War Stories

Linda Grisolia

September 9, 2021

Army Corporal Edward DePasque

As a corporal in Korea, Edward DePasque readied howitzer shells for loading, shot flares to guide troop movement at night and even did a stint as a cook.

Edward DePasque was born in his parents’ home on 36th and Francisco in Chicago. He was one of nine children; two died as infants. His mother, Victoria Marino, was from Salerno and his father, Giovanni, from the Abruzzi region of Italy.

DePasque’s parents grew a vegetable garden to keep their large family fed, using free tomato plants provided by the Campbell Soup Company. The close-knit family worked in the garden, jarring tomato sauce and making their own sausage, pasta and ravioli. “In those days we would go out and pick dandelions and make dandelion wine out of the flowers,” DePasque recalls. They also made barrels of red wine. At the young age of 6, DePasque’s job was to push down the fermenting grapes as they rose to the top.

DePasque attended Burroughs Grade School and Kelly High School, and worked for the railroad until he was drafted into the Army, reporting for active duty in October 1951. “I don’t think my mother was too happy about it, but I figured, it’s a job,” he explains. “They call you and your duty is to go help your country.”

He completed 16 weeks of basic maneuvers at Camp Chaffee, Ark., specializing in artillery and becoming a fire direction specialist. After a short furlough, DePasque boarded a Liberty ship in Seattle and headed across the Pacific.

The voyage to Pusan, Korea, took eight days, with DePasque working KP duty because “I heard I would get plenty to eat.” Recalling the mood and the camaraderie on the ship, he says, “People in those days were willing to go and if you were called for duty to fight, you didn’t put up a fuss about it.”

DePasque was part of the 999th Field Artillery Battalion, based near the 38th Parallel. His unit had 18 155mm self-propelled howitzers, each typically having an eight-man crew. The powerful guns were capable of shooting a 95-pound shell 12 miles. Fuses were put on shells according to the different operations. If they were targeting troops coming up a hill, a particular fuse was put on so the shell exploded above the troops, raining down shrapnel. Cpl. DePasque’s job was to ready the shells to load into the breech of the cannon.

Forward observers searched for the enemy and relayed the target information to the guns. Most often, DePasque’s unit covered the Marines, who preferred to make night raids. DePasque shot flares, carried by parachutes, over or under the target, depending on the wind, to light the way for the foot soldiers. He recalls a frigid New Year’s Eve, when the wind blew the flares back over their position, lighting up the sky. Luckily, the enemy did not see them. “We froze half to death,” DePasque chuckles, “but they did not shoot.”

DePasque’s unit moved between the front, middle and rear positions, depending on the need, but were usually three to four miles behind the front lines. Sometimes fighting persisted around the clock if the North Koreans and Chinese were making a big push. “You didn’t want the enemy to know where you were, so when you did shoot, you had to get rid of them so they wouldn’t shoot back at you,” according to DePasque.

Occasionally there was a lull in fighting, but the soldiers were always ready. “We were called upon because we could move out so fast,” DePasque says. “We could go to another position or we could strike the enemy.” He saw many wounded soldiers and too many deaths. “You feel bad,” he says. “Who’s next?”

DePasque carried a .30-caliber carbine. “That saved your life,” he says. “Sometimes the enemy broke through the lines. They’re out to kill you. They blew their bugles and we knew they were coming, but the Marines generally fought them off.”

The snowy, mountainous terrain was treacherous, with temperatures often falling below zero. “It was rough … a rough country,” he recalls. In the forward position, he was too busy to think about the cold. When they could, the soldiers took turns resting. “You would wrap yourself in a sleeping bag and crawl under a tank sometimes and that’s where you sleep,” he says.

Even worse were the torrential rains that lasted for a week or more. The tank engines were always running and sometimes the soldiers stood on top to dry off from the engine’s warmth. “You’re constantly wet and you always had to take care of your feet,” he explains. “You would wring out your socks and put them on your body to dry them out.”

DePasque manned the big guns for three months before becoming a cook. He told the mess sergeant, “Hey Sarge, you’re always complaining about the cooks, make me a cook.” When asked if he could cook, DePasque replied, “Yea, I’m from a good Italian family, we had to learn how to cook.”

The cooks prepared three meals a day for 150 soldiers, wherever they were. If they were in the front position, food was brought up to them. If they were there for several days, DePasque brought the kitchen up. The kitchen moved often, according to need, and could be loaded up and on its way 25 minutes after getting the call. Breakfast was usually bacon, eggs and toast, and always coffee. Lunch and dinner meals included chicken or turkey and, DePasque recalls, “We had a lot of hamburger meat.”

Food came up from Seoul every day. If the truck couldn’t make it, they ate K rations. “We never let a guy go hungry,” says DePasque. The 30-gallon pot of “cowboy coffee” constantly brewed. The water was kept boiling and grounds were continuously added. Occasionally they even had ice cream. “Summertime, you wouldn’t get it,” says DePasque, “because they used all the ice for the bodies of the Marines to preserve them.”

When in the rear position, DePasque received care packages from home that included salami and cheese. “I would invite all the Italian guys and make pizza,” he says. “Everybody’s your friend when you’re the cook.” The soldiers bought beer from the PX to go with the pizza. “You gotta have some pleasure,” DePasque notes.

After one year in Korea, DePasque completed his service at an Army base in Joplin, Mo., and returned to Chicago when he was discharged in 1953. He married in 1955 and has two daughters and three grandchildren.

A widower since 1990, DePasque is retired from a sheet metal career, enjoys traveling around the country and spending time at his cabin in Colorado, and remains active with the American Legion. His daughters live nearby and they all continue the family tradition of making homemade Italian sausage and pasta dishes.

Last fall, DePasque made the Honor Flight to Washington, D.C., and would recommend it to any veteran. “They really take care of you,” he says.

Reflecting on his time in Korea, DePasque says, “It was an honor to serve our country.”

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Linda Grisolia

September 2, 2021

Air Force Tech Sergeant Ted Micci

Born a century ago in Chicago Heights, Ted Micci is a living testament to the determination of the crews who flew bombing missions over Europe during World War II.

