1911
A great blow to all classmates is the news of the death of Rath Sprague, who died suddenly of a heart attack just before Christmas. A quiet, loyal, and interested member of the class, we pay respect to him and send deep sympathy from all to his widow and daughters.
Ed Pearson, John's son, Si/c Fire Control Operator USN, has passed the training in his specialty with the highest honors in his class and has been assigned to the Pacific area.
Dick Backus has returned from his assignment in Europe as a navigator of a bomber and after a furlough with Mother and Dad in Webster, N. Y., has been assigned to a field in Texas where he is teaching navigation. His sister Priscilla has recently become a member of the WAC and is in training in Georgia.
Rollie and Ruth Hastings are now resigned to running their ranch alone since their last daughter has married a Harvard man and left the family hearth.
Lt. Col. Fred C. Eaton Jr. continues to make his parents proud. He has recently been awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for leading a Fortress group in a successful raid on Germany last July 19, despite being seriously wounded. Fred is now Assistant Operations Officer of the 15th Air Force in Italy. On this occasion he ordered all other planes in the formation to land before his co-pilot brought his damaged plane to a landing. At last account, he had completed 101 missions in addition to his service against the Japanese in the Pacific. In addition to the Distinguished Service Cross, he has been awarded the Silver Star three times and holds the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Air Medal with several Oak Leaf Clusters, the Purple Heart, and five Presidential Citations, three received with the 193d Bombardment Group in the Pacific and two with the 301st Bombardment in Italy. His brother John is a fighter pilot and now ready for action in the Pacific. The youngest boy Austin has just received his gunnery wings and will take advanced bombardier training.
From what is considered a source of reliable nformation, we have heard that Captain Larry Odlin has retired from active duty in the Navy. However, this source was unable to state what Larry's plans for the future are.
For some time the Log Jacksons have made New Boston, N. H., their permanent home. Now it appears they have named the place "Four Winds Farm."
Recently a program of the presentation of the Army-Navy E Production Award to the employees of The Buckeye Traction Ditcher Co., Findlay, Ohio, was received, accompanied by the richly engraved card of Jonathan Edwards Ingersoll, Director of Industrial Relations.
The Hawkridge boys are now all in the Service. Ed has been assigned to the Gunnery School at the Naval Base in Washington, D. C„ where he is receiving training for gunnery officer, following sixteen months in the Pacific. Allen is in the Army and assigned to some spot in India. Bob has just started his training in the Air Corps.
The Troy Parkers are back in Chicago for the winter, taking up their former residence at 1117 North Dearborn St.
The Les Waldrons, who left Washington so that Les could take up his new assignment with the Dayton Rubber Manufacturing Co., may be reached c/o Box 136, Delmont, Pa.
Jack Coggins keeps us well posted on the doings of his family. He continues to withstand the rigors of Army life at Pratt Field in Kansas, and, in fact, hasn't lost a day in four and one third years of war-time service. Young Jack is a first lieutenant, has the Air Cross and a Presidential Citation for Normandy, and as navigator of a C-47 was active in D-Day operations. At D-Day time he made three trips, one from England to Normandy, another from Italy to Riviera, and the third from England to Holland. Marjorie is a lieutenant stationed in England and France, and Barbara, also a lieutenant, rides a 600-bed hospital ship touching Mediterranean ports. Here are a few more' paragraphs from Jim Mathes' letters, which we shall continue to include from month to month:
The war has suddenly become very real. We've been in on history, and man has a damn-fool way of making history.
We patrol "somewhere in- the English Channel. " This morning we played crash boat—the plane—a paratrooper job—(1000's have been going over and coming back a hundred feet or so over our heads) went down just as we got to the scene, but all the crew were safe in their rubber boat. We took them aboard, and I treated a slight arm wound on one. Then we transferred them to a larger naval vessel. They were so grateful. They tried to give us whatever they had.
We left station again to go alongside a "sweep", which had just hit a mine. She was a mass of tangled wreckage, broken in two and barely hanging together. She was burning and sank ten minutes after we left her. We took off forty-two men in various wounded stages. We picked several men out of the water first. I went over the side to get one of them. We boarded the sweep and carried off a good third of the forty-two men. (We must have got about half the crew—another ship got the rest). A couple I saw weren't worth bothering with. We gave morphine. I bandaged and sprinkled sulfa—and there were some awful holes I sprinkled. We got them all onto a hospital ship—skippered by a Dartmouth man, Larry Gilbert, and the Navy doctor aboard, Doc Lynch, was even a Dartmouth classmate.
I'm quite contented. I'm grateful that we saved men today instead of killing men. I even got the ship's cat off safely—poor, dazed, wet thing. She had a little cut on her neck. This war must accomplish a great deal to compensate for the suffering I've seen this day. I don't think it can counterbalance the evil within it.
Secretary, Harvard Hall, Apt. 705 1650 Harvard St., N. W., Washington, D. C.
Treasurer, 631 Walden Road, Winnetka, Ill.
