Liberty Belle
Well-known member
This story was in the Rapid City Journal yesterday. Harold Thune's son John, our senator from SD, is one of my heroes and from this article it's easy to see where he came by his patriotism:
Vet shys from 'hero' label
5-29-06
Harold Thune asked me not to use the "H" word in this column.
It was one of the last things he said during a 45-minute telephone interview Friday afternoon about his battle-zone experiences in World War II.
"If you're writing anything down about a hero status, you scratch it," he said.
This came from a former Navy pilot who shot down four Japanese Zeros and damaged two more during a furious dogfight in the skies over Formosa in 1944. He's the same guy who landed his Grumman F6F Hellcat on temporary landing mats laid on beaches in the Philippines and walked away from a fiery crash after his plane blew a tire on take-off, clipped a coral boulder along a make-shift runaway and exploded.
Then, left for dead by a squadron on the move, he dragged himself from the wreckage, found his way to medical care, had his burns bandaged, bummed a ride back to his unit on an admiral's plane, shocked his squadron commander by appearing at his tent alive and simply resumed his service to country.
Sorry, Harold, but "hero" is a hard word to avoid.
Like so many of his generation, Harold Thune doesn't hide from the word. But he doesn't embrace it, either. It makes him more than a bit uncomfortable, as if the mere mention of heroics might turn him into some Audie Murphy wannabe.
Harold believes he served his country, as did so many others, and was lucky enough to come home alive. In Murdo and towns like it, that's just doing your job.
"I didn't go through near what lots of people did," he said. "And of course, there were those who lost their lives. Somebody said 'war is hell,' and it is."
Today, the 86-year-old father of U.S. Sen. John Thune will represent the generation that knew the hell of World War II during Memorial Day services at the Murdo cemetery south of town. There will be an avenue of flags, an honor guard and a rifle salute "with the rifles that still work. Some of them do and some of them don't," Harold said, chuckling.
But there won't be any misfires in his memory. Harold Thune remembers the war, its horrors and its triumphs in remarkable detail. And today, when he thinks of his own heroes, they will be the men he knew who fought and died for their country.
"I had a couple of very close buddies who were lost," he said. "We had 54 pilots in my fighter squadron, operating in the Philippines area. We lost 12 of the 54, and some of them were very good friends."
It happens quickly in war, as it did that day in October of 1944, over the Island of Formosa, which later became Taiwan. Thune was in his Hellcat as part of an advance fighter sweep hunting enemy military installations on the ground and strafing them with their wing-mounted, 50-caliber machine guns.
"We saw an airstrip below and planes down there, so we started in on that. We didn't know they had fighters sitting up in the clouds above us," Thune said. "As soon as they came out, we got into quite a dogfight. Somebody sees them and hollers 'here come bogeys' on the radio, and away you go."
Most of the action was over in 10 or 15 minutes, Thune said. Although initially surprised by the diving Zeros, the fast-and-maneuverable Hellcats from several aircraft carriers soon took the offensive and shot down 22 Zeros.
"There's a lot of action real quick. And the tide turns pretty quickly in those situations," he said. "We lost four pilots. I'm not sure about the other carriers."
The battle was the most deadly skirmish of the war for Thune. It's one of the stories his son, the senator, likes to tell with both pride and amazement - and more often, perhaps, than his dad would prefer.
"John shouldn't talk so much," Harold said.
It took years and some serious prodding from his five children to persuade Harold to reveal some of the more dramatic details of his military experience.
"He never volunteers that kind of stuff. My brothers and I sort of decided to get that stuff out of him," John Thune said. "They're real reticent, that generation. It was like, 'We did our duty,' and that's that."
When Harold's tour of duty ended, he returned to Murdo with his wife, Pat. They intended to help with the family hardware store "for a while" and then maybe move to Pat's hometown of Minneapolis and see how they liked it there.
"But we never got out of town," Harold said
It wasn't for lack of options. His war experience left open possibilities in the military. And his years of playing basketball for the University of Minnesota gave him useful connections in the Twin Cities.
But Harold doesn't regret the decision to stay in Murdo, where he worked in the hardware store, taught school and helped Pat raise five children and only occasionally talked about the war.
"A small town like this it's a good place to live," he said. "It's a good place to raise kids."
It's a good place to raise heroes, too, even when they won't admit that's what they are.