Attilio (Ted) Micci was born 100 years ago in his parents’ home in Chicago Heights. Massimo and Frances Rotaloni Micci emigrated from Marche, Italy, and settled in the Hungry Hill Italian neighborhood of the city. Micci’s maternal grandparents lived across the street, and his aunts and uncles lived down the block. They all shared Sunday dinners together. Micci loved everything his mother prepared. “She was a pretty good cook,” he says.

Micci graduated from Garfield Grade School and attended Bloom High School before transferring to Joliet Central High School when his family moved. After graduating, he was employed as an apprentice electrician until joining the Army Air Forces in October 1942 with three buddies. “In order to get what we wanted, like the Air Force, we volunteered,” he says. “I was interested in airplanes.”

Micci completed basic training and airplane mechanic school in Texas. While working on a cadet plane, the pilot asked Micci if he wanted a ride. Micci grabbed his parachute, harness and jacket, jumped in, and they took off. “He did everything he possibly could with that airplane. I almost got sick,” says Micci. “Oh man, especially when you first ride — it was an experience, and from then on, I loved it.”

Micci worked as an airplane mechanic until he volunteered to become a radio operator. He received his training in Wisconsin and began flying with B-17 (Flying Fortress) bomber groups. Micci was assigned to a 10-man crew: four officers and six enlisted men. Based in Walla Walla, Washington, they trained daily, “in order to get yourself indoctrinated into the plane itself, get to know your crew people and get to know your job that you’re supposed to do on the plane,” Micci says.

They picked up their B-17 at Fort Sheridan, Illinois, flew to Maine and then on to Scotland. Micci was assigned to the 364th Bomb Squadron of the 305th Bomb Group. Each bomb group consisted of four bomb squadrons, and every squadron had 21 B-17s.

Micci was stationed at the Chelveston air base in England with the Eighth Air Force and arrived shortly after a fateful August 1943 bombing run over Schweinfurt, Germany. “They lost 60 bombers with 10 men on each one. That’s 600 men,” says Micci. “We were replacements for those who didn’t come back.” When Micci arrived, the personal effects of those killed in action were being collected and removed from the barracks. “The feeling was not good,” he says.

The 305th Bomb Group did not have fighter escorts until their later missions. They flew in formation over Norway, Belgium, Holland and Germany, targeting such strategic areas as oil refineries, ball bearing factories, airplane manufacturing plants and mineral mines.

The men faced not only enemy gunfire, but also extreme below-zero temperatures. “You get frost on your oxygen tank, frost on your eyelids,” Micci says. They were shot at by anti-aircraft artillery on the ground and enemy fighter planes in the air. “There’s no foxholes up there!” says Micci. “You’re trying to save your fanny and shoot at them if possible. There’s nothing you can do when they shoot from the ground. You can’t evade them; you can’t dodge them.”

Micci and his crew had several close calls with their plane, Thundermug. On one bombing mission, the B-17 in front of them blew up after being hit by ground cannon fire. “No parachutes, no nothing from that plane!” Micci remembers. Debris from the explosion nearly hit the Thundermug. “We had to do some maneuvering,” he says. “I felt sorry for the guys there.”

Another close call occurred flying over Oslo, Norway. While his crew dropped bombs over the targeted mineral mine, the 70-below-zero temperature in the plane was causing the gas valve to freeze. The Thundermug left formation and flew low over the choppy ocean waves in the frigid November weather. “We threw all our guns out and everything to make our ship lighter because we weren’t getting any gas into our main tank,” says Micci. “We kept flying, kept flying, kept flying, and meanwhile I was sending out SOS messages on my radio.” The crew was ready to ditch the plane when they spotted English territory. They barely made it and landed at the very end of a runway. “All four engines stopped: no gas! That was it!” Micci says. “I got out and kissed the ground.”

Planes were lost on every mission. The Thundermug was riddled with holes, but it was always able to stay in the air and did not lose any men. “We lucked out,” Micci says.

During battles, Micci manned a gun and assisted the crew. “You’re more or less a runner between all the gunners, take their place because they got hurt or they’re frozen, because we’re 50 below zero up there,” he says. “Maybe their ammo is low and you help replenish them. There’s always something to do to help out.”

Every mission began the same. The men awoke at 2 a.m., ate breakfast, were briefed, grabbed their gear, boarded the plane and were ready for takeoff at 6 a.m. They were debriefed upon their return. “They’d want to know how many fighters, how many this and how many that,” Micci says. “You just go up and do your work and that’s it, and take it as it comes when the fighters come at you or they shoot cannons up at you.”

Micci completed his last mission on March 22, 1944, over Berlin. “I flew 25 missions; that was the max at the time,” he says. He returned to the States in April, became a radio instructor at Lowry Field in Denver and married Esther Buccarelli in December 1944 while on leave. Micci was discharged in October 1945 with the rank of Tech Sergeant. Among his decorations are a Distinguished Flying Cross and an Air Medal with three Oak Leaf Clusters. Micci is featured in the American Air Museum in Britain and is a member of the Joliet Stone City Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 2199.

A retired electrician, Micci has four children, eight grandchildren and five great-grandchildren. His interest in planes continues, and through the years, he has ridden in B-17s during military airplane tours. At the time of his interview with Fra Noi, he was looking forward to his eighth ride in a bomber as a civilian.

Micci’s late wife is buried at Abraham Lincoln Cemetery, which he visits regularly. The proposed NorthPoint Compass Project is troubling to him, as the trucking depot would greatly impact the serene environment of the cemetery by bringing an additional 5,000 semi trucks per day into proximity with the hallowed grounds. Micci is among many veterans and others who are plaintiffs in a legal battle against the project.

Reflecting on his time in the Air Force, Micci says, “It was a surprising adventure. You’re getting into situations where you have to think for yourself and try to survive for yourself … you do a lot of praying.”

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Linda Grisolia

August 12, 2021

Army Sergeant Frank Calé

Having stared death in the face as a BAR gunner in Korea, Frank Calé was glad to close out his tour of duty as the platoon cook.

Editor’s Note: Frank passed away in November 2020. This article was published in the April 2017 issue of Fra Noi and is being republished here in his memory.

Frank Calé was born in Valenzano in 1930, immigrating to the United States with his mother and sister when he was 6 years old. His father, who had moved to Chicago before them, picked them up at the train station and took them to their new home on 1106 S. Troy St. They eventually settled at 3046 W. Arthington Ave.

