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| Clarence Wolf Guts, the last Lakota code talker. Photo by Bernie Hunhoff. |
Clarence Wolf Guts was not the sort of hero who capitalized on his exploits; he never wrote any books or ran for office, and you could count his speaking appearances on one hand. When we met him in 2007, he was living almost as simply as he did when he was a boy on the Rosebud Reservation in the 1920s.
Much about Clarence Wolf Guts is confusing, beginning with his name. He didn’t know what he was called when he was born on Feb. 26, 1924 in the Red Leaf community on the Rosebud Reservation of south-central South Dakota. His birth certificate listed him as Eagle Elk, but his father and uncles soon decided to give him a more unusual name — Wolf Guts.
He learned Lakota from his grandfather, Hawk Ghost, and his grandmother, Hazel Medicine Owl.”My grandfather taught me the facts of life and the Lakota language,” he said.”He told me ‘you’ll go to school and stay in school.’ But he also said to speak Indian because ‘you’ll need it later in life.'”
He and a cousin, Iver Crow Eagle, left the boarding school they attended in St. Francis in the eleventh grade to fight in World War II.”I didn’t know if I could make the physical in Omaha,” he said.”I had a perforated ear drum. I guess a bug got in there when I was a little kid. My grandmother took tweezers and pulled the bug out, and hurt my ear drum.”
But it was 1942, and the U.S. Army wasn’t fussy. The cousins were assigned to hand-to-hand combat training in Tennessee, desert exercises in Arizona, and finally to Ranger training at Camp Rucker in Alabama.
Wolf Guts recalled with considerable detail the day he became an important player in the war effort. A captain came to his barracks and asked,”You talk Indian?”
“I am Indian. One hundred percent Indian.”
“Well, the general wants to see you.”
“Me?” wondered Clarence.”What in the world did I do now?”
The captain told him to get a haircut, take a shower and dress in his best clothes. He also offered tips on military etiquette: stand two feet from the general, salute, say your name, rank and serial number. Then he and the captain went to see the general.”Sir, this is Clarence Wolf Guts from South Dakota,” said the captain.”He talks Indian.”
Major General Paul Mueller, commander of the U.S. Army’s 81st Infantry, poured glasses of whiskey for the three of them, and told Clarence he wanted a man-to-man talk –“none of this ‘sir’ or ‘general.’ Just talk to me like a man.”
“Can you speak Indian fluently?” the general asked. Clarence said he could”read, write and speak the Lakota Sioux language.” Satisfied, the general explained that the Japanese were intercepting vital communications, and he intended to confuse them by sending messages in a Native American language.
Clarence told the general,”I don’t want no rank, I don’t want no money. I just want to do what I can to protect America and our way of life.”
“I’ve never seen or met an Indian before,” the general said.”You guys were first in this country?”
“Yes, supposedly we were,” replied Clarence.
Gen. Mueller said he liked his spunk. Then he asked if he knew of any other soldiers who spoke Lakota. Clarence said his cousin, Iver, was also at Camp Rucker, whereupon Gen. Mueller exclaimed,”I hit the jackpot!”
Two other Lakota from South Dakota — Roy Bad Hand and Benny White Bear — were also recruited. The four learned how to operate military radios, and they worked with officials to develop coded messages. They developed a phonetic alphabet and assigned military meanings to common words like turtle, tree or horse. Their communications helped the army to move troops and supplies without tipping off the enemy.
Clarence Wolf Guts, just by the good fortune of staying alive, became one of the most acclaimed WWII vets in South Dakota.
Clarence was Gen. Mueller’s personal code talker and traveled with him and the 81st as the division moved from island to island in the Pacific, headed for Japan. Iver accompanied the general’s chief of staff. Even though they had special protection — two bodyguards were assigned to each code talker — Clarence still shakes when he thinks of the bullets, mortars and bombs.
Frustrated by a language they didn’t know, the Japanese made special efforts to find the code talkers. Some code talkers in other units later said that if their outfit was overrun, the bodyguards were expected to shoot the code talkers to prevent their capture by the enemy. Clarence and Iver never spoke of that, but they had enough to worry about.
“How will we ever survive this?” Iver asked Clarence on a particularly harrowing day.
Clarence replied,”There is a God. He is protecting us.”