Contact Kevin Woster at 394-8413 or [email protected].
http://rapidcityjournal.com/articles/2006/05/30/news/columns/918higbee.txt
Vet shys from 'hero' label
5-29-06
Harold Thune asked me not to use the "H" word in this column.
It was one of the last things he said during a 45-minute telephone interview Friday afternoon about his battle-zone experiences in World War II.
"If you're writing anything down about a hero status, you scratch it," he said.
This came from a former Navy pilot who shot down four Japanese Zeros and damaged two more during a furious dogfight in the skies over Formosa in 1944. He's the same guy who landed his Grumman F6F Hellcat on temporary landing mats laid on beaches in the Philippines and walked away from a fiery crash after his plane blew a tire on take-off, clipped a coral boulder along a make-shift runaway and exploded.
Then, left for dead by a squadron on the move, he dragged himself from the wreckage, found his way to medical care, had his burns bandaged, bummed a ride back to his unit on an admiral's plane, shocked his squadron commander by appearing at his tent alive and simply resumed his service to country.
Sorry, Harold, but "hero" is a hard word to avoid.
Like so many of his generation, Harold Thune doesn't hide from the word. But he doesn't embrace it, either. It makes him more than a bit uncomfortable, as if the mere mention of heroics might turn him into some Audie Murphy wannabe.
Harold believes he served his country, as did so many others, and was lucky enough to come home alive. In Murdo and towns like it, that's just doing your job.
"I didn't go through near what lots of people did," he said. "And of course, there were those who lost their lives. Somebody said 'war is hell,' and it is."
Today, the 86-year-old father of U.S. Sen. John Thune will represent the generation that knew the hell of World War II during Memorial Day services at the Murdo cemetery south of town. There will be an avenue of flags, an honor guard and a rifle salute "with the rifles that still work. Some of them do and some of them don't," Harold said, chuckling.
But there won't be any misfires in his memory. Harold Thune remembers the war, its horrors and its triumphs in remarkable detail. And today, when he thinks of his own heroes, they will be the men he knew who fought and died for their country.
"I had a couple of very close buddies who were lost," he said. "We had 54 pilots in my fighter squadron, operating in the Philippines area. We lost 12 of the 54, and some of them were very good friends."
It happens quickly in war, as it did that day in October of 1944, over the Island of Formosa, which later became Taiwan. Thune was in his Hellcat as part of an advance fighter sweep hunting enemy military installations on the ground and strafing them with their wing-mounted, 50-caliber machine guns.
"We saw an airstrip below and planes down there, so we started in on that. We didn't know they had fighters sitting up in the clouds above us," Thune said. "As soon as they came out, we got into quite a dogfight. Somebody sees them and hollers 'here come bogeys' on the radio, and away you go."
Most of the action was over in 10 or 15 minutes, Thune said. Although initially surprised by the diving Zeros, the fast-and-maneuverable Hellcats from several aircraft carriers soon took the offensive and shot down 22 Zeros.
"There's a lot of action real quick. And the tide turns pretty quickly in those situations," he said. "We lost four pilots. I'm not sure about the other carriers."
The battle was the most deadly skirmish of the war for Thune. It's one of the stories his son, the senator, likes to tell with both pride and amazement - and more often, perhaps, than his dad would prefer.
"John shouldn't talk so much," Harold said.
It took years and some serious prodding from his five children to persuade Harold to reveal some of the more dramatic details of his military experience.
"He never volunteers that kind of stuff. My brothers and I sort of decided to get that stuff out of him," John Thune said. "They're real reticent, that generation. It was like, 'We did our duty,' and that's that."
When Harold's tour of duty ended, he returned to Murdo with his wife, Pat. They intended to help with the family hardware store "for a while" and then maybe move to Pat's hometown of Minneapolis and see how they liked it there.
"But we never got out of town," Harold said
It wasn't for lack of options. His war experience left open possibilities in the military. And his years of playing basketball for the University of Minnesota gave him useful connections in the Twin Cities.
But Harold doesn't regret the decision to stay in Murdo, where he worked in the hardware store, taught school and helped Pat raise five children and only occasionally talked about the war.
"A small town like this it's a good place to live," he said. "It's a good place to raise kids."
It's a good place to raise heroes, too, even when they won't admit that's what they are.
Contact Kevin Woster at 394-8413 or [email protected].
http://rapidcityjournal.com/articles/2006/05/30/news/columns/918higbee.txt