Calé attended St. Agatha Grade School and Manley High School. Working at various jobs — including construction, like his father — he joined the National Guard in 1947. He reported for infantry training every weekend until he joined the Army in December 1950. The fighting in Korea was raging and Calé’s father did not want his only son to go off to war.

He deployed to Ft. Leonard Wood, Mo., for basic training and after two months received his assignment. Calé was headed for Korea. “I just took it in stride,” Calé says. “My parents didn’t like it. My father was very hurt.”

Calé boarded a train to Ft. Lawton in Seattle and embarked on a 14-day journey across the Pacific to Pusan, Korea. The soldiers slept in cloth bunks, six high. He remembers seas so rough that he could see the bottom of the ship as the waves crashed against it.

The soldiers trained and exercised daily on board in preparation for battle. “You had to be scared,” Calé says. “If you say you’re not scared, you’re not right.” He arrived in Pusan in March 1951 as part of the 24th Infantry Division, I Company, Third Battalion, Third Platoon. Calé’s weapon was a Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR). The death rate was very high for soldiers carrying this particular machine gun, because “it’s what the enemy goes for.”

Calé marched from town to town, right behind the front line. He lived in a two-man pup tent and patrolled daily with seven to eight other comrades-at-arms, rookies paired with veterans, searching for North Korean and Chinese soldiers.

Calé fought not only the enemy, but also the snow and sub-zero temperatures in the winter; the hot, humid weather in the summer; and the treacherous mountain terrain. The region contained many small caves and other formations in which the enemy hid. When they came across one, the soldiers threw grenades in to flush the enemy out. Calé fought in several skirmishes amid exploding artillery shells and gunfire. “You’re trying to stay alive,” Calé remembers. “You’re scared. … Are you going to be next to get it?”

North Korean and Chinese troops routinely booby-trapped their dead, dressing them in American uniforms and using them for bait, hoping to blow up unsuspecting American soldiers. Patrolling, Calé spotted a body lying in the middle of the road ahead. He reacted quickly but was suddenly pulled back. “You see a dead soldier on the ground and the first thing you want to do is get him off the road, but they were booby-trapped,” Calé remembers. “I got sick.” His buddies saved his life. “I was very thankful for them!”

Camped behind the front line, the soldiers had no place to bathe except in a ravine filled with 5 to 6 feet of water. Calé was in the water when his buddies yelled, “Frank get out of the way, get out of the way!” Two bodies were floating toward him. If one had touched him, he would have been blown up.

Casualties were high. One of Calé’s close friends was killed in a firefight. He was distraught as he carried him up the hill. “That’s something I don’t like to talk about.”

Calé’s mother and sister wrote to him and regularly sent care packages that included spaghetti, tomato sauce, salami, provolone, capocollo: food that did not spoil. After six months of front-line combat, Calé heard about an opening for a cook. Using food he received from home, he whipped up a batch of spaghetti, complete with tomato gravy the way his mother made it, and served it to the troops.

Switching from BAR man to cook, his new job assignment, he fed the 300 or so troops on the front line, preparing three meals a day on propane-fueled field stoves. Meals included eggs, potatoes, sausage, bacon and whatever provisions he could get his hands on. Supplies and food were regularly delivered to the troops.

Calé filled containers with the food, packed it all up and — with the help of South Koreans, fondly called “Chickie Bears” — carried it up to the soldiers on the front line. When they finished eating, Calé packed everything back up and returned to the field kitchen. Reserve troops ate at the camp. Some of his buddies were mad at him for switching from a BAR man, but Calé responded, “I’m looking to stay alive. I’m still coming up to the front.”

Calé served in Korea for 13 months and left for the states in April 1952. “Let me put it this way. Going out to Korea, I was one of the troops eating the food. Coming back, I was cooking it!” Back in the states, he was stationed at Ft. Jackson, S.C.

Calé was discharged from the Army in December 1953 with the rank of sergeant and returned to his parent’s home in Chicago. He was introduced to his future wife, Terri, and when they met, they realized they knew each other as children. They married in June 1954, and have three daughters, six grandchildren and two great grandchildren. Calé worked for the Oak Park Water Department for 27 years, moving with his wife to Bolingbrook after he retired.

A scrapbook contains photos of Calé and his buddies in Korea outside of their pup tents and around camp. The book also has his orders to be a mess sergeant on a troop train that carried soldiers to the port of embarkation in Seattle.

Another souvenir is a menu of the three meals he prepared at Ft. Jackson on Oct. 16, 1953. Supper that day consisted of sautéed fish with a lemon wedge, creamed paprika potatoes, buttered lima beans, coleslaw, bread, butter, pineapple pie and coffee.

Calé is a member of the Italian American War Veterans, a former commander for Post 1 and a past state commander. He is active in the VFW, American Legion and the Knights of Columbus. He still cooks for his wife as well as for functions at St. Francis Church in Bolingbrook. Calé’s photos, medals and army helmet are on display at the Italian American Veterans Museum at the Casa Italia in Stone Park.

Reflecting on his time on the front line, Calé says, “You never knew what would come up. You always gotta be watching.”

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Linda Grisolia

August 5, 2021

Army Sergeant Al Provenzano

As a platoon sergeant, Al Provenzano was responsible for shepherding his men across Europe from Omaha Beach to the brink of Berlin, earning a Purple Heart and five Battle Stars along the way.

Editor’s Note: All passed away March 2018. This article was published in the April 2017 issue of Fra Noi and is being republished here in his memory.

The third of nine children, Angelo (Al) Provenzano was born on Feb. 29, 1920, in Melrose Park. His parents, Gaspero and Maria (Greco) Provenzano immigrated from Lappano in Calabria.

Provenzano attended Melrose Park Grade School and Proviso Township High School. Growing up during the Depression was tough, especially in a large family where everyone wore hand-me-downs. “It was some rough times, but everybody was on relief, so everybody was kind of equal,” he says. Fondly recalling his mother’s cooking, Provenzano says, “Her specialty was homemade raviolis. She’d get 100-pound sacks of flour, and she baked bread twice a week.”

He worked for the Charles Bruning Co. in Chicago when he was drafted into the Army. “I went at a very sad time,” he says. “My dad had leukemia and I was helping my family out.”