Thoughts of the Rosebud Reservation provided some comfort.”I always wondered if they had food on the table, if they’re dancing, if they’re remembering us,” he said.
Clarence started to drink heavily in the army.”We went to war and war is hell,” he said.”All I can say is we went to hell and back.” He and many others found at least temporary relief in the bottle.”It’s easier that way to take another man’s life,” he said.
As radio operators, they had access to another avenue of escape.”We could tune in the radio to the U.S. and get western music from San Francisco,” said the old soldier.”We could hear You Are My Sunshine and Chattanooga Choo Choo.”
They even got some kicks while on duty. Clarence started laughing one day while transmitting a message to Iver.”Are you laughing at me?” asked Iver.”No, I’m laughing at the Japanese who are trying to listen to us,” Clarence said in Lakota.
Decades later, a Japanese general admitted that his country’s top cryptographers couldn’t decipher the code talkers’ language. When told it was Native American he replied,”Thank you. That is a puzzle I thought would never be solved.”
When the war ended, Clarence and about a dozen other Lakota code talkers returned to the reservation. They were not welcomed home with parades or programs, but he and a few soldiers held their own party, dancing and singing a song of thanks that they’d learned from Indian elders. Asked about it many years later, he said the dance of thanks wasn’t for the dancers.”We did it for our people and the people of the United States of America. It was for them, and for the people of the world, because if the Japanese ever took over the world, we would be dead.”
Code talkers from other Indian tribes were asked to not talk about their unique roles in the war, perhaps because the U.S. military thought it was a trick worth saving. All written reports about the code talkers were classified. Clarence didn’t remember being told to keep his service record a secret, but he and his fellow Lakota soldiers, happy to be home on the Rosebud Reservation, told no one. They didn’t think of their services as particularly heroic. Like many veterans, they tried to forget.
“I wanted to be a rodeo man,” he said. I rode three bulls, and then I said ‘I’ll stick to horses.’ Those bulls can kill you.” He was a bronc rider at rodeos in Valentine, Gordon, Rapid City, White River, Fort Pierre and other West River cow towns.
He earned $100 on a good weekend, but spent it on alcohol and gas to get to the next rodeo. In 1949 he broke his ankle at Cody, Neb. and soon retired from the arena. A year later he married Allgenia Brown. They had two daughters and a son before divorcing in 1959.
He worked on farms and ranches, on or near the reservation. Heavy drinking kept him from accomplishing very much; and it also caused his greatest sorrow. He attributes both of his daughter’s deaths to alcohol, and he says many of his other relatives suffer from alcoholism.
But his life took a turn when the silence surrounding the role of the code talkers was lifted. It began when the military declassified official information about its linguistic trickery. Then Max Collins wrote a book, Wind Talkers, about two Navajo code talkers. The book became a hit movie in 2002. The U.S. Congress awarded congressional gold and silver medals to the Navajo soldiers, and the story spread. Over a hundred code talkers were identified from 17 tribes. Unfortunately, by then almost all the other code talkers had died. Clarence Wolf Guts, just by the good fortune of staying alive, became one of the most acclaimed WWII vets in South Dakota.
He received an honorary degree from Oglala Lakota College. He rode in the Rapid City American Legion parade, traveled to Oklahoma City as a special guest at the opening of a traveling exhibit on the code talkers, spoke at the American Indian Veterans Conference in Wisconsin and was honored at a national WWII conference in New Orleans where he was given a red, white and blue”flag” shirt.
South Dakota’s congressional delegation — Senators Tim Johnson and John Thune, and Rep. Stephanie Herseth — introduced a bill to award him and the other forgotten code talkers the Congresional Gold Medal. Clarence traveled to Washington with the South Dakota Indian leaders, including Don Lowdner, the national commander of the American Indian Veterans Association of the United States, to testify for the legislation.
Clarence looked as uncomfortable at the senate committee hearing as the senators would look riding a bucking horse. His dark face was wrinkled and creased. His legs were so cramped that he could hardly stand. His hair was white and scruffy. Still, he spoke simple, heartfelt words to the lawmakers.”I am a full-blood Indian, and we do whatever we can to protect the United States because we love America,” he said.”Nobody can ever take that away from us.”
