ann (Kay) who married Roland (Rally) Dean, Irene Lucille who married a man from Emery County, Doris who died as a little girl in a really cold winter, and James (Jim) Carter.

They were pretty isolated living up in the creek, the only people that lived up there were his dad, his Grandpa Carter, his Uncle Darrell and Uncle Josie (Josiah). They came up and bought the farm off Jack Evans and Doc Watson who couldn’t make the payments on the farm because times were hard in 1918. Once Vivian rode his horse down to 300 west so he could go to scouts. He tied the horse up by the train tracks. That old horse, being up in the creek had never seen a train before. One came along and spooked that horse so bad that he ran away and left Vivian there. Vivian had to walk ½ way home before he was able to catch the horse.

Vivian went to school in Lehi. The Carter children had to walk down to where Bernell Bateman drove a wooden school bus to pick them up. It was an old truck and he built a wooden frame on it and put in some seats. He attended elementary, Jr. High, and High Schools in Lehi down on Center Street. When he was in High School he played Trombone in the marching band. Lehi had one of the best bands in Utah County. Abe Anderson taught band until Mr. Shaw moved in and then he was the band instructor.

His dad played in the Carter Orchestra and Vivian played in the band for his dad while he was going to school. He didn’t get home some nights until 1:00 in the morning, only to get up early in the morning to milk the cows (they had seventeen), and then rush down to school for band. Vivian never had time to get into trouble like the kids do today.

The Carter’s were separating the milk and selling the cream to the Salt Lake Creamery and feeding the milk to the pigs. When the war started they had to have milk to feed the soldiers so someone from the government went to the Carters and asked them to start shipping grade A milk. His dad Ray and Uncle Darrell told them they weren’t equipped to ship A grade milk. They said that didn’t matter, they needed the milk. Ray and Darrell told them they didn’t have

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coolers to cool the milk but they were told to just get a wash tub and run water in it. So that’s what they did. Well, after they started shipping milk they had to have a milking machine. The first night they put the milkers on the cows there was horse manure all over the barn. The cows didn’t like that. This was after Pearl Harbor day so it had to be in 1941 or 42.

Vivian had a girl in high school, Juanita Fotheringham and he thought they would get married someday but this never happened. He was going to enlist in the Army but his dad talked him out of it. His father told him the war would be over before too long and told him he needed to come back home and help him. There were a lot of sugar beets planted and his father needed his help to harvest the beets to sell to the Lehi Sugar Mill. They also grew alfalfa and grain. After Vivian graduated High School in 1944 he went and enlisted in the service anyway. He went up to Fort Douglas in Salt Lake on the old Interurban train that ran through town. That was the last time he ever rode that thing. The Interurban use to go out through the Jordan narrows to get to Salt Lake and it would almost jump the track every time.

When he got to Fort Douglas they interviewed everyone. Vivian told the man that he wanted to get in the Navy. The man said, ‘You’re in the Navy.’ Then the kid next to him told the man he also wanted to be in the Navy but he was told, “You’re in the Army.” Vivian thought he was going in the Navy. He came home for a couple days and then him and LaVar Bateman had to go back up to the post office building in Salt Lake. When they got to Salt Lake the second time they had Officers from the Army, Navy, and Marines. All the guys were sitting lined up in the hall and someone came in and said, “We need volunteers for the Marine Corps.” They counted off several men, LaVar Bateman was the last one and took them away – they were in the Marine Corp. They counted off more men and took them into the Navy. Vivian just got out of High School but now he was in the Navy.

When you join the service you are not yourself anymore, you are government property. When you raise your hand to take the oath you are part of the U S Government.

They sent Vivian the U. S. Naval Training Station in Farragut, Idaho. Eleanor Roosevelt picked the place for this training station. He was there for three months. Then they sent him to California. He was at Camp Parks at the Shoemaker Navy Training and Distribution Center.

He got down there and thought he was solid in the Navy but they called them all in and sit them down in a warehouse and told them they were being called to the United States Seabees. This is what Vivian called the ‘can do boys.’ They built the road to Japan. The Seabee’s were the U.S. Navy’s Construction Battalion who built miles of roadway and airstrips. He ran jackhammers and dug coral up on the islands to build buildings (that coral was tough). Everyone just done what they were told. Everybody that was in the camp was strictly Seabees. They were a working outfit but Vivian never complained. He was in California for about a month while they were trying to find somewhere to send them.

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They put Vivian on a ship, the USS Fairland. It wasn’t a big war ship. It was screwed together with the labor of women in California. It did have guns on it. They took him down to Pearl Harbor, right next to where the USS Arizona was sunk. They wouldn’t let anyone off the ship. Vivian was able to get on a garbage detail so he was allowed to carry the garbage cans off the ship onto the shore. After being there for only a few days, he left Pearl Harbor for Guam. The USS Fairland had to have an escort the rest of the way. Once he got to Guam they took him off the ship and that was the last time he saw that “hunk of junk!”

He helped build the airfields for the B-29’s in Guam. They would load the B-29’s down so heavy with bombs that when the plane would go down the runway getting ready to take off they would waddle like a duck. Some of them couldn’t take off. There was one plane they called ‘no abortion’ because it was able to take off and never aborted any flights. The ones that were too loaded ended up aborting the flight and had to pull off to the side.

Vivian did a lot of work over there. He was on a cement detail, mixing cement to build buildings or other things they needed cement for.

One crew tried to get Vivian to go with them on a bombing crew but the only way he would be able to go was if he signed his life insurance away so if he got killed his parents wouldn’t get any money. It was not his regular assigned duty. Going with the bomb crew would have been doing his own thing and the Navy would not take responsibility because it was not the government ordering him to go.

Vivian had heard there was a LDS church service so he had to walk about 5 or 6 miles to get there. When he got there he found LaVar Bateman, Lynn Gray, and Don Devey, buddies from home. Don Devey from Alpine was in the Marines stationed in Guam and a good buddy to Vivian. It wasn’t much of a church. It was in a Quonset hut.

Vivian was in Guam during the battle of Iwo Jima. There was so many guys that got killed evading that island. The ambulances would come into Guam where there was a big army hospital and blood would run out of the back of them. Guam was a very bloody island at that time.

Most of the hard fighting was over with by the time Vivian got there. Once he fell in a fox hole over there and inside the fox hole was a shell box marked Salt Lake City, Utah which came from the Remington Arms Company plant in Salt Lake. He got so home-sick he got out of the fox hole and went back to work where he was headed to in the first place.

There were a lot of fun times over there but some of it was kind of scary. When he got to Guam they took the guns off them and he asked, “What are we going to do to defend ourselves?” He was told, “You got a knife haven’t you.” It was the marine’s position to guard them.

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One time they sent Vivian and some others down in a cave that the Japanese had dug and when he they got in there it was dark, there were no lights they only had candles and matches. Something told Vivian in his head to get the heck out of there so he told his buddy they better go. They were able to get some shell souvenirs and stuff on the way out. They stumbled upon a dead Japanese soldier so Vivian cut one of his ribs out. He was going to send it home to his dad. He took it back to the barracks and buried it in the sand so the ants would eat the meat off. Later he started looking at it and remembered what they told him back home in Seminary during High School. He decided he was going to leave the rib right there where it was at. He never brought it home and he never tried to kill anybody.

The next day or two some guys went down in that same cave and got killed. There were some Japanese in there and they were not going to give up that cave.

