They served in different wars, in different parts of the world, in different branches of the military, but their message was the same: Be thankful to those who fought so you could live in a free country.
On Monday, 22 veterans were honored at Four Rivers Community School’s annual Veteran’s Day breakfast and ceremony.
After eating with students, the veterans, their families, school staff and students’ relatives went to the school gymnasium, where students performed a sign language interpretation of the Star Spangled Banner, read poems, and sang “Proud to be an American.” Afterward, veterans were invited into classrooms to share their experiences.
Harvey Hatfield of Ontario was drafted into the Army in 1968, spent a year in Vietnam in the 101st Infantry Division, and participated in the Battle of Hamburger Hill, a May 1969 operation pitting U.S. and Army of the Republic of Vietnam forces against forces from the People’s Army of Vietnam. This was a turning point in U.S. involvement in the war, as Hill 937, which was captured by US forces, was seen as having little strategic value and was abandoned shortly after.
Hatfield said he belongs to all three local veteran organizations, and has attended the annual ceremony at Four Rivers Cultural Center for the past several years.
Fruitland’s Bob Swanson was in the Navy from 1967-1971. He was in an aviation company known as the Blue Dragons, and he did maintenance work on aircraft. His company’s “submarine seekers” task was to fly around and search for submarines, as well as keep track of ships entering and leaving port.
He told a group of students that his brothers encouraged him to join the Navy before he got drafted and wouldn’t be able to choose his branch.
“In all four years, I never went on board a ship. My brothers were kind of mad,” he said.
Swanson said his two granddaughters attend Four Rivers School, his son is the athletic director, and his daughter-in-law is a teacher at the school. He has attended this event for three years, and says the kids singing is his favorite part.
Leo Busch of Ontario actively served in the Navy from 1961 to 1967. He had previously been in the reserves, starting in 1953.
“That was the end of the Korean War. They signed the armistice that year,” he said. “My neighbor lost a son in Korea. That influenced my decision to join” the Navy, he said.
When the Berlin Crisis occurred in 1961, he signed on full-time to the Navy. He was a pilot based in Pensacola, Florida, and said after one hurricane, he and his flight crew delivered aid to Nicaragua. After breaking his eardrum in a training accident, he was no longer allowed to fly, and was later discharged.
Busch said he has grandsons at the school, and has attended the event for three years.
“I was the oldest private in my platoon,” David Lucero of Nyssa told the children.
He said he had always wanted to join the military, but once he was old enough, he had met a woman and didn’t want to leave her. Then, at 29, he decided the time was right. He said there were six children in his family; three joined the Army and two were Marines. Lucero chose the Army, and served for nine years, shooting a Howitzer.
Nyssa’s Newell Cleaver followed in his father’s footsteps when he joined the military. Cleaver, who served in the Air Force, said his father served in the Infantry during WWII “when they pushed the German Army out of Rome.”
Cleaver said military service is never far from his mind, largely because of a friendship his father struck with another man in his unit, Newell Phillips. Their friendship was so strong, that each of the men agreed to name their firstborn son after the other.
Shortly after leaving Rome, Phillips was severely injured. Cleaver’s father Lloyd carried Phillips out of danger, but he died in Cleaver’s arms. The following day, Lloyd Cleaver was seriously injured, and spent four months in the hospital. When he returned home, he married and had four daughters and one son, whom he named after his Infantry buddy.
Wendell Pabst attended the assembly for the first time this year. He served in the US Air Force from 1970 to 1974, during the Vietnam War. As his parents’ only son, he was given special consideration, and not sent into combat.
His job during the Cuban Missile Crisis was “on the front lines, without seeing the front.” He worked at a missile silo in Tucson, Arizona, assigned to guard the missile, doing 24 hour shifts.
“It was a 110-foot-long missile” which, if deployed, would reach Vietnam from the north. He asked a student volunteer, Eric Rojas-Gonzalez, to assist him in showing the United States and Vietnam on a globe.
One of the younger attendees, Jeremiah Lopez, was an Army Infantryman on the front lines. He joined the Army at 17, and was sent to Georgia for boot camp, and then to Germany. Within two weeks, he was in Iraq. This was 2003. He then was sent back to Germany, to Afghanistan, to Texas as a recruiter, and then back to Germany.
“We love Germany,” he said. One of his daughters is a student in Germany, and another is in the Army, stationed in Germany.
The last time he was sent to Afghanistan, “I got blown up.” He lost his high-pitch hearing, and was discharged after 18 years in the Army, including 14 in Germany.
Devon Knutson was in an Army artillery howitzer battalion from 1961-1964. He was stationed in Germany during the Bay of Pigs, and explained to the students a little about the attempt to put a missile silo on Cuba.
“I got out in ’64,” he said. “Vietnam was really starting to swing in ’64. I was lucky.”