Editor’s Note: In 2008, the Code Talkers Recognition Act was passed, honoring all Native Americans who used their native language to aid communications in World War II. Clarence Wolf Guts died June 16, 2010, at the age of 86.
This story is revised from the May/June 2007 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call 800-456-5117.
Missile silos were once buried under South Dakota’s short grass prairie west of the Missouri River. They housed 150 Minuteman II warheads that could have streaked 15,000 miles per hour over the North Pole and into the Soviet Union if the super powers had fought a nuclear war.
As it happened, the silos were deterrents, and curiosities for ranchers and passers-by. Only one was ever launched; a 7-second test flight near Newell resulted in the missile landing harmlessly in a field. South Dakota’s missiles were deactivated when the cold war ended in 1991. Most were destroyed, but the National Park Service preserved one silo and one control center near Badlands National Park as the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site.
Visitors can peer into the underground silo and see the control room where two-member teams worked 24-hour shifts. Surely all the little red buttons have been disconnected, but be careful just in case. Headquarters is along Highway 240 — the Badlands Loop Scenic Byway — at Interstate 90 exit 131.
Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the March/April 2010 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a copy or to subscribe, call 800-456-5117.
Jack Thurman remembers the photograph as if it were taken yesterday. He was standing on the slope of Mount Suribachi on the Japanese island of Iwo Jima. It was the 25th or 26th of February, 1945. American forces were in the heat of a battle with the Japanese for control of the small island about 650 miles south of Tokyo. As a member of the United States Marine Corps’ 5th Division, 27th Regiment, Thurman had volunteered to help the 28th Regiment secure the mountain. They had been on Iwo Jima since the 19th. They were making progress.
On the 23rd a group of Marines made it to the top of Mount Suribachi and hoisted an American flag. A few days later, Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal gathered those soldiers again for another photo around the flag. One of them noticed Thurman standing a few yards down the mountain and invited him up. After the photo was taken, the soldiers returned to the fight and Rosenthal left with another good war picture. In this one the soldiers were jubilant. Some held their helmets in the air. Others raised their guns. Rosenthal was able to identify everyone except one man — Thurman.
For more than 55 years, the smiling young Marine standing on the far left side of the photo was identified only as”unknown.” But his name is no longer a mystery. After years of silence, Thurman identified himself as the only unknown soldier in that image from Iwo Jima.
Thurman, the oldest of 15 children, grew up on a dairy farm outside of Mitchell. He remembers”a lot of hard work,” milking cows and farming with a team of horses (Thurman’s father finally bought a tractor in 1939). He rode a horse to country school before enrolling at Notre Dame School in Mitchell.
When the United States entered World War II in December 1941, thousands of young men across the country clamored to join the military. Thurman was no different. When he was 17, he told his family he wanted to enlist, but his father wouldn’t sign the necessary paperwork, saying he needed him on the farm. So Thurman waited until Sept. 27, 1943, his 18th birthday. He walked into the recruiter’s office in Mitchell and joined the Marine Corps.
“As I looked over my right shoulder, I saw that flag going up…it was the most beautiful thing I ever saw in my life.”
After training at Fort Snelling, Minn., and San Diego, Thurman became a member of Carlson’s Raiders in the South Pacific. In early 1945, Thurman found himself on a ship heading west from Hawaii. Only after a few days at sea did the Marines find out they were headed for Iwo Jima. As they approached the island they saw nearly constant gun flashes along the horizon.”We were all thinking to ourselves, ‘How can anything survive on that island with that kind of an attack?'” Thurman recalled.
On Feb. 19 the 5th Division’s 26th, 27th and 28th regiments landed on the southern coast of Iwo Jima. Thurman remembers chills running down his spine as he stepped over dead Japanese soldiers lying on the black sands of Iwo Jima’s beach.”We didn’t know what to expect,” he says.
The 28th Regiment was assigned to take Mount Suribachi, an inactive volcano on the southern tip of the island. The 26th and Thurman’s 27th Regiment were to take an airstrip that sat just a few hundred yards northeast of Mount Suribachi. The Marines set to work, firing on foxholes and rooting out Japanese soldiers, many of whom were hidden within 11 miles of tunnels.