On one crew he was unloading trucks that was coming up the harbor in Guam. On the shift he was working, they would feed him at night about 1:00 in the morning. He went down to the mess hall to eat and there was a Japanese soldier in the line. The Japanese were starving and would do anything to get food. Vivian got in line to go into eat and some of the guys ahead of him spotted this Japanese dressed in American soldier clothes. When the Jap figure out that he had been spotted he blew himself up with a hand-grenade. It took ½ of the mess hall. It wasn’t much of a mess hall. It just had a canvas top with a screen around it. That was an experience for him.

Toward the end of the war they sent new Seabees in from back east right from boot camp. These guys had guns who liked to shoot. They shot the heck out of the drag lines in the crane and blew out windows. The closest time Vivian came to getting killed was when he went out one night and was coming back to his Quonset hut. A bunch of those new Seabees where scared to death and one of them grabbed Vivian and put a gun in the middle of his back. Vivian told the guy to get that gun away from him or he would take that gun off him and shoot him with it. It was one of his own guys. The new ones were scared to death over there.

The toilets were six holers that they filled with lime to kill the smell. They didn’t use a toilet very long before they had to move them.

One night Vivian walked down the island where Don Devey was stationed and they were having supper. Vivian didn’t have any way to cut his hair. His hair was quite long. Don said it would be fun to trick the marines. Don went and got a nurses uniform and put it on Vivian. Don fixed Vivian’s hair all up, put him in some boobs, and sent him to the chow line. The marines were fighting over who was going to get his tray for him. Vivian thought, “My gosh, these guys are going to kill me if they find out.” Don stood there and laughed. When they found out he wasn’t a women Vivian left the camp in a hurry. Ol’ Don he was always full of tricks but a pretty good guy. Don was always good to Vivian and was a cousin to the woman that Vivian eventually married.

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Vivian believes that most of his unit made it back home. He doesn’t remember any getting killed. They moved a lot of them. Some of them couldn’t take it out there. They sent one kid back home for a while but told him he would have to come back. About the time Vivian was ready to leave, here come the kid back who had to stay there until his time was up.

Vivian had a lot of money from the war. He worked on the late shift and when he got back all the other guys was playing cards on his bed. He decided if they were going to stay there all night he would start playing with them. He got to be quite the poker player and made a lot of money. He sent it home to his mother. The guys would get mad because he was sending the money home instead of losing it back to them. He never played cards before he went in the Navy.

It wasn’t always fun and games over there. Guam was in America’s possession and the Japanese took it over. American had to fight to get it back.

They didn’t have any lights to land those B-29’s. All they had were little oil pots that they use to use on the side of the highway. They would light them oil pots for the B-29’s and some of those aviators were dang good. They were able to land their planes right between those oil pots. That was quite a chore.

When it was time for Vivian to get out the Navy, they put him and a bunch of others on a ship that was taking a bunch of black men home. They went down around Panama and landed in New York’s Hudson Bay. Vivian brought home a picture of the ship he came home on but his mother found it and thought is wasn’t any good so she burned it. Vivian doesn’t remember the name of the ship but he said it was huge. He could have put the ship they went over in on the fantail of the ship he came back on. It was a big ship.

He stayed in New York about a week and he made the most of it. That was when the Empire State Building was the highest building in New York. Vivian went up to the top. It wasn’t so bad going up. You would look down and the cars looked like little play cars. When they let the elevator down it left Vivian standing in the air, it was so fast.

He was still in the Navy and they wanted him to go on some burial detail for someone but he got spared and didn’t have to go. They put him on a train and took him across the United States. When he got to Colorado he looked out the train window and got scared to death going over a bridge. He didn’t think the train would make it across. Denver wasn’t a very big town then. They went across Soldier Summit in Utah, through Provo, and into the D&RG railroad station in Salt Lake. When he got into Salt Lake he called his Aunt Nessie who lived in there. She was glad to hear from him and told Vivian her husband had just died and they were having his funeral that day. Vivian told his aunt Nessie that he couldn’t get off the train to go to the funeral. He had to continue on to California to get discharged. He went onto California and was there long enough to get discharged. The Navy gave him $65.00 to get home on. He was dang glad to get out of there. He was in the military for two years and left in 1946. He served with Battalion 739.

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He hitched a ride into San Francisco (Vivian didn’t like San Francisco much). He used to go over to San Jose because they had a big ice skating rink there. He used to go ice skate before he shipped out to Guam instead of going out with the boys. One night he couldn’t find any place to go to bed. There was an old warehouse and some guy filled it full of army cots and charged $1.00 to sleep on the cot at night.

Anyway, he got on a train to come home. When he was in Wells, Nevada the train stopped and he went into a café to eat. He never saw so many silver dollars in his life as there was in that café. He was anxious to get home. The train he was on was so old it had signs that read, “Don’t shoot the buffalo out the window.” They didn’t have enough trains to carry all the troops on and they wouldn’t put them on the main line. They put them on the slower trains. He got to Salt Lake in the middle of the night. There was no one around and he couldn’t find a ride home. There were no buses so he started walking down the road with his thumb out to hitch a ride. Vivian and another kid got down the road quite a ways but a cop stopped and asked them what they were doing. He told the officer they were trying to get home. The cop never offered them a ride. A big gas truck come along who was heading straight south and the driver let them get in the cab with him. Vivian got off in Lehi in front of the diner. He called his dad who wanted to know why he was calling him in the middle of the night. He said he wanted to come home. His father didn’t know he was in town.

As soon as Vivian got home his dad put him back in the orchestra. He played the drums. He bought a 1941 Chevrolet and got it all dolled up. It was a nice car that came from Washington State. It had a lot of salt damage in it.

One night he went up to see his grandmother Forbes in Alpine. He saw a group of girls walking across the road and he asked if any of them wanted a ride. All of them shook their heads except Alice Devey. She knew him because she seen him playing the drums in the Carter Orchestra. Once at a dance Alice asked Vivian’s uncle Darrel if that man up playing the drums was married. Darrell told her, “Nope, he’s not married.” Alice immediately took him up on his offer for a ride. Alice got in the car and they took off. None of the other girls would get in.

Vivian had taken Alice up to Ogden to see one of her girlfriends. There were lights all over in the car but something went wrong with the lights. When he got home, it was just about the day before Christmas, he went to town to get something to fix the lights but everything was closed. He went to American Fork to get some wire but when he went to make a turn in American Fork where there was always a fog bank some kid with no drivers license, in a borrowed car, and no insurance hit Vivian head on. The Highway Patrol was called. A semi-truck came by and Vivian thought the Semi was going to hit him. He was lucky it didn’t. The doctor told his father that Vivian should have been dead from the accident. He was spared.

Six months later on February 6, 1947 Vivian took Alice Devey to Provo and married her.

6

They have six children; Jay, Dale, Sandy, Cindy, and Debbie and a daughter who was born dead. The doctor never told Vivian about it. It was the nurse who ended up telling him.

Vivian really wanted to go and become a veterinarian but his dad wanted him to stay and play in the band. Every time he would get ready to go his dad would talk him out of it. He never went to veterinarian school and took a job in the post office delivering mail in Lehi. He helped his dad on the farm and continued to live in Carterville up by the creek. One day he was called out from delivering mail and told his father was not doing well. He went up and found his father dead. He tried to revive him but was not able to. That was pretty traumatic for Vivian. He has stayed in Lehi all his life living up in Carterville. He delivered mail for 28 years.

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Spencer Kelsey Chatfield Casualty of World War II

Spencer Kelsey Chatfield, son of Arthur Kelsey and Naomi Felt Chatfield, was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, December 26, 1911.

The family moved to Lehi in 1928.

On January 28, 1942, Spencer volunteered for service in the Army Air Force. On July 20, 1942, he sailed for overseas and was killed in action December 1, 1943 at Tunisia, Africa.

David Wallace Christofferson Casualty of World War II

David Wallace Christofferson, son of Louise Vickery and Alexander D. Christofferson was born on May 5, 1922 at Lehi, Utah.

He entered the Armed Forces November 19, 1942, where he became a right gunner on a B-29 plane stationed in India.

He was killed in action in a raid over Singapore , February 1945. MEMOIRS OF DONN R. CLAYBAUGH'S NAVY LIFE DURING WW-II

1943 Enlisted in United States Navy as A.S. (Apprentice Seaman) on February 15, 1943. Went to U.S.N.T.S. (U.3. Naval Training Station) in San Diego, Calif. on March 4. Left "Boot Camp" in San Diego as S1/c. Was in Company 43-87. May 11. Arrived at Naval Torpedo Station in Keyport, Wash. on May 15. Graduated from Keyport as S1/c August 7. On leave August 7th to August 16th. At home. Arrived in San Francisco August 18th. Sent to Treasure Island Receiving Station until 19th. On Goat Island (Yerba Buena) from August 19 to September 6. On board S.S. Tabinta, a Dutch freighter, from Sept. 6 to Sept. 28. Went to Tahiti, then New Caledonia. At R.S. Noumea, Navy Base for three weeks. On transport, U.3.3. Pinkney Oct. 19 to Oct. 21. Went to Havanah Harbor, New Hebrides. On yard oiler to Efate Harbor, New Hebrides. On transport 3.3. John Bartram Oct.. 21 to go back to Havanah. On banana barge to Efate. Boarded U.3.3. Hudson at Efate, Oct. 21, 1943. Back to Havanah Oct. 22. Arrived in Tulagi next. In Task Force 31 for Bougainville Invasion Nov. 1. First action seen. To Guadalcanal for Transports, then back to Bougainville. Made several trips to Bougainville & Treasury Island during November. Ran aground in Russel Islands about Nov. 20th Went to Espiritu Santo, New Hebrides on Dec 1 to dry docks & had screws fixed. Dec. 19-20, Convoy duty in Solomons to Bougainville Met no opposition. Dec. 21, Saw Munda & Rendova, scene of most bitter fighting of war so far. Dec. 22, Saw Vella La Vella, pretty island. Dec. 25, Ate Christmas dinner off Bougainville. Had Army rations. Dec. 26, Had regular Christmas dinner.

1944 Jan. 5, Bougainville again. Caught convoy at Russels on 4th. Jan. 4 to 15, Trips to Bougainville. Jan. 15, To Rendova with PT's. Jan. 24, Patrolled within 25-miles of New Irland, furthest north we've been. No Opposition. Jan. 25, Bombarded Buka off Bougainville. Jan. 29, Anchored off New Georgia. Jun. 30, To Green Island with New Zealand Raiders. Jan. 31, Back to Green for Raiders. Sunk sub on way back. Feb 1, Bombarded Buka. Feb. 2, Got Marines Marines from Guadalcanal. Bombarded Kolombungara Island. Set record for most shells fired in a limited time. Feb. 4, Got war souvenirs on island. Feb. 5, shot at sleeves. Five ships with six sleeves, got five of them and fired last. Feb. 15, Captured Green Island. Feb. 20, Took large convoy to Green Island. Feb. 22, Back to Purvis Bay, Guadalcanal. Feb. 23, Underway patrol duty around Rabaul & St. Georgia Channel. Patrolled to northern tip of New Irland. Sunk tug & barges. Feb. 28, Patrol duty north of equator in Carolines. Feb. 28, Patrol Duty around Truk. Feb. 26 to March 8, In port at Tulagi. March 10, At Bougainville Strait on sub sweep. Used 44 depth charges. Sunk 1 sub. Bombarded barges attempting to evacuate officers from Bougainville. March 15. Took LST'S to Green Island. Dropped six charges. March 22-29, In task force to Imarau. North of Kavieng. April-May, In convoy to Sidney, Australia to prepare for invasion. June 8, Arrived at Roi Island. June 10, Left Roi for Guam. June 13, Arrived at Saipan & Tinian. Bombarded & dive bombed, but no resistance. June 15, Marines landed. Light resistance. Slight air attacks. June 16, Arrived at Guam. Left same morning to engage enemy fleet. June 19, Fought greatest air battle of war in Philippine seas. Two men killed, 5 injured, 3 ships hit. Shot down 747 Jap planes in one day. June 20, Within 400 miles of Tokyo, very close to China coast. June 25, Left Saipan vith heavy cruisers & convoy. June 26-July 17, Between Saipan & Guam. Bombarded Guam. July 13, Left for Guam. July 21, Invasion of Guam. No air resistance. Troop casualties light. Advance steady. July 27, Picked up 4 native enlisted men who escaped in small Japanese boat. Guamanese. July 29, Japs committing-Hari-Kari off cliff at Guam. August 12, Left Guam for Eniwetock. August 24, Arrived in Esperita Santo, then to Purvis Bay for maneuvers. Sept. 6, Left Purvis for Palau. Sept. 14, Invaded Palau after bombardment. Shells close over heads. Sept. 28, Arrived at Manus Admiralties. Oct. 5, Left Manus for Pearl Harbor. Oct. 14, Arrived in Pearl Harbor. Oct. 15, Left for United States. Oct. 21, Arrived in San Francisco, Calif. On leave for twenty-one days. At home. Reported back to San Francisco Nov. 11. Was there while Hudson was being repaired at shipyards. Left San Francisco first part of December, arrived in San Diego. Left San Diego Dec. 18 for Pearl Harbor. Arrived Pearl Harbor Dec. 24. Saw brother, Carl in Pearl Christmas Day. 1945 Jan. 27, Left Pearl for Eniwetok. Feb. 5, Arrived in Eniwetok. Feb. 7, Left for Pagan for picket duty Feb. 15, Arrived in Saipan. Feb. 16, Left for Iwo Jima. Feb. 19, Arrived and invaded Iwo Jima. Very hard fight. Many air raids and much bombardment. Most fortified place in world. 6th Star. Feb. 24, Shot down Jap plane. Air raids almost every night. Feb. 28, Jap Betty flew over fantail. March 1,& 2, Bombarded Iwo Jima. March 6, Left for Guam. March 8, 3-29 crashed into sea killing 6 men outright. Picked up 6 men, 2 died on board. Headed for Saipan. At 10:30 or 11:00 P.M. Hubert Stephen DeWitt sustained electrical shock which caused his death at 2:30 A.M. March 9, 1945. Escorted body to beach.- The loss of the best friend I ever had. March 10, Left for Guam. March 11, Arrived and 1--L't for Ulithi. March 12, Arrived and left for Leyte. March 15, Arrived in Leyte. March 18-21, Picket duty in Surigao Strait. March 22-26, Availability in Leyte Harbor. March 27, Left for Okinawa after taking part in rehearsals for invasion of Okinawa. April l.. Arrived at Okinawa, Ryukyus Islands. April 2. Picket duty 62 miles NW off Okinawa. Sunk two barges. April 5, Picket duty 62 miles NW off Okinawa. sunk one mine. April 6, Picket duty 62 miles SW off Okinawa. Sunk sub and one plane. April 7-22, Picket duty around island. Several air raids and plenty of excitement. Lots of destroyers getting hit and we were wondering when our time was coming. April 22, A Kamikaze suicide plane hit the ship and slightly damaged us, but failed to Crash it. It's wing hit forecastle as it was banking. Crashed into the sea ten feet from ship One Casualty, Dinwiddie injured. April 23, Air raids developing. Relieved on picket duty and proceeded to base. Arrived at Keramo Retto for repairs. May 4, Back on picket station. A plane shot down crashed into the escort carrier, U.S.S. Sangamon which burned fiercely. We pulled alongside and fought the fires until it was under control. The ship received considerable damage. May 10, Left for Guam to undergo repairs. June 22, Repairs completed. Returned to Okinawa and operated in vicinity of Nakagusuki Wan. July 1, Left for Eniwetok, Marshall Islands. July to August, Were on convoy duty between Eniwetok and other bases. August 11, Left for Adak, Aleutian Islands for duty in North Pacific area. August 31, Left Adak and went to Ominato in the Northern Honshu and Hokkaido area of Japan for occupation. Sept. 7, Arrived in Japan. Stayed about two weeks. Sept. 21, Left for. Adak and stayed for two or three weeks. Oct. 1, Left for Kodiak and stayed until Oct. 20th. Oct. 27, Were in Skagway for Navy Day. Nov. 1, Left for Kodiak. Nov. 5, Arrived in Kodiak. Nov. 10, Left Kodiak for Seattle, Washington. Nov. 13, Was discharged from Hudson. Went to PAL barracks in Seattle. Went to Receiving Sta. in Seattle and stayed for three days. Nov. 16, Was sent to Bremerton, Washington. Nov. 19, Got on an Army transport and went to San Francisco, Nov. 21, Arrived in San Francisco. Stayed an hour. Nov. 22, Arrived in San Pedro. Went to Terminal Island Receiving Station. Nov. 25, 1945. Was honorably discharged from U.S.N.R. (United States Naval Reserves.)