Provenzano completed basic training at Camp Robinson, Ark., and advanced infantry training at Camp Polk, La. His father passed away during this time and Provenzano recalls, “It was a little rough for my mom.” Worried about the family, he designated a large portion of his monthly paycheck to his mother and the government added an allotment. “It wasn’t much, but every little bit helped,” he explains. “She used to wait for that check.”

He deployed overseas on the Queen Mary. As the converted cruise ship zigzagged across the Atlantic from New Jersey to Glasgow, Scotland, Provenzano remembers the morale of his fellow soldiers: “The blood gets in you. You know you’re going to battle sooner or later, you don’t know when, but you know you’re going to war. Everybody felt we gotta get this damn war over with and then we go back home.”

From Glasgow, Provenzano boarded a train to Stratton on the Fos. As a platoon sergeant for the Army, he was stationed along with his men at a base near by. The soldiers trained continuously. “We knew there was going to be an invasion, we just didn’t know when,” he says.

Finally, the commanding officers told the platoon sergeants, “Get ready, get your men together, we’re going, this is it!” That day was June 6, 1944: D Day! The soldiers piled onto the LCIs (Landing Craft Infantry) and headed across the choppy English Channel.

“Most of us got sick,” remembers Provenzano. As they approached the beach, the Germans started shooting. “We sobered up in a hurry. We had our rifles, grenades. You rush out there, shooting. That’s it: Shoot, kill or be killed!”

Bodies were in the water and on the beach; gunfire surrounded him, bombs flew through the air. “You had no time to think,” Provenzano says. “You gotta protect yourself and your men. You gotta keep shooting.”

As the German troops retreated up the hill toward St. Lo, Provenzano’s company settled into Omaha Beach. “Paratroopers were stuck in the trees, dead, with their parachutes dangling,” Provenzano says. “It was a sad thing to see!”

In the lull between gunfire, Provenzano grabbed two of his men and started climbing the hill to scope out the enemy. They were near the top when machinegun fire opened up. Provenzano yelled to his men, “Keep low, keep low, those machine guns are shooting down over us, but as long as we lay low, we’ll be safe.” They each had about 10 grenades and Provenzano told them, “If you get a chance, throw the hand grenades! Throw ’em all!”

They lobbed their grenades, knocking out the machinegun nest, and Provenzano told his men, “Scramble down the hill now, go back to the hedgerows!” As they reached safety, Provenzano turned to join them when fragments from a mortar shell hit both of his legs. “I had blood all over me. I thought I was through!” he remembers. Provenzano feared the worst, but he was lucky. Field medics removed shrapnel, bandaged him, gave him penicillin and he returned to his men. “You feel pain, but it’s not unbearable,” he says.

Provenzano reported to his colonel, “They got everything zeroed in on us. We’re downhill, they’re uphill, they got the advantage. We need our Air Corps to drop some bombs on St. Lo.”

As they fought their way inland, Provenzano and his men took shelter in the dense hedgerows that lined the fields of Normandy. He told his men, “We gotta keep together and help each other. Don’t go stickin’ your necks out for no good reason.”

A couple of days later, Provenzano and his men advanced to St. Lo. He remembers, “It was in smithereens; we walked right up!” The troops continued moving through France and Provenzano recalls that the civilians were lined up on the road waiting for them. “Oh they loved us; they grabbed us, kissed us.”

German soldiers, waving their white handkerchiefs, surrendered to them. “They knew we had them outnumbered,” Provenzano says. “They didn’t want to fight anymore than we did. They were so happy to see us.”

The Germans, along with Russian soldiers who were locked in a stockade and released by Provenzano, were taken to a safe place, as were the Italian soldiers that they encountered.

Continuing on to Belgium, “There were a few skirmishes here and there, but we cleaned them up in about 10 minutes,” Provenzano recalls. “We were too many for them.”

Recalling the Battle of the Bulge, Provenzano says, “It was vicious; there was always gunfire and it was cold! As you’re going through and the bombs are landing here and there, you warm up in a hurry, your blood gets pumped up.”

The soldiers rested when they could. “You’re just concentrating on beating them up, winning the war, bombing the heck out of them so you can go home!” He shakes his head, “The snow was all red … Oh God, the poor guys … it was a sad, sad affair.”

In all, Provenzano fought in five major battles on the way to victory against the Nazis. After the war ended, Provenzano returned home to Camp Grant and was discharged with a Purple Heart and Five Battle Stars.

He married his wife, Blanche (Bunny), in 1952 and they settled in Oak Park. Provenzano was the co-owner of two businesses, Tru-Pal Pet Supplies and Dan-Al Tool & Die Co. He meets friends daily for breakfast and lunch and is active with his church, occasionally visiting Hines Hospital to sing to the men.

Reflecting on the war, he says “Your heart gets acclimated to it and all you’re thinking of is, you gotta save your life. To save your life you gotta be the winner. You have to do what you have to do!” Of his fellow soldiers he says, “You’re with the guys night and day, your life depends on them and their life depends on you.”

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Linda Grisolia

July 29, 2021

Marine Judge Advocate General Bob Larsen

Larsen with Gen. Colin Powell at the Marine Corps Birthday Party in 1991

A newly minted Marine at the start of the Gulf Wars, Bob Larsen was picked to serve in the courtroom rather than on the battlefield.

Bob Larsen was born in Arlington, Virginia. One of four children born to Robert L. and Joan Campagna Larsen, he also has a brother and sister from his father’s second marriage. With roots in the Chicago area, the family returned here when Larsen was 4 years old, settling in the Edison Park neighborhood, then moving to Park Ridge when he was 13.

Larsen’s mother prepared traditional Italian pasta dishes, but the family also enjoyed meals from his father’s Irish and Norwegian backgrounds. He visited his grandparents and extended family regularly, and he and his siblings were all close.

Larsen attended St. Juliana Grade School, Lincoln Junior High and Maine South High School, where he participated in advanced placement courses. “I did a lot of studying,” Larsen admits.

As a child listening to his father talk about his time in the Marine Corps, Larsen became interested in joining one day. “When I was about 10 years old, I told him that I wanted to go to college, get into Notre Dame, get into law school, join the Marine Corps, and then go into the CIA or FBI, and then into politics,” he says. “The only thing I haven’t done is go into the CIA or the FBI.” He graduated from Notre Dame in 1986 with a double major in government and economics, entered law school at Catholic University in Washington, D.C., and joined the Marines in the spring of 1988. After meeting stringent academic and physical requirements, Larsen entered Officer Candidates School (OCS) that summer.

Once OCS began, it was a matter of surviving. “That was a challenge in and of itself,” Larsen says. In his class, only about 55 percent of those who began the program actually completed it. “That’s what comes from 10 straight weeks of 20-hour days,” he says. “It’s very grueling both physically and mentally, and it’s intended to be.” The stress of real combat is recreated as candidates are pushed hard to see if they will fold under pressure or can lead in the most trying of circumstances. “The purpose of the Marine Corps Officer Candidates School is to identify people who can handle extreme mental and physical stress and still make decisions that will save Marines’ lives rather than getting them killed,” says Larsen. “I feel like the learning experience that I gained from that, the confidence and ability to handle that stress, has served me well throughout my life.”

Larsen graduated from OCS as Second Lieutenant and was temporarily released from active duty so he could complete his third year of law school and take the bar exam. Once Larsen passed the bar, he went back on active duty and then attended The Basic School, a six-month training program that the Marines, unlike other branches of the military, require their lawyers to complete. “Part of the reason the Marine Corps does that is they want their JAGs (Judge Adjutant Generals), their lawyers, to understand what it means to be a Marine, to experience, if not actual combat, then what it’s like to be in it,” Larsen says. “There were times we spent five days straight in the field, 25-mile hikes, all kinds of physical challenges that every officer in the Marine Corps goes through.”

Larsen’s Naval Justice School graduating class

Next, he attended Naval Justice School in Newport, Rhode Island, finishing first in his class of 40 Navy and Marine Corps officers. Larsen was then assigned to the Law Center at Quantico, where he handled a variety of legal cases. During this period of time, Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm were launched, marking the beginning of the Gulf Wars. It was the first extensive combat involving all branches of the military since the Vietnam War. Larsen thought he would surely deploy to Southwest Asia with about half of the Marine Corps, but his services were needed at Headquarters Marine Corps at the Pentagon. As a Civil Law Judge Advocate, Larsen handled a variety of legal issues, including serving as legal counsel to the Conscientious Objector Review Board.

The U.S. military is an all-volunteer force, and those who join have to acknowledge under oath that they are not conscientious objectors. With the nation suddenly shifting from peace to war, servicemen and servicewomen began applying for CO status for political reasons or out of fear of combat. “These can’t be accepted as legitimate bases to walk away from their obligation,” Larsen says. “They had to submit documentation, and they had to demonstrate that they had a legitimate change of heart and a legitimate change of philosophy that wasn’t related to simply not wanting to fight in the war.”

Each application was brought before the Conscientious Objector Review Board. Larsen talked through the facts with the board and advised whether or not it was legally obligated to grant the status based upon standards established by Congress, the Office of the President and the Department of Defense.

Training at The Basic School helped prepare Larsen for this duty. “I was able to bring to my job that connection with what it really means to be a Marine. I wasn’t just looking at it like some corporate attorney,” he says. “It’s stressful when a person is told, ‘You are going to leave your family, you’re going to go 10,000 miles away, you’re going to get shot at, you might get shot, you might get killed or see others killed or have to kill someone.’”

Larson says he understood those stresses and took his job very seriously. “I wasn’t going to deny status to somebody who genuinely earned it,” Larsen says, “but by the same token, I was defending the honor and the principles of the Marine Corps and the requirements of service that these Marines signed up for.”

He also handled other issues such as the legality of using the Marine Corps emblem and name in fundraising and promotional situations.

Larsen was discharged from active duty in 1992 with the rank of Captain. Two years later, he was employed at a law firm in Chicago when he heard from Marine Air Control Group 48 based out of Glenview Naval Air Base. They were looking for a Site Judge Advocate.

“They told me, ‘We heard a lot about you from different sources, and you’re the guy we want,’” Larsen explains. “When presented with the opportunity to go back and serve, I took it.”

One weekend a month, Larsen reported to the base. “I would address any kind of legal issues they had: disciplinary issues, fundraising issues, ethical issues,” he says. “Anything the commanding officer wanted me to work on, I would do it.”

During an annual two-week stretch, Larsen would report to Marine Corps Reserve Headquarters in New Orleans. “I would work on whatever administrative or legal responsibilities the commander of the legal section down at the battalion in New Orleans would assign to me,” he says. Accidents or injuries of a significant nature were investigated, and Larsen reviewed the proceedings. “I would make sure that whatever happened wasn’t happening on a regular basis and figure out if anybody was criminally at fault,” he says.

A Marine can be involuntarily discharged in one of two ways: through a court martial or through an administrative discharge proceeding. The latter can occur if a Marine tests positive on a drug test or is found to have committed a crime in the civilian community. A specific process is then followed, and the Marine has a right to be represented by counsel. “I reviewed the administrative discharge packages to make sure that the Marine’s rights had properly been protected before they were administratively discharged,” Larsen says.

Larsen and a fellow JAG offer free advice to a Marine unit in Seattle.

Next, he was assigned out of Marine Corps Reserve Support Command in Kansas City, traveling the country at the head of a section of Marine Judge Advocates. The Judge Advocates taught law of war classes to deploying reservists, helped Marines address financial concerns, and ensured that they all had a will and power of attorney. “We talked to them about financial issues and made sure that, if they were going to go fight a war, they didn’t have to worry about what was going on back home with their family, that they had already taken care of that,” Larsen says.

Larsen served in the Marine Reserves from 1995-2011, retiring as Lieutenant Colonel. One of his favorite moments on active duty was an assignment as Officer of the Day at Marine headquarters. The assignment requires the officer to spend the night handling any issues and disputes that might arise and touring the Washington monuments with other Marines to make sure all is well. “When we’d return, we would do the sunrise unfurling of the flag and playing of the National Anthem,” he remembers. “That was an inspiring and emotional experience.”

Larsen is currently a partner in the law firm Cunningham, Meyer & Vedrine, P.C., and he served on the DuPage County Board from 2010-20. He spent the last year as the finance chairman, seeing the county through the financial crisis caused by the pandemic.

Larsen and his wife, Jane Marchese Larsen, enjoy preparing Italian dishes. She makes “fantastic gravy,” and he specializes in making limoncello and crescia, a traditional Italian Easter bread. “Jane’s family really has allowed me to embrace my inner Italian,” he says.

Reflecting on his military career, Larsen says, “I had the privilege of spending 20 years with an amazing group of people, most of whom were better than me. The principles that I learned in the Marine Corps — discipline, honor, focus — I carry with me every single day.

“I love the Marine Corps. I loved being a part of what we were accomplishing in the war. I loved being in charge of defending the ethical standards of the Marine Corps, and mostly I loved the people I worked with … some of the most exceptional people I’ve ever encountered in my life.”

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Linda Grisolia

July 22, 2021

Two-War Veteran Mario Ortigara

Having served as a weather observer in southern Illinois after World War II, Mario Ortigara never expected to be called back up and thrown into the teeth of battle in Korea.

Mario Ortigara was born in his parents’ home on the South Side of Chicago, where brother Benny welcomed him. A few years later, sister Mary joined the family. Anna Panozzo and Domenico Ortigara were from small towns in the Piedmont region of Italy, where they met and married. They lost their first-born son to illness before immigrating to Chicago, where they settled in the historic Pullman area. Domenico was employed at the Blue Island Brickyard, and Anna was a homemaker.

Their neighborhood was a mix of many different ethnicities: Polish, Irish, Lithuanian, Slovakian and Italian. Ortigara explains that each nationality had its own Catholic Church, and his family socialized mostly within the Italian community. He attended St. Anthony Grammar School and Mt. Carmel High School. The Ortigara brothers began taking accordion lessons in 1935, laying the foundation for their future. Ortigara remembers playing handball and baseball in the neighborhood streets with his buddies. “There was very little traffic in the 1930s,” he says.

The Epiphany was a special feast day celebrated in the Ortigara family, and his mother prepared a delicious meal. “She was a very, very great cook,” Ortigara says. “My favorites were the gnocchi. My sister, brother and I, our favorite meal through our lives was gnocchi.”

Though World War II had ended, Ortigara was drafted into the Army after high school graduation. “You didn’t question it. If you got drafted, you got drafted,” he says. Ortigara reported for duty in December 1945 and completed basic training at Sheppard Field, Texas. Then it was back to Illinois for a six-month training course at Chanute Air Force Base, learning to be a weather observer. Ortigara remained there at Weather Central until he was discharged in November 1946. “We plotted maps and read information off the teletype machines,” says Ortigara. Weather forecasters used the maps to forecast weather for Army camps throughout the country.

He returned home to Chicago and managed the Casablanca Cocktail Lounge, a family-owned business, until he was hospitalized with rheumatic fever. After recovering, Ortigara attended Rizzo Conservatory, where he studied accordion and also began teaching at the Midwest School of Music, owned by his brother.

On March 15, 1951, Ortigara was drafted into the Army for the second time. The Korean War was going strong, and because Ortigara had previously served less than one year, he was eligible for the draft. “I didn’t think that I’d have to go again,” says Ortigara, “but they wanted me to do it, so I had to do it.” He was 24 years old, one of 15 others that he knows of at the time who had also been drafted twice. “We were called Primary Overseas Replacements, P.O.R.,” Ortigara says. “Get them over there as fast as you can, never mind the training.”

He received a two-week “refresher course” at Fort Leonard Wood, had a furlough and headed to Fort Lawton, Washington, where he boarded a ship to Japan and then on to Inchon, Korea. Ortigara was an infantryman with an M1 rifle. “So I was sitting thinking what am I gonna do with this rifle and heard they needed medics because they got shot up pretty badly, so I volunteered for that,” Ortigara says.

He trained for two weeks to become a combat medic, learning how to bandage a wounded man and get him out of the line of fire. Ortigara was attached to the First Cavalry Division, 8th Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Battalion King Company and was on the front lines in North Korea for six months before transferring to Hokkaido, Japan.

Ortigara lived in two-man foxholes right next to the infantrymen while in the battlefields. “I didn’t carry a rifle, I had a medical aid bag,” he says. “My job was not to fight; my job was to bandage the men that got wounded.” When he heard someone yelling, “Doc,” Ortigara left the shelter of his foxhole and ran to help. He quickly assessed the wounded soldier, bandaged him and put him onto a liter which carried him about two miles behind the front line to the “liter jeep” and driven about eight miles to the first aid station. Helicopters, used for the first time during the war, brought the more badly injured soldiers back to the division level.

Ortigara did not have time to think about his safety as he cared for the wounded on the battlefield. “Usually when the shells come in everybody’s digging as far as they can into their holes to save their life, and that’s the one time that the combat medic has to get out,” he says. “That’s the only time you have a job, when they are wounded, taking care of them.” He worried because he did not have a lot of training. “All I prayed for was that no one would die because of my not having the knowledge,” Ortigara says. “I was very fortunate that I was never wounded and everyone that I took care of made it back to the first aid station where a doctor got to see them.”

He moved from one combat area to another, establishing the perimeter, and building a foxhole. “You could be in one position for a month or two months and when the fighting was finished there, they would pull you back, put you in a convoy and bring you to another place,” Ortigara says. “Wherever they need you. Wherever the combat was going to be. Wherever you’re needed most.”

Ortigara remembers Thanksgiving 1951 as the worst battle. The first shell coming in hit a foxhole with four soldiers, killing them instantly. Shelling continued for 12 hours. “That was a very, very bad night, and the shells are exploding all over. If somebody calls for doc, you have to go out there and bandage them even though shells are exploding overhead. You’re risking your life to help someone, and that’s why I got the Bronze Star for Valor.” Ortigara says.

Ortigara was discharged on Christmas Eve 1952, returned to Chicago and worked at his brother’s music store. He married Cecilia Tribbia in 1953, and they raised their five children in Tinley Park. Now widowed, Ortigara enjoys spending time with his family, which includes 12 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. He remains active at the family music store, formerly known as Midwest Music School and established in 1965 as Ortigara’s Musicville with Ben, Mary and Mario as partners. He belongs to various organizations, including the Korean War Veterans Association, American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars.

Ortigara remembers his time on the front lines and says, “When you’re out there, it’s like, ‘Just get me out of here alive, I’ll never complain again, Lord.’ For anyone who is in combat, from one minute to the next, you don’t know if you’re going to be there or not.”

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Linda Grisolia

July 15, 2021

Navy machinist mate Al Cenofante

A Navy machinist mate during World War II, Al Cenofante kept everything from landing crafts to full-fledged attack transports running smoothly.

One of four children, Al Centofante was born in Chicago to Angelo and Teresa Panarese Centofante. The family lived at Polk and Campbell streets, with Teresa selling groceries from a small basement store to make extra money during the Depression. She came to America from the area around Naples; Angelo was from Abruzzo.

Centofante grew up in a close-knit neighborhood where the adults all spoke Italian, and the kids played kick the can, hopscotch and hide and seek. His mom was a great cook and made homemade bread. “She would prepare the dough and wrap it up in a cloth, and I would carry it down the street to the bakery,” Centofante says. “In the afternoon, we’d go pick up (the baked loaves).” Wine was a family staple, and his father made barrels of it. “We had to help him squeeze and press the grapes and also clean the barrels when the wine was pressed,” Centofante recalls.

Centofante attended John Crerar Grade School and Crane Tech High School. After graduating from Crane, he attended Herzl Junior College, completing only one semester before being drafted in May 1943. “The war was on; I had to go,” Centofante says. He reported to the Chicago Draft Board only to be sent home because the area quota had been filled. A few weeks later, he was called back by the draft board and put on a North Shore train to Milwaukee, where he was inducted into the U.S. Navy. His parents were sad to see him leave. “Their boy was being taken away from them,” Centofante explains. “They didn’t like that at all.”

He completed basic training and engineering school at the Naval Training Center Great Lakes before traveling to Naval Base San Diego to attend internal combustion engine school. “I suppose from my technical background at Crane, they decided I was well educated for that mechanical part of the Navy,” he says.

Centofante was placed in a landing craft unit during a brief stint at the Naval Amphibious Base at Coronado Island, California, before being transferred to the Amphibious Training Base at Morro Bay, farther north on the coast. Soldiers came from their Army bases to Morro Bay, where sailors trained them to disembark from transport ships onto landing crafts. The transport ships were anchored about a half mile from shore, according to Centofante, and Navy personnel ferried the soldiers to the waiting ships. “They were in full uniforms and fully equipped,” he says. “They had to go up and down rope ladders, and they’re hanging over the side of the ship, which was part of their training.”

These maneuvers were essential in preparing the troops for beach invasions and landings, and Machinist Mate 2nd Class Centofante played a crucial role. “With the training they gave me on internal combustion engines, it was my job to make sure that the engines in these landing crafts were functioning properly,” he says. Centofante was constantly checking and repairing. He didn’t know which invasions the soldiers were training for, but only that these men would soon be fighting for their lives. “I felt pretty important. People depended upon me. I knew it, and I had to do my job correctly to make sure they were safe,” he says.

Centofante’s younger brother had been drafted into the Army, and before heading off to the Philippines, he was stationed at a base in California. The two brothers enjoyed a short reunion. “We spent two or three hours together. I was the only sailor on an Army base with 10,000 soldiers,” Centofante chuckles.

Centofante was stationed at Morro Bay for a year. By that time, the war in Europe had ended, and he was finally assigned to a ship. The USS Barnwell, an attack transport, carried 1,700 troops when fully manned. “Because the servicemen were being discharged, the airlines and trains were loaded, so they used the transport ship that I was on to move these people up and down to various cities along the West Coast,” he says.

Centofante was the ship’s machinist. In addition to maintaining the internal combustion engines, he ran the machine shop. “We had to repair the parts that broke down aboard ship. When you needed a part, you couldn’t go to Ace Hardware or a machine shop to buy it. We had to make it,” Centofante explains. “When I say we, I mean me. I was the only machinist aboard the ship.”

After completing its mission along the western seaboard, the Barnwell headed for the opposite coast. During a short stay in Panama, Centofante was assigned shore patrol duty. “I walked up and down the streets, in full uniform, carrying a gun and a billy club,” he recalls. “My job was to keep the sailors from going into the houses of prostitution.”

The Barnwell continued up the East Coast to the Newport News Shipyard in Virginia, where it anchored. There, it was tied up with two other ships and furnished power to them while they were being decommissioned.

Centofante was discharged from Lido, New York, in early 1946. He returned home to his parents and, under the G.I. Bill, graduated as a master machinist from a trade school in Chicago. “The Navy is what changed my career because I was studying to become a mechanical engineer and ended up being a machinist,” he says. “I liked it so much I decided I would follow that as a career.”

Centofante worked at International Harvester as a tool maker and tool designer until he opened a construction business, Al’s Excavating and Grating, in Lombard. He married Josephine Tarsitano in September 1946. They have three children and six grandchildren, and are expecting their 14th great-grandchild. Last year, Centofante was among a group of veterans honored at a Chicago Blackhawks game. “I’m a very fortunate man. I just completed chemotherapy, and I have three great children who take care of me.”

Every person serving in the military during World War II played an integral part in winning the war, whether they were on the front lines or supporting those who went off to battle. Centofante’s role was to keep the engines running smoothly on naval vessels, large and small. “I was kind of a king aboard that ship,” he recalls with pride. “I had a lot of respect. They depended on me.”

At 95 years old, Centofante reflects, “I would say if a person wanted to go into the military service and have a lot of fun, besides working hard, he should go into the Navy.”

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Linda Grisolia

July 8, 2021

Marine Corporal Charles “Muzzy” Ippolito

Charles Ippolito was set to ship off to Korea when he was assigned to a newly re-activated Marine Division that saw extensive combat in the Pacific during World War II.

The third of four children, Charles “Muzzy” Ippolito was born in 1931 in his parents’ home at 13th and Paulina. Calogero and Maria (D’Angelo) Ippolito emigrated from Sicily after they were married in 1927.

The family spoke only Sicilian and Ippolito did not learn English until he went to school. The neighborhood was largely Italian along with a mix of other ethnicities. The older boys would grab the little guys in horseplay, throw them to the ground and give them a baldy sour with hair clippers. Mussolini was in power at the time and young Ippolito, speaking only Italian and with a shaved head looked like a little Il Duce. The guys all started calling him “Muzzy” and the nickname stuck! “Nowadays, they’d call you a bully,” Ippolito says. “They’d slap you around in those days. It was nothing.”

Ippolito attended Gladstone Grade School and Crane Tech and was employed by Admiral Corp. when he was drafted in October 1951 during the Korean War. The recruiter needed Marines and asked, “Who wants to volunteer?” Ippolito raised his hand.

Ippolito completed 10 weeks of Boot Camp at the Marine Corps Recruitment Depot in San Diego and then went to Camp Pendleton for Advanced Infantry Training. The majority of the Marines that Ippolito trained with deployed to Korea and he was prepared to go, too. However, the Third Marine Division — which was formed during World War II, saw action in the Pacific and was disbanded after the war —was reactivated on January 7, 1952. Ippolito was chosen to be a part of the reactivation.

Based at Camp Pendleton, the division began intensive combat training, including new tactics and maneuvers. The Marines participated in extensive exercises and training, including amphibious invasions, helicopter landings, airborne operations and attack, and defense against atomic weapons and missiles.

Ippolito was a corporal in charge of 10 men in the Ration Platoon, which supplied food for troops in the field. Their job was to bring food into the combat area, locate a safe place to set up and then build a compound (structure) to keep all the supplies secure.

Training for amphibious landings, the men sailed in convoys at sea for a month at a time. Over 120 ships carried troops, artillery, ammo, machinery, vehicles and food — everything necessary for an invasion.

Ippolito recalls the practice landings in the rough seas. “Guys were sick all over as they came down the nets,” he says. “I can’t believe how these guys in WWII came down, so sick before they hit the beach. It was unbelievable what those guys went through.”

The base at 29 Palms, Calif., was reopened and Ippolito’s contingent was the first to occupy it since it closed after WWII. “It was desolate.” Ippolito says. “A good training place for shooting artillery. It could handle 155 artillery, shoot for 20-30 miles and not hit anything.”

When not on training exercises on islands or at 29 Palms, Ippolito stayed at Camp Pendleton, going on patrols and taking part in maneuvers. The men lived in 4-story barracks housing over 100 soldiers. The workday ended at 5 with evenings and weekends free, except for rotational guard duty. Ippolito usually stayed on base while off duty. “I didn’t have money,” he says. “Pay was about $78 a month.”

Ippolito was discharged in October 1953 and returned home to Chicago. Luckily, he did not see combat. “You can only appreciate that you did what you did,” he says. The real heroes, he feels, were four of his childhood buddies: guys who all hung out on the street corner together and who weren’t as lucky.

Cpl. Sirio Ricci was a machine gunner with the Marines in Korea. There were three hills named Carson, Reno and Vegas because they were such a gamble to keep. On March 29, 1953, Ricci was engaged in battle on Vegas Hill. He was walking up and down, checking that his men were dug in when he was hit and killed by a mortar. Ricci was awarded the Silver Star. “He was at the wrong place at the wrong time,” laments Ippolito. The Corpsman who notified Ippolito about Ricci’s death wrote, “They killed so many of them, they looked like dead logs out there.”

Pfc. Johnny Puccini, was a forward observer in the Army. He also took on the added duty of stretcher-bearer because one of his buddies just could not handle the job. His unit was overcome by North Koreans and he was almost killed as they shot into a hut he was in before being rescued by South Korean troops. Puccini was awarded the Bronze Star.

Sgt. Joe Capizzano served in Special Services with the Marines. In November 1950, he was with the infantry in North Korea, close to the Chosin Reservoir. The end of the Korean War appeared near when suddenly, hundreds of thousands of Communist Chinese soldiers poured into Korea. Ippolito says, “They came over like flies and they overran them.” The Americans and their allies were forced to retreat in a strategic withdrawal.

Marine Pfc. Chris Mennella was on patrol in Korea when he stepped on a landmine that blew his calf off. Ippolito and Mennella were in advanced training together, and by the luck of the draw, Mennella deployed to Korea and Ippolito stayed back. Mennella recuperated at Coronado Naval Hospital near Camp Pendleton and Ippolito visited him on Sundays. “I used to push him in the wheelchair,” remembers Ippolito. Mennella was awarded the Purple Heart.

“I felt terrible!” Ippolito says, when he learned Ricci was killed. “He was like a brother. You feel guilty. I always question myself, how would you be, fight or flight? You don’t know.”

Ippolito married his wife, Helen, in November 1953 and they have three children and eight grandchildren. His son, Chuck, was a corporal in the Marines as crew chief on the F-4 Phantom jet fighter/bomber. Ippolito is retired from Illinois Bell where he was employed for over 33 years as a telephone repairman.

“I love the U.S. Marines Corp.,” Ippolito says, “and would not take any amount of money in exchange for my experience and what it meant for the rest of my life.”

He remembers Ricci’s mother crying, “How come all the boys come home, but not my son?” Ippolito softly recalls her saying. “How do you answer that?”

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Linda Grisolia

June 30, 2021

Army Sergeant Casey Presta

As a member of the 34th Infantry Division during World War II, he battled his way up the peninsula where his father was born.

One of five children, Ferdinand Prestia was born in 1921 to Peter and Jenny (Tavolina). His father immigrated to Chicago from Marsala, Italy, by himself when he was 17 years old. The family moved several times during Prestia’s childhood, always in Italian neighborhoods, before settling in the 3900 block of West Flournoy Street.

Prestia graduated from Sumner Grade School and attended Crane Tech High School. Over the years, his father worked hard to bring his brothers, sisters and parents over from Italy, and Prestia grew up with many relatives close by. “At that time, you had a big family you all get together,” he says. “Christmas, my mother would bake everything.” He remembers his mother as a good cook. “She used to make breaded veal, out of this world,” Prestia says. “That was a favorite, everybody’s favorite, I guess.”

Baseball was a popular pastime for Prestia, his brothers and friends, and they played whenever they could. During a game, someone called him “Casey at the Bat” and the nickname, Casey, stuck and remained with him through life. “My mother called me that; my father called me that; everybody called me that,” says Prestia.

He was working at a tailor shop when he was drafted into the Army in October 1942 and completed basic training at Fort Carson, Colorado. Prestia remained there for a year learning survival and combat skills as an infantry soldier in both the mountains and jungle. “We didn’t know where we were going to go,” he says.

Prestia was assigned to the 168th Regiment, 34th Infantry Division, and in June 1944 boarded a ship for a 10-day voyage across the Atlantic Ocean. “We were lucky no German boat was allowed to sink us,” says Prestia. After a two-week layover in North Africa, he shