The Ghost Mountain Boys - James E. Campbell [171]
At some point, as they near the end of their lives, some of the veterans of the Buna and Sanananda campaign made the brave choice not to die with their memories, but to break the silence with which they have lived for so long. I am thankful for their stories. I hope this book is a tribute to them.
I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to a variety of people and sources from Wisconsin and Michigan to Washington, D.C., to Australia and Papua New Guinea. First and foremost, I would like to thank the men of Muskegon, Michigan’s Company G: Carl Stenberg, Stanley Jastrzembski, Russell Buys, Samuel DiMaggio, Don Stout, Ferrell “Bing” Bower, and Don Ritter, who has since passed away. I would also like to thank a group of veterans from the Grand Rapids, Michigan, area whose input helped me immeasurably: Bob Hartman, Carl Smestad, Martin Bolt, Erwin Veneklase, Jack Hill, Wellington Homminga, Frank Jakubowski, Steve Janicki, Ed Szudzik, Russ Prince, and Delbert Rector. Thanks also to Bill Sikkel of Holland, Michigan, and Ray Bailey of Green Bay, Wisconsin, who proved to be veritable fountains of information, and to Frank Stobbe of Berlin, Wisconsin, who even at ninety-five has a knack for telling a good story, and to Phil Ishio for his insights into what it was like to be a Japanese-American translator at Buna.
There are many other veterans of the New Guinea campaign whom I had the good fortune to interview. Although their names may not appear in this book, I relied on them to tell this story: Irving Hall, Alan Strege, Roy Gormanson, John Laska, Glen Rice, John Serio, Gordon Zuverink, Edward Doyle, Hilding Peterson, W. Lewis Evans, Harold Leitz, Dewey Hill, Robert Mallon, Don North, Don Ryan, Lyle Hougan, Roy “Soup” Campbell, Robert Johnson, Ed Cox, Ernest Gerber, and Walter Gerber, and to Bill Barnes, Charles “Red” Lawler, and Lawrence Chester Dennis, who have also passed away since I began the book.
The Ghost Mountain Boys, in a sense, is a collaboration. Without the help of so many people, many of them family members of New Guinea veterans or of men who perished there, this book would have been impossible to write. Thanks so much to Bill and Joyce Boice who, in 2001, made their own brave journey to Buna to see where Bill’s father, Captain Jim Boice, died in battle; to Jerry and Alice Smith, Al and Dave Medendorp, Harry Keast, who lost his father at Sanananda, and Alice Brahm; to Angeline and J. P. DiMaggio, Paulette and Rick Lutjens, Wendell Trogdon, George Pravda, Art Edson Jr., Joanne Steenstra, Cornelius Warmenhoven, Walter Hunt and Amy Hunt, Katherine Schmidt-McConnell, Lloyd Fish, Terry Shima at the Japanese American Veterans Association (JAVA), Sandy Cochran, Susie and Tamar Walllace, Evelyn French, Walt and Pam McVeigh, Al Wiesner, Doc Sartell, Don White and the 32nd Division Old-timers gang, Lieutenant Colonel Tim Donovan, Robert Frankenstein, Bert Ramirez, Scott Renkema, Frank Boring, and lastly Katherine (Bailey) Mathews for her strength and grace, and Ann Holman and Muriel Joldersma for their courage.
A world of thanks to Abbie Norderhaug and the superb staff at the Wisconsin Veterans Museum, whom I have relied on for the last three and a half years. And to Kenneth Schlessinger of the National Archives and Bill McKellin at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. Thanks also to writer-historian Tom Doherty, who very generously offered his notes, research, and expertise, and his insights into the campaign and some of its participants.
I am indebted to author-historian Mary Ellen Condon-Rall for her help in portraying the situation faced by the 32nd Division’s medical staff. Thanks also to Major Lewis Barger in the office of the Army Surgeon General.
Thanks to Sarah Beyer-Kelly, National Public Radio’s Weekend Edition Saturday producer, and host Scott