While Thurman and other members of his regiment fought the Japanese on the ground, the 28th Regiment started its slow ascent up Mount Suribachi. On Feb. 21 the men had nearly surrounded the base of the mountain and started to climb. At a little after 10 a.m., on the morning of the 23rd, as Thurman was fighting in the middle of the airstrip, a soldier noticed activity on the mountaintop. Marines had reached the summit and were raising a flag.”As I looked over my right shoulder, I saw that flag going up,” Thurman said.”It was the most beautiful thing I ever saw in my life. The ocean breeze hit it and the flag itself unfurled. It was just a beautiful thing up there. And there were a few of us who had some tears in our eyes, because we lost a lot of men between the 19th of February and the 23rd of February. We lost a lot of men, so we weren’t ashamed to shed a tear.”
Marine Corps photographer Lou Lowery captured the first flag raising. A few hours later, another group of Marines reached the top of the mountain with a larger flag. As they took the smaller one down and hoisted the bigger flag into place, Rosenthal snapped a picture. The image, which was given the title”Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima,” won a Pulitzer Prize and became one of the most reproduced photos of the war.
Thurman was a bit hesitant days later when that soldier from the 28th Regiment invited him into Rosenthal’s group photo.”I said, ‘Well I’m 27th Regiment.’ And he said, ‘That makes no difference. You’re still one of us.’ Well, that sounded pretty good to me,” Thurman said,”so I went up.”
Thurman is standing directly behind Ira Hayes, one of the six men immortalized in Rosenthal’s flag-raising photo. John Bradley, Franklin Sousey and Mike Strank–three other soldiers from the flag raising–are also in the photo. As the only man who was not a member of the 28th Regiment, Thurman became the only unidentified soldier.
Many of the men standing alongside Thurman, including Sousley and Strank, were killed days later as the Japanese continued their attempt to hold Iwo Jima. The fighting continued until American forces finally secured the island on March 26, 1945. Thurman left Iwo Jima that same day.
In a few months the war was over. Thurman came back to the United States and bounced around the West Coast looking for work before coming back to South Dakota. He had a number of jobs in Mitchell, Aberdeen and Rapid City before he and his wife, Carol, headed for San Diego. It was there that he was introduced to drafting and embarked upon a career in architecture. He finally settled down in Boulder, Colo., where he designed many of the buildings on the University of Colorado campus.
After years of silence, Thurman identified himself as the only unknown soldier in that image of Iwo Jima.
For more than 30 years after the war Thurman remained silent about what he had experienced.”I just didn’t particularly care to talk about it,” he said.”It was hard for me to hold back my emotions when I got into the real messy part.” In the late 1970s, though, Thurman was invited to speak at a Denver-area Kiwanis Club. Since then he has been open about his war experiences and has written a book detailing his military career.
The country was re-introduced to Iwo Jima in 2000 with the publication of Flags of Our Fathers. Written by John Bradley’s son James, the book chronicles the lives of the six men who raised the flag on Iwo Jima. The picture of those men from the 28th Regiment, plus an unknown Marine, gathered on Mount Suribachi is included in a section of photographs from the battle.
After the book came out, Thurman’s family members and friends were sure they knew the unidentified soldier.”People in the family were calling me asking ‘Isn’t that you in that picture?'” By saying yes, Thurman finally ended a half-century of mystery.
In 2006 Clint Eastwood turned Flags of Our Fathers into a movie. Thurman saw the film in Denver with a host of other Iwo Jima veterans. Shortly before Christmas that year, Thurman met Lt. Keith Wells, the platoon leader whose men were charged with putting the flag on Mount Suribachi.
“So you’re the guy in that picture?” Wells asked.
“Yes, sir,” Thurman said.
“We’ve been wondering who in the hell that guy is,” Wells said.”We could not figure out who he was. We’ve got a name for everybody but that one.”
“Well,” Thurman answered, with a laugh,”I’m the lone ranger.”
Editor’s Note: This story is revised from the March/April 2008 issue of South Dakota Magazine. To order a back issue or to subscribe, call 800-456-5117.
Think of the Civil War and what comes to mind? We all learned about Bull Run, Vicksburg, Gettysburg, Antietam, Shiloh and Robert E. Lee’s final surrender at Appomattox Courthouse. But are you familiar with the Battle of Whitestone Hill? The Battle of Killdeer Mountain? The Battle of the Badlands?