Keith G. Davis Casualty of World War II

Keith G. Davis, son of A.W. and Della G. Davis, was born in Lehi, Utah January 17, 1918.

He enlisted in the Army March 19, 1941. While in training, he married Donnavieve Anderson of Provo. Their daughter Donna, was born while they were living Camp Bowie, Texas.

On January 10, 1944, he left for overseas. September 13, 1944 he was killed in action at Chaumont, France. Harold Fenn As interviewed by Judy Hansen

Harold was born March 27, 1926 in Pomerene, Arizona the fourth son of Peter and Florence Lorena Jones Fenn. His siblings were Thelma, Evan L, Elora, Alva, Terry E, and Lester. He attended high school in Benson, Arizona where he completed his junior year. Harold said everyone called Pomerene polygamy town, Arizona.

His father was hunting jobs for his boys and he had a vision that things were better in Utah. He felt you couldn’t go wrong there. Harold moved to Lehi, Utah in March 1943 with his parents. Harold worked for the Forest Service for a short time. He started working at U S Steel in Orem, Utah on a cement crew during the initial construction. The plant was finished in 1944 so he joined the service.

On February 11, 1944 he voluntarily went to Provo and enlisted in the United States Navy. They took Harold and a bunch of boys down to the depot station and said, “There you are boys get on that train” and they were sent to California. He went to San Diego Naval Training Station and they made him march. He did a lot of marching. They sent him overseas on a troop transport ship named Santa Monica to Nouméa, New Caledonia.

He served on the USS Rio Grande in the South Pacific as a shipfitter1 or as he described, “the construction and repairman who was always carrying a big hammer.” The USS Rio Grande was a tanker ship assigned to the Army Air Force. The army was over the Air Force because they didn’t have a separate Air Force in WWII.

Nouméa served as the main supply and support depot for amphibious operations in the South Pacific.2 The USS Rio Grande was assigned to the US Pacific Fleet as a unit of the mobile support group and carried petroleum products to help provide fuel for the fighting ships of the

1 According to wikipedia a shipfitter is an enlisted or civilian person who works on heavy metal like high-tensile steel, high yield strength steel, etc. Shipfitters fabricate, assemble and erect all structural parts of a ship, coordinate all fixed tank work performed on submarines and ships, and coordinate all sonar dome work. Shipfitters also use heavy machinery such as plate planners, shears, punches, drill presses, bending rolls, bending slabs, plate beveler, saws, presses up to 750 tons, angle roll (vertical and horizontal), dogs and wedges. Shipfitters are responsible for hydro and air testing of tanks and compartments as well as perform grinding, drilling, and fit up operations on submarines and surface crafts.1

2 World War Two Pacific Island Guide, pg 71.

1 fleet to invade Japan.3 It was the staging base in April 1945 for the Okinawa assault.4 Harold said there were a lot of swap jockey’s (the guys that were always cleaning the deck) on board the ship. There were always ‘work details’ that needed to be done.

USS Rio Grande (AOG-3)

The SS Indianapolis was a battleship that came out of the US west coast delivering one of the key components of the atomic bombs that were used to bomb Japan. It left the Philippines and was send back to Pearl Harbor but was sunk by a Japanese submarine. Harold’s ship the USS Rio Grande fueled the SS Indianapolis before it left for its mission. A gentleman requested the Captain’s log of the SS Indianapolis but when he got it, there were pages missing out of it. The SS Indianapolis was a black-eye to the Navy. They didn’t want anyone to know what was on the ship or what its mission was. It was sent back alone without an escort which is very unusual.

Harold served in the Navy for a little over 2 years and on May 2, 1946 he received his discharge in Clearfield, Utah.

After he returned from his military service he continued his employment with US Geneva Steel where he ended up as the head grinder in the Roller Mills for 39 ½ years. He ground rolls for the roll line. Each roll of steel was put on a lathe which had to be turned for 8 to 12 hours and all the blemishes removed so they were perfectly smooth with a flat surface. This resulted in the

3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Rio_Grande_(AOG-3) 4 ibid

2 finished product ready for sale. He left his employment there just before they shut Geneva down in 1985. On May 15, 1947 Harold married Bertha Clark Courney in Ely, Nevada. She had one child Robert Lynn Courney by a previous marriage. On June 22, 1948 a son, Jerry David was born. Jerry was a lovable little fellow who romped and played with the neighborhood children, but one day Jerry became tired and listless. He was diagnosed with Wilm’s Tumor which is cancer of the kidney usually found in children and rarely in adults. He was in and out of the hospital and everything that could be done was tried but he passed away after six months on February 2, 1954.

In 1957 Harold and Bertha bought a home with 1.67 acres located at 9058 W 8570 N county road in Lehi, just west of the Lehi Veteran’s ball park. He lived and raised his family there.

Another son, Randy Blake was born on March 3, 1955. Randy brought a lot of joy into the home. Randy was a good son and also a good student. He graduated from Lehi High School.

Besides working at Geneva, Harold also farmed in Lehi. He took jobs cutting, raking, and bailing hay for his neighbors. He also harvested their beets. He rented 10 acres of field directly east of his home from Ray Stewart and grew hay. After his son graduated school, Harold and his brother Lester bought and developed a 640 acre farm 80 miles west of his home past Simpson Springs on the old pony express route in the river bed. They dug 2-16” wells for irrigation where they grew wheat and milo. They sold the sold this farm after two years.

Harold’s wife died November 19, 1999. A black spot was found in her stomach but she never returned to get an official diagnosis. They suspect it was cancer. This left Harold living alone. His son Randy and wife Valerie have made sure Harold has been well cared for during his senior years.

Harold was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saint in a muddy river when he was a young boy. He had the opportunity when he was younger to be baptized for the dead in the Mesa, Arizona temple 22 times. He never considered himself a religious man but after his wife passed away he went to the LDS temple.

It is interesting to note that Harold’s brother Evan served in WWII on the USS Monaghan that was capsized in a typhoon and he was one of 6 sole survivors. When he died he was the sole survivor of the six. Evan lived in Lehi for a short time prior to his service.

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Gary Harold Findlay as interviewed by Judy Hansen July 2014

I was born in Smoot, Wyoming on the 25th of July 1930 to Hugh and Gertrude Findlay. Dad had a dairy farm and I spent all my growing up years there. Because I was so small I was held back a year in school.

After the 2nd world war my dad ran a milk route. My brother was gone and it was pretty hard for my dad to do all the heavy work because of his age. So in 1947 I stayed out of Star Valley High for one year to help my dad. I drove the milk route so he wouldn’t have to.

I went back and finished school. While I attended school, I joined the 141st Tank Battalion Wyoming National Guard in the fall of 1949. It was stationed in Laramie, Wyoming. I spent nine or ten months in the guard. I graduated high school in May of 1950. In June 1950 the Korean conflict broke out. In September 1850, our unit was due to move out and go to Fort Campbell, Kentucky. That is where I spent most of my time.

When I joined the Guard I was in the kitchen and was classified as a cook. I cooked for a while but that was when I was in Wyoming. As soon as we left Wyoming our status was changed from National Guard to Regular Army. Every person that went into the regular army had to be trained so they put us through regular basic training. We were supposed to go to Korea in December 1950 but they cut our orders. They decided they wouldn’t send us over because the Koreans were pushing really hard. The enemy pushed everyone back and off of Korea so the US took everyone and sent them to Japan or the other islands they had control of out there. That was when they made us a cadre unit. A cadre unit is a unit that trains other people. Once they decided they were going to make us a cadre we had to train all the new recruits coming into the Army – their basic training, infantry and such. I spent quite a while at Fort Campbell training people. I provided training in quite a few different things. I trained people in the tanks and arms. I spent about nine months doing this.

I had one Officer that went through the course. He followed his men through their training to see how the instruction was going. He told me, “Man, this is outstanding; you do an outstanding job teaching these people. I’d recommend you to teach my guys anything.” This was quite a feather in my cap. I enjoyed the Army. I liked working with the guys. There were a lot of good people. I enjoyed shooting the tanks; shooting the 90 mm’s.

We were driving around in tanks all the time and a lot of people were upset because they had to walk everywhere. While I was in Fort Campbell a lot of the folks from Kentucky had never seen a rodeo. They talked us guys from Wyoming into going to their hometown and putting on a rodeo for them. We had one guy dress as a rodeo clown and everyone thought it was pretty neat. They didn’t have a corral or arena to put the rodeo on in so we told them to take a lot of fence panels, put them together, and create their own arena. There were a lot of animals but they were all racing horses. They finally built an arena and found enough horses and we put on a rodeo. It all worked out great. I had been helping at the chutes and we got down to the last rider and they asked me if I was going to ride. I told them I hadn’t thought of it but they told me to come along and they would put me on the last horse. I had ridden horses all my life but this was bareback. There was only a cinch around the horse’s waist that you could hold onto with one hand. I got on the horse and she tore out of there. I lasted three jumps. I went straight up in the air and away she went. I came down and landed flat on my back. They come out and tried to pick me up but I told them I was alright. I started walking back to the chutes and my legs buckled and I couldn’t stand up. They took me to the town hospital in an ambulance. After they x-rayed me and couldn’t find anything wrong they hauled me back to camp. I was on light duty for a while. It was an experience.

I also spent a bit of time in Fort Lee, Virginia. They sent me there for quartermaster’s school. That is where you learn all about taking care of equipment and supplies. I worked in the supply room. When they sent me there it was with the idea that I would be with them for a while. After I got there and was done with the training they found out they were shipping all the National Guard home so I would be discharged. While I was in Fort Lee, I had a buddy, Stanley Bass that lived close to Washington DC. I was able to stay there for Christmas in 1951. Stan and his girlfriend took me to Washington DC and I was able to go through the Smithsonian, the Washington Monument, and all the sites to be seen there. Many of the places we visited Stan told me he had never seen before even though he lived right there.

I served almost two years. I went back home to Wyoming in May 1952. I stayed in the guard until October 1952 and then they discharged me.

I had a lot of training benefit coming to me from the military so in January 1953 I went to what they used to call Central Utah Vocational School in Provo; now they call it UVU (Utah Valley University). I wanted to go out in welding but they told me I couldn’t do it because they didn’t have enough room for me. They told me they would put me in welding for ½ day and forging1 the other half. I eventually ended up in the forging school full time. I went to school for three years.

I went to the Samoa Islands on an LDS mission in 1956 for two ½ years. I got home to Wyoming from my mission Dec 7, 1958. After that I registered in school again for the same program. I started school in January 1959 and went down to live with my brother and his family in Orem.

I met this kid in my class and asked him if he knew any rich women that could take care of me for the rest of my life. He said, “Yea – I know just the one for you.” He introduced me to Wanda Littleford from Lehi. It was a blind date; and boy she was blind. She’s been sorry ever since (he laughs). We were married August 1959.

1 Metal working process Wanda and I rented Doc Jone’s farm in Lehi when we first got married. Then we moved up to Riverdale for a year and ran a church farm. I interviewed with the government and went to work for Hercules and we moved back to Lehi and built our home here2. That was 1963. Hercules guaranteed worked for five years but started laying people off after three years. When they laid me off I went to work for IMCO in Quality Control. I heard Tooele Army Depot was hiring so I applied and started working for there as a sheet metal specialist until I racked my back up and had to quit.

Wanda had been divorced when we married so she bought a son, Jay into our family and I adopted him. We then had four more children Jeana, Alan, Bryan, and Janet. We also had several people from Samoa and some Indian students come live with us while they went to school.

2 630 S 600 E Morris O. Fox Casualty of World War II

Morris O Fox, son of Jesse and Mary Powell Fox, was born in Lehi, Utah August 29, 1916.

He entered the Army Infantry in 1941. Going overseas in November 1942, he participated in the invasion of Africa.

He was later killed in action at Sicily, Italy, November 10, 1942. Eugene Smith Patrick Francom as interviewed by Judy Hansen July 2014

I was born in American Fork on the farm in 1932. The farm was actually between American Fork and Pleasant Grove. I didn’t go to the hospital. My father was William Abraham Patrick. His parents came from England in 1910 when he was 13 years old. I was 8 months old when my mother separated from dad. I have a brother, two sisters, and a half- sister. My full older brother is Lionel and my older sister is Geraldine. She died when she was 50 years old. I have another full sister LaRae Hardman and a half-sister Miriam Francom. My mother was RhuEmma Jane Smith. When my real father got married again he had a daughter and two sons. I went to the schools in American Fork. In the 11th grade I transferred to Trade Tech in Provo and took drafting and construction classes. I didn’t graduate from High School but I graduated from Trade Tech.

On Pearl Harbor day December 7, 1951 I married Joan Grace from Lehi. She is the daughter of Francis and Luella Grace. At first we lived in Pleasant Grove but then we built a little place in American Fork.

In June 1952 I joined the 1457th Engineer Battalion National Guard. I was 19 years old. I would work between the Lehi guard and the American Fork guard teaching heavy riggin’ and heavy equipment operating. The 1457th Engineer Battalion would build roads, bridges, and airfields. Me and Bob Whimpey built the road that goes up Beef Hollow to Tickville. We both operated bull dozers. That is what we also did when we were regular Army.

Weekly we had meetings and then one week a year we had to go to camp. We had to certify with the rifle and shoot at camp. I was marksman of the company. We’d go out to Camp Williams. We had to shoot the ol’ M1 Garand, the 30 caliber machine gun, the 50 caliber machine gun, and the bazooka; this is the one that would shoot the rocket that would blow the tracks off the tanks - It looked like a pipe. At that time Camp Williams was really neat. All there was out there was a few buildings and then tents. There were four of us men sleeping in one tent. We had kitchen KP and I remember peeling a lot of potatoes. We’d go out bivouac (pronounced bib-wack) and we’d have to do the dishes in galvanized garbage cans. It wasn’t like it is now, we really were the old Army. We didn’t have meals brought into us; didn’t have

1 the beautiful buildings that are out at Camp Williams now; and there were no phones. I was in the guard for three years.