They aren’t as prominent in Civil War history because they didn’t directly affect the outcome of the conflict. But they are important here because all three battles took place in Dakota Territory and greatly affected how this region was settled.
We’re in the midst of commemorating the 150th anniversary of the Civil War as well as the 150th anniversary of the Dakota Uprising in Minnesota (another important regional clash during the Civil War period). To discuss Dakota Territory’s role in the war that divided our nation for four years, a series of programs is planned around the state beginning this weekend and continuing through the fall.
“Back East it was the Civil War. Out here on the Northern Plains it was a whole different situation,” says Brad Tennant, an associate professor of history at Presentation College in Aberdeen and discussion leader for a portion of the series. “I think it’s often overlooked.”
The first tragic event was the Dakota War of 1862, which ended with the executions of 38 Dakota warriors, the largest mass execution in U.S. history. Following the uprising in September 1863, the military dispatched Gen. Alfred Sully up the Missouri River through Dakota Territory in pursuit of hostiles who had fled Minnesota. He found an encampment at Whitestone Hill, about 80 miles northwest of Aberdeen. Sully’s troops murdered nearly 300 Yanktonais, Dakota, Hunkpapa Lakota and Blackfeet. As it happened, none had been involved in the Minnesota conflict.”It’s North Dakota’s counterpart to Wounded Knee,” Tennant explains.
The next clash between Sully and the Indians came at Killdeer Mountain in June 1864. More than 1,600 warriors fought Sully’s force of 2,200 men. Estimates range from 31 to 150 Sioux warriors killed, compared to five U.S. Army soldiers. The Battle of the Badlands followed in August 1864 near Medora, with another 100 to 300 Indians killed.
Not surprisingly Dakota Territory promoters had a difficult time convincing Easterners to settle on the Plains. Tennant cited a study by former University of South Dakota professor Thomas Gasque that found only three South Dakota cities with a population greater than 1,000 possessing a name of Indian origin: Sisseton, Yankton and Sioux Falls.”That’s not just a coincidence,” Tennant notes.”Most of our places were named after people or geographic features, simply to make it sound less Indian, and to convince Easterners that the territory was not as hostile as they may have been led to believe.”
There’s much more to learn about the Civil War period in Dakota Territory at these upcoming discussion sessions.
Aug. 26, Sept. 16 and Oct. 7: Klein Museum, Mobridge
Sept. 6, Oct. 18 and Nov. 8: Public Library, Sturgis
Oct. 4, Nov. 1 and Dec. 6: Siouxland Library Main Branch, Sioux Falls
Oct. 11, Oct. 20 and Nov. 4: South Dakota Cultural Heritage Center, Pierre
No one knows why or when Wessington Springs’ cannon arrived in South Dakota from its birthplace at the Watervalet Arsenal in New York, or if it ever saw action in wartime. But over the years, the 114-year-old weapon has become an important symbol of military service by Jerauld County veterans. Recently, the Wessington Springs True Dakotan announced that residents had restored the cannon to its original glory, using local time and talent.
“The American Legion talked Brian Van Buren of Wessington Springs into doing the metal restoration that included disassembly, sand blasting, cleaning, painting and reassembly. Hub Kieser’s -81 Enterprises, on the north side of Wessington Springs, offered their facility for the restoration project. Fred Knight donated sand, Jason Weber donated the use of a sand blaster, South Dakota Wheat Growers provided an appropriate air compressor,” wrote the True Dakotan. They hired expert wheelwrights Hansen Wheel and Wagon of Letcher to built new wheels. The total cost of restoration was about $5,000.
The 829 lb. weapon now stands guard in front of the Jerauld County Courthouse as part of the Wessington Springs Veterans Memorial, where it will honor South Dakota veterans for many years to come.
South Dakota has produced some amazing veterans. Jean Mehegan, founder of Medary Acres greenhouse in Brookings, survived the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Don Smith (Belle Fourche) was a member of Doolittle’s Raiders, who launched the first retaliatory attack against Japan after the surprise Hawaiian bombing. Walter Herrig, who taught in SDSU’s Army ROTC program, was a prisoner of war for much of the conflict. He was on the island of Corregidor when the Japanese captured it in 1942. Clarence Wolf Guts was a Lakota code talker.
Recently I learned about Gordon Joseph Lippman of Lemmon. Lippman was one of 54,000 American servicemen and women who fought in World War II, Korea and Vietnam. He enlisted following his junior year at Lemmon High School, and it didn’t take long for others to realize he had incredible courage and battlefield instincts. He was credited with saving his patrol against German resistance in southern France. As a member of the 517th Parachute Infantry Regiment, he was wounded at the Battle of the Bulge.
Lippman was a battalion operations officer during the Korean War, where he was again wounded near Do Chung in April 1951. Lippman was leading his men across the Hantan River in darkness when an enemy outpost spotted them. Lippman and his troops came under fire in the middle of the water, but he rallied them and led a charge that destroyed the outpost. Then he reorganized and led his men toward their objective: a hill whose perimeter was ringed with enemy gunners. Only a single platoon made it under heavy fire. Lippman, realizing his soldiers faced annihilation against overwhelming odds, created a diversion. For 45 minutes, armed with a pistol and grenades, he darted within yards of the enemy, drawing their fire so his soldiers could gain a better position and take the hill. He earned the Distinguished Service Cross, the Army’s second highest military decoration, awarded for bravery.
A soldier might think himself lucky to emerge from one war alive. Surviving two could be considered miraculous. Sadly, Lippman didn’t survive a third. He was sent to Vietnam in September 1965, where he served as the executive officer of the Third Brigade, First Infantry Division. Four months later, Viet Cong snipers infiltrated his camp near Lai Khe. Lippman died from small arms fire while trying to personally locate them.
His sister Marlys was fortunate enough to spend a week with Gordon at his home in Washington, D.C., in May 1965. She remembered he spent evenings working on his master’s degree at Georgetown University, which he earned shortly before his deployment.”My last memory was that I had sent him for Christmas 1965 a fruitcake plus other edibles and a felt bookmark which I made for him per his request [to] ‘only send very small things that can travel with me.’ In February, two months after he was killed, the package was returned to me with DECEASED written on it — with a very spoiled fruitcake. I wept. It was so little, and he didn’t even receive it.”
South Dakotans should be proud of Gordon Lippman and veterans like him. They possess courage the rest of us only imagine we have. Days like Veterans Day or Memorial Day are fine times to honor them, but they should be remembered the other 363 days as well.
The annual observance of Veterans Day is to acknowledge our soldiers for their patriotism, willingness to serve in times of war, love of their homelands and their readiness to sacrifice themselves for the common good of the people. The holiday originated on November 11, 1918 when an armistice went into effect at the eleventh hour between the allied nations and Germany.
Lakota people have long celebrated Veterans Day by remembering the soldiers who gave the ultimate sacrifice of their lives in the course of defending our homelands. We acknowledge the men and women currently serving our country, along with those who returned to resume their lives among their people.
Our country has been at war for nine years. During this war many young men and women have sacrificed their very lives for us. The courage displayed by our soldiers has been passed down by a legacy of Akicita (soldier).
Lakota warriors have always been an integral part of our society. Long before the arrival of Columbus and all who followed, our warriors were dedicating themselves to defending the people and their camps against attacks or invasions. They were not afraid to sacrifice themselves to ensure the safety of their families and Oyate (people).
Not much has changed over the centuries. Countless Lakota people have served tours of duty in the military and returned home to their families. Other Lakota people are still on active duty. Today, it is a fact that American Indian tribes are the most widely represented group in terms of military enlistment.
I believe tribal governments could do more for the soldiers returning from active duty. But even while tribal officials may want to provide more adequate support systems for veterans they might not have the dollars to do so. Many of our people come home with deep emotional, mental, physical or spiritual scarring resulting from their tours of duty.
I know there are some Lakota families who have provided traditional cleansing rituals for many Akicita upon their return from the war zones. I believe tribal governments could contribute to these efforts by providing increased support to the spiritual leaders who offer these Lakota ceremonies to make them more available to our soldiers.
I always remember the Akicita, both living and deceased, in my prayers. They are also remembered with prayer and song at many traditional ceremonies across Indian Country. Our soldiers and veterans are a very important part of our society.
Vi Waln is Sicangu Lakota and an enrolled member of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe. Her columns were awarded first place in the South Dakota Newspaper Association 2010 contest. She can be reached through email at sicanguscribe@yahoo.com
This past weekend we remembered and commemorated our veterans. Given that South Dakota had a higher percentage of their male population in uniform in World War II than any other state, there was a near universal experience about the effect of the veteran’s service on the veteran and their family. The challenge we face as a citizenry going forward is remembering how that service impacted and shaped the many South Dakotans it touched. This is one son’s effort to memorialize that service by one vet.
It’s a special place,
over there, where that soldier lays at rest.
He was a farmer’s son,
who throughout life gave his best.
He learned life’s values on the farm,
and when Grandpa died,
It was Dad who raised the family,
safe from harm.
When the nation called him,
to foreign soil
He left that farm,
to do his share of America’s toil.
But after the War was over,
he returned to his special place.
Became a husband, a father,
a contributor to our part of the human race.
Well, several years ago,
we laid that soldier to rest.
No titles, no monuments,
to testify to his best.
No — rather,
the values he left were his legacy.
They came wrapped in that folded flag,
that day you gave to me.
Now I am just a mechanic’s son,
and when my race is finally run
I pray my son can say with pride,
that I’ve earned the right to be buried at that soldier’s side.
And if he can, then I will pass to grace,
honorably buried over there, by that special place.
Lee Schoenbeck grew up in Webster, practices law in Watertown, and is a freelance writer for the South Dakota Magazine website.
Black Hills people should make time this Veterans Day weekend to visit the Herbert Littleton monument in Spearfish.
No place tops the Black Hills when it comes to memorializing heroes in granite or bronze: Crazy Horse, Washington, Lincoln and the rest on mountains, and every U. S. president on Rapid City street corners. We even have beautiful monuments for sort-of heroes. A couple for Wild Bill Hickock come to mind.
The Littleton monument honors a true hero, and a local one, at that. One of eight South Dakota Congressional Medal of Honor recipients, Herbert Littleton lived in Spearfish and then Sturgis as a kid. As a young man — still a teenager, in fact — he worked for a Rapid City electrical appliance firm. Littleton joined the Marines just after his 18th birthday and found himself two years later at Chungchan, Korea, in the middle of a hot war. In the dark, early morning hours of April 22, 1951, he threw himself on top a grenade tossed into his company’s shallow foxhole. That fast action cost Littleton his life, and saved the lives of many other Marines.
His heroism is described on a plaque that’s part of the Spearfish monument. When the monument was unveiled, then-governor Bill Janklow said,”People will read it and they’ll say they can’t believe he did that.”
True. Yet what intrigues us about heroism, after we mull it over, is the realization that there’s something in human makeup that makes the ultimate sacrifice possible. It’s been proven again and again on battlefields, and during natural disasters. Lots of people, some among the last anyone would expect, are capable of true heroism.
Strangely, when we use the term”hero” loosely, we’re often talking about actions beyond the capabilities of 99 percent of the population. Like slam-dunking a basketball against defenders who stand seven feet tall, or muscling a football through a wall of 300-pound monster men.
Sort-of heroes typically hit the public consciousness in a blaze of hyped expectation. By contrast, true heroes usually emerge without fanfare. I heard lots of folks sharing stories and observations about Herbert Littleton at the monument unveiling ceremony, but no one claimed to have expected heroism from him, or to have heard anyone predict it. Here was an average-sized kid who played a little high school football at Sturgis, dropped out of school before graduation, joined the Marines in hopes of getting his education back on track, and planned to marry his sweetheart from Idaho. He served as a radio operator in Korea, and minutes before his death was sternly scolded by a lieutenant for gabbing needlessly over the airwaves.
In short, Herbert Littleton was not substantially different from most 20 year olds in 1951, or from the 20 year olds who now cruise the streets he knew in Spearfish, Sturgis and Rapid City.
Knowing Littleton was a normal guy until the last moments of his life somehow enhances his heroism. It might even make us think about our own capabilities differently — and those of contemporary young men and women we know.
The Herbert Littleton monument stands in the Indian Springs section of Spearfish City Park, at the intersection of Canyon and Dakota, under the three flags of the United States, the Marine Corps, and the state of South Dakota.
Paul Higbee has written regularly for South Dakota Magazine since 1991, serving as our Black Hills correspondent. Paul and his wife Janet live in Spearfish. This column originally appeared in the November/December 2000 issue. To order a copy or to subscribe, call 800-456-5117.