I don’t like to think about my military experience much although we did have fun. We would have to build the fire breaks that you can still see out at Camp Williams. We’d have to cut out all the wood and peel out all the grass in strips so fire couldn’t jump from one side to the other.

One time they came up and told me they needed me and my cat down at the airstrip. I remember going over the top of the hills and down the valley to get there. I got down there and found out they needed the hanger moved but they had already hooked two big troop carrier trucks onto it and moved it so I went for this long ride for no reason at all.

When they had Governors day we all had to dress up in our pretty clothes and march up and down on the field for him. They had Governors day every year.

When we’d play war out at Camp Williams it was just like we were in combat. The planes would come over and bomb us with little sacks of flour. I only got hit once. I was tearing brush down to get it out of the way so I could cut the road. A plane came over and I got hit; There was flour all over me and the caterpillar.

One time I was backing up the hill to push the brush up the hill and I kicked the cat out of gear so I could roll back down. I hit the gas can holder in the back of a jeep and that jeep flew about 20 feet in the air. Then I found out it was the Colonel and his aide. They were in the jeep and thankfully they didn’t get hurt. The jeep jump 20 feet and then just landed back on the road.

I use to get so mad at those guys. When I was teaching heavy rigging1 I would cut the heavy rock stuff with the cat and we would put a shank charge in which blows a hole down into the ground. It stands on legs about two feet long and then you fill it with explosives to break the rock and everything up. I’d tell those guys to get out of the way. One day three of them went up to sit by an oak to smoke a cigarette and when that charge went off that angle iron flew up and cut the brush right above their heads. It’s funny it didn’t kill all three of them.

1 Lifting heavy stuff with a crane

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Then we use to disarm landmines for practice. They weren’t real landmines; they would use blocks of wood with those cherry bomb things under them. Instead of those guys diggin’ down and taking the igniter out and then moving the mine they would flip it with their bayonet. One of those kids got his face full of gravel. You could tell some of these guys were really not too smart.

I transferred to Active Reserves. The headquarters was up in Heber. Our company; the 1457th got called to Korea. We all went up to Fort Douglas took all the tests; both physical and mental, got the shots, and was ready to go. Then they came to us and told us we were on hold because they didn’t need us right then. It came time for me and Bob Whimpey to get our discharge. Two weeks after my discharge they sent my unit overseas to Korea. The Armistice agreement had been signed on July 27th, 1953 but from July through November 1954 our troops were there exchanging the dead through operation glory. Although I was no longer on active duty I still had to serve time. I continued to do weekly assignments only this was through the Army and not the guard. I was formally discharged on June 2nd, 1960.

I’m glad I didn’t have to use these skills because I wouldn’t have enjoyed killing people. One sad part of the Korean War was those women who would be carrying a baby with explosives on them; they’d walk into a group of soldiers, then blow herself the baby and everyone else up. The soldiers got to where they had to shoot the women before they even got to them.

In 1957 or 1958 we moved to Lehi. We bought this lot and had a small one bedroom house moved here.2 We lived in that as we built on around it.

Outside the military I worked construction – Iron work. I worked on the Marriott Center, the BYU Law Library, the Student Union building, BYU student housing. I also worked on the Provo Temple, twelve bridges over the freeway when they put that in, the Ogden Tabernacle, a bunch of schools in both Utah and Salt Lake Counties including the Lehi High School and the American Fork High School, some bridges up Spanish Fork Canyon, the Holy Cross Hospital, a bunch of buildings at the University of Utah, and then I worked for twelve years at Geneva Steel for the American Bridge company. They were the contract company to rebuild everything. Right toward the end of my retirement I was the General Foreman at the Fabrication yard for Consolidated Western Steel on the west side of Geneva by Hecket3. We fabricated the steel for Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena and had it sent to California.

I had back surgery and couldn’t go back doing steel work so the Doctor made me retire when I was fifty. After I retired I started refinishing antique furniture. I had people coming from Arizona and everyplace to have me make claw feet for their old furniture. If a piece was missing a foot I’d hand carve a new one to match the others. I’ve made a lot of furniture (Eugene showed me some beautiful pieces he made that are in his home). I have a real nice shop out

2 1919 N 500 W, Lehi 3 Hecket is a contracted company that took care of the tailings at Geneva.

3 there. I’ve done a lot of that to waste my time. I also used to turn a bunch of bowls and stuff on the lathe.

Oh! And then I oil painted. (he has several paintings hanging throughout his home that his wife showed me) I’ve painted pretty near all the old buildings of Lehi, the old schools, the churches, and this picture of the Lehi Tabernacle (as he points to the picture hanging on the wall beside us). When they tore the Lehi Tabernacle down and built the Stake Center across from the fire station I was the night supervisor. We put all the foundation in pouring these ten foot walls. There was a basement there they wanted to fill full of dirt. I told the Architect that filling it full of dirt was not right. I said, “Let’s put a slab on top here and then you will have those great big rooms there in the basement.” Finally I talked him into it so we did and now it is the Genealogy Extraction Center in Lehi. It is the perfect temperature down there. That is the only thing that is left of the Lehi Tabernacle is that basement area. We had to pour the new walls and stuff but that hole and basement was there from the old Tabernacle.

I have memories of the old Lehi 4th ward. My Grandfather, Joseph Jesse Patrick was working on the addition of that church building. He was digging the foundation and when it came time for them to quit for the night they couldn’t find him anywhere. When they went looking for him they found him lying dead in the footings of the old 4th ward church. He moved here to Lehi in 1910 from England and lived in a home on 900 East between 400 and 500 North.

I took my picture of the Star Flour Mill in American Fork to two or three shows and won ribbons for it. My Parkinson’s disease has gotten so bad that I can’t paint anymore. Anyway – I’ve stayed busy since I’ve retired.

Joan and I are the parents of three boys: Eugene, Kurtley, and Kirk.

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Lucky! His Life Was Spared- The War Experiences of Myrten Francis Grant

Myten Francis Grant was born on November 21, 1924 and was the oldest son of Francis Bromley Grant and Myrtle Powell Grant. He grew up in Lehi, Utah, graduating from Lehi High School in 1943.

He was immediately drafted into the United States Army at the age of eighteen. He was inducted in the army at Fort Douglas where he stayed for only a short time. He said they dressed him and fed him and got him ready to go to the infantry school. The short time he was there, he remembered that there were a lot of farm boys that the army made clean under their fingernails. He also remembered that there were a lot of returned Latter-day Saint missionaries who felt it was their responsibility to turn all the new recruits into good Latter-day Saints. They had family prayer with the group and some of them didn’t even know what a family prayer was.

From Fort Douglas, Myrten was transferred to infantry training at Camp Roberts in California. He said that is was extremely dry. There were a few barracks here and there and a parade ground. There was a large number of Spanish American recruits would sing loud songs all night long. He said that it was like hell listening to them when he wanted to go to sleep.

After he finished training at Camp Roberts, he went to Fort Benning in Georgia which seemed to him like he had been transferred to Heaven because they got to eat pork chops and ice cream. Lucky! His life was spared.

Myrten left for Europe with the largest convoy to cross the Atlantic Ocean during the war from Newport News. He was sent to Italy in the 91st infantry and ended up on the front lines.

One time his group ended up behind the German lines. He spent a lot of time in the Po River Valley in the winter and said that was the coldest he had ever been. He received a Presidential Citation for the Po River Valley Push. He achieved the rank of Corporal.

During the first battle he was in, he said he thought it was beautiful. The tracers were lighting the night sky. To better enjoy it he stood up making himself a perfect target for the enemy. The guy next to him pulled him down to the ground calling him a few choice words. Lucky! He was spared.

Another time he almost got killed, but didn’t when the group he was with were all asleep. The Germans fired at them and took the top of the ten Myten was sleeping in completely off. He woke up looking up at the star-studded sky. Lucky! He was spared.

All of the soldiers he was with called him “Curley” or “Junior” because he was by far the youngest of the group. He told of receiving packages with cigarettes and other things they needed in. He would trade his cigarettes to the other guys for their gum. Then he would go into the nearest town and give the gum to the little Italian children.

Myrten often said that he wasn’t sure if he ever took anyone’s life, but he did save two of his comrades from death. The soldiers used to dig a hole, put gas in it, light it and place their helmet filled with water in them over the fire so they could shave. One time his friend discovered he didn’t have enough heat, so he attempted to pour more gas on the flame. Unfortunately the flame jumped back at him and set him on fire. Myrten quickly grabbed a sleeping bag that was close and enveloped his friend, putting the fire out. The only bad thing was it was the captain’s sleeping bag which had a large hole burned in it. His captain was not happy. But-Lucky! Their lives (because of Myrt’s fast action) were spared.

The second occasion Myrten saved someone’s life was when the soldiers were swimming in a body of water. One guy couldn’t swim and didn’t realize how deep it was. He began screaming for help and going under. Myrten, being an excellent swimmer cove beneath the man and brought him to safety. Lucky! Their lives (again because of Myrt’s action in the time of crisis) were spared.

Toward the end of the war the Germans were on the run. One time they left everything and took off. When the group Myrten was in came across the German’s previously owned things, the GI’s decided to take advantage of the booty. It looked like such a rag-tag group that General Mark Clark sen an order to them. He said that anyone who was found in possession of any German items would be court marshalled.

While in Italy, Myrten contracted hepatitis and had to go to the base hospital. This was the only time throughout his life he was in the hospital until just before he passed away. Yes Lucky! His life was spared.

Sometime before he was admitted he had taken an IQ test. The results came back and his commanding officer came to Myrten and said, “I didn’t know you were such an intelligent young man, but you have the opportunity to go to the University of Florence. Myrt happily looked forward to that experience, but before he got the opportunity to do that, the war ended.

His outfit was shipped to naples to go to the South Pacific. While he was on the train taking him to the ship, a soldier rushed by with the news that the United States had dropped two gigantic bombs on Japan and they had surrendered. Myrten didn’t believe it at first, but when they got to the seaport, they were some of the first to return home. He was honorably discharged November 21, 1946, on his 21st birthday. Lucky! His life was spared.

Upon returning home, Myrten entered college at Brigham Young University where he learned of the College of Pharmacy, a new school at the University of Utah. He entered at that time and graduated in June of 1950. He served as a licensed pharmacist for 30 years. He served a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints as the first pharmacist in the Humanitarian Service of the church and three years as the ward mission leader with his wife. He served in many offices of the church throughout his life and had many choice spiritual experiences. He was in the bishopric, Elders and Seventies President, Stake Sunday School councilor, teacher and home teacher.

He was an honorable righteous man. He married Vervene Sorenson in the Salt Lake LDS temple on June 15, 1949 and became father to three children, Brenda Joy, Winnifred Ann, and Peter Myrten. He has four grandchildren and eight (almost nine) great grandchildren. He left a family who adore and honor him as a great man. He loved his family dearly, and they knew it. Lucky for us! His life was spared.

He also loved God and his Country We are all very proud of his noble wonderful exemplary life which ended on August 20, 2011. He was buried in Lehi City Cemetery with full military rites.

Lucky for all- His Life was spared.

George Edward Hampton as interviewed by Judy Hansen April 2014

George Edward “Ed” Hampton was named after his grandfather George Martin Hampton. He was born to Philip Theodore and Emma Myrtle Reeve Hampton and raised in Maysville, Colorado until he was about 10-years-old. At that time the family moved to American Fork and bought a home. However, Alpine School District bought their home so Forbes School could be built and the family moved to Pleasant Grove where Ed graduated from High School in 1956.

After he graduated he joined the National Guard Marine Reserve in Salt Lake and went into active duty for six months at Camp Pendleton, California.

When he got home he went to work as a life guard at Saratoga for the summer. Carma Fern Carter, daughter of Darrall and Fern Carter of Lehi had been working out there as a cashier for three years. Ed and Carma were not interested in each other at all. She didn’t like his type and he didn’t like her type. Well they kind-of grew on each other because they married in December 1958.

Ed and Carma rented a home in Lehi and Ed went to work for a trucking company for a while. After a short time he got a job with the Salt Lake Police Department as an Officer. They bought a small home in Salt Lake. His salary was so low all they qualified for was a little old two bedroom house by State Street on Winslow Avenue.

Ed kept taking the Sargent’s test and would pass the tests with a higher score than anyone else but they wouldn’t advance him because they were promoting the older officers that had more seniority. It was becoming a dead-end job.

He had always liked the Marine Corp Reserves and he also always wanted to be an auto- mechanic. He decided he would talk to the recruiters at the reserves office and they told him if he went active duty they would send him to auto mechanic school and he could get his schooling in the military. They told him when he got out he would have a G.I. Bill and he could get more

1 schooling after his military service. They also told him he would get his housing paid for. Ed believed the man and thought this was a good deal because the police officer position wasn’t going anywhere. He went home and told Carma that he had enlisted in the US Marine Corp. She about died.

He went down alone for boot camp at Camp Pendleton, California and then his wife and child went down to live with him in December 1961. He was told there was inexpensive housing on base but he found out his rank was too high to qualify. The Marines took the rent for housing right out of Ed’s check. They had a one bedroom apartment on base. When Carma got pregnant they were able to put in for a two bedroom apartment but there was a waiting list. When the two bedroom apartment came up they moved.

Their daughter Lezlie was born October 1962 and this is right when the Cuban crisis came up. Two weeks after Leslie’s birth they put Ed and all the soldiers on a ship and sent them away. There were almost no men left in Camp Pendleton. They wouldn’t tell the families what they were doing, where they were going, or how long they would be gone. The mission was top secret.

Russia was sending missiles to Cuba in 1962. President Kennedy told them not to do that. They still kept sending the missiles anyway. The United States decided to do a blockade that they called a ‘quarantine’ around Cuba with their ships. The US told Russia if they kept sending their ships they would shoot them down but Russia kept coming. The marines jammed all these guys on a troop ship and sent them down through the Panama Canal and into the Caribbean. It was a 13-day confrontation.

They never landed in Cuba but they did land in Haiti to re-fuel and gather supplies. They were able to get off there and purchase souvenirs.

Later, all the women heard on the news that the Russian ships were turning around and going home. That is when they figured out where the men were and felt everyone would be coming home soon. They were right. Ed was gone about three weeks.

When he got back to Camp Pendleton he stayed there with his unit and they sent him to school. He never got to mechanic school. They told him they didn’t need mechanics so they sent him to officer training school and weapon’s repair training. He always got the highest grades in his class. He was at Camp Pendleton for two years. He didn’t re-enlist because his rank was low and he didn’t make enough to support his family and the Marines weren’t training him as a mechanic like they promised they would.

After Ed was discharged from the Marines he went back to work for the Salt Lake Police Department. A lot of the Officers were working two and three jobs in order to make ends meet. Ed was no exception. Besides his full time work on graveyard shift as a Police Officer, he was

2 working a part-time job in the mornings as a motorcycle police escort and had another part-time job in the afternoons in a car dealership.

Since he had a G I Bill for being in the Marines he decided he might as well go to school. He started taking classes to become a machinist at the Salt Lake Trade Technical Institute.1 He continued to work at night as a police office and worked the part time job as an escort while he attended school. He did this for two years and graduated the top of his class.

His instructor contacted United Airlines and they sent someone up to interview Ed. They gave him a job as a machinist making parts for the planes but he had to move to California. They had that little old house in Salt Lake and they couldn’t sell it. They put a lot of work into that old house but it was still old. They ended up renting it out.

Ed made good money working for United. It was three times what he was making for the police department. They found out that rent was also two times as high as Salt Lake so they had to move further and further away from his job. They rented a little house in Freemont, California. He still had his G.I Bill available so he decided to get his degree in machine technology. He attended Chabot College in Hayward, California for two more years and got his degree. Having that degree gave him more money with United Airlines. Housing costs continued to rise and it was a hour and a half commute into San Francisco so they decided they needed to buy a house. They found a house they liked in Freemont and then the union Ed belonged to went on strike the day they closed on their house.

He got another job as a machinist but he wasn’t making as much money. They eventually called him back to work at United Airlines. He wanted to go back to Utah to live and started thinking that he could transfer if he had a mechanic’s license. By this time they had four children and Carma also wanted to raise her children in Utah. He went back to school for two more years. Ed went to school almost the whole time they lived in California. They had an old VW bus and Carma would pack a cooler full of food for his lunch. Ed would drive to school and take his classes, then he would have his lunch and take a nap in the VW, and then go to work at United.

When he finished that education program, he applied for transfer to Salt Lake but United told him they changed their policy and they were only going to have mechanics at Chicago or San Francisco. They didn’t want to move to Chicago and they were sick of San Francisco so Ed started looking for jobs in Utah. He could fly to Utah cheap for interviews. When he quit the airlines it about killed Carma.

Ed took a job with a company in Salt Lake that ended up going out of business. However, when they sold their home in Freemont they got quite a bit of money for that. Carma’s father Darrall Carter gave them an acre on the North Bench in Lehi but Lehi City wouldn’t let them build on it so they bought a little house at 855 N 1060 E in Lehi.

1 Salt Lake Trade Institute later became Salt Lake Community College.

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After working in Springville for a while, Ed decided he didn’t want to commute anymore and eventually got a job at Fowler Pump working for DeVere “Dee” Fowler in Lehi as a machinist. Ed was very happy working for Dee and was one of two supervisors at Fowler Pump. He gave his all for that company. He worked there for 17 years and after Dee retired Ed quit and went to work for Joe Colledge in Pleasant Grove. Ed really loved working in Joe’s machine shop. He worked for him until he retired at age 65.

They lived on 1060 E for 20 years. Eventually they traded the acre on the bench for an acre behind Carma’s parent’s home and built a home there so Carma could be closer to her parents to care for them as they aged. They continue to live in this home located at 2074 N Center in Lehi.

Ed and Carma are the parents of four children, Mark, Lezlie Gaskey, Tyler, and Scott.

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Lester “Jack” Hansen As interviewed by Judy Hansen

Jack was born to Oliver and Vinnie Hansen on December 1, 1920. He grew up in Bear River City, Box Elder County, Utah. When Jack was 14 (1934), his parents moved to Salem, Oregon. They didn’t stay in Salem long before they moved to Vale, Malheur County, Oregon in 1936. Vale was a farming town and his parents never sent him back to school after they moved so he never graduated High School. It was more important for him to help with the farm. During war the most important thing was food so the farmers had to produce the food for the soldiers.

In the beginning of WWII they had to send soldiers over to the war so when a man reached a certain age he was drafted into the service. Jack was drafted while he was living in Vale November 30, 1945. He went to basic training in Harlingen Air Force Base in Texas. The United States picked him and put him into the United States Army Air Corp (USAAC). They sent him to Keesler Air Field in Biloxi, Mississippi where he attended A & M School. Keesler was a technical basic training center and they sent men there to become airplane and engine mechanics, while others transferred to aerial gunnery or aviation cadet schools. He was in the 3704th AAF Base Unit. Jack said, “It was fascinating to learn all about airplanes and how they worked. We had heard so much about B-17’s, B-24’s, and the Mustang and now we were learning about them.”

While Jack was in taking this training he was the top in the class where his grade was 3.9. He got such good grades they asked him to be an electrical instructor in mechanic school. He taught others about starters, generators, voltage regulators, ignition systems, etc. He received an award for his high grades. He ended up getting his high school equivalency and a couple years of college. He taught his colleagues how to repair the electronics of the airplanes. The airplanes had two of everything on them. Jack taught them how important it was to make sure everything was working, especially the magnetos. He was an instructor there for a little over a year.

The US Army Air Corp sent Jack to England after he left Biloxi. He was assigned to (376th) bomb groupi. Jack was a Flight Engineer which meant he was in the plane guiding them to the target where they should drop the bombs. He was never too worried about being shot down because they would fly so high that the anti-aircraft guns of the enemy couldn’t reach them. They would fly over and drop bombs on Germany’s railroad so they wouldn’t have any way to transport their supplies.

Jack always rode in a B-17 during his missions. There were seven people in the plane; the pilot, co-pilot, bombardier, nose gunner, tail gunner, turret gunner, and flight engineer. They would carry about 20 bombs. He left England once a day to fly to Germany to drop the bombs. It took them a couple hours round trip to complete their mission.

The English didn’t like the American’s very well. They had a saying, “Over-sexed, over-paid, over-here.” Jack didn’t see a lot of the war because he was overhead in the airplanes dropping bombs. They lost a couple planes during the war but they didn’t lose many. There was also some B-24’s but Jack didn’t work on them too much because they just didn’t use them as much.

The engines of the B-17 were air cooled and had 9 pistons. He loves looking at the engines.

Jack was discharged December 30, 1946 then he went back to Vale and started farming but it wasn’t long before he went on an LDS mission to Denmark. Denmark had been occupied by Germany during the war. During the whole war nothing was allowed into Denmark. The only thing they had was what they could produce themselves. They never saw things like an orange at all during the war. They had to follow curfew and be in at a certain time. Everything had to be dark at night. Jack went on his mission to Denmark right after all that had occurred there. He was 27 and served in Esbjerg from 1947-1950.

Jack had met a young lady in Denmark from Løgumkloster and was quite taken by her. After he came home and was released from his mission he returned to Denmark and brought Ruth Seegert back to Vale, Oregon where he married her in 1951. They had three daughters Ingrid, Caroline, and Jacklyn.

Jack divorced Ruth and he later married again. They moved to Lehi in 1974. He divorced his 2nd wife and married Lila Hamilton Cossey in 1983. She passed away in 2010. Jack has remained in Lehi the rest of his life. He is loved by all his neighbors. He has loved to garden and has always left the spoils of his harvest with everyone in the neighborhood.

i There is paperwork that Jack was an instructor. However, his discharge papers do not indicate he was overseas during his service. Jack started having memory problems later in life but stated he was overseas in England during the war on several occasions. He is very detailed about the description. His family does not know if this is accurate but he mentioned years ago before the onset of memory problems that the first time he had seen a television was when he returned to New York City. Walden I. Hayden Casualty of World War II

Walden I. Hayden, husband of Arleen Webb, was born at Hunter, Utah July 7, 1905.

He enlisted in the Navy at the age of 17, and continued in that service until his death, when he was reported missing in action August 1942.

He leaves two children, Ray and Elaine, who are living with their mother in Pleasant Grove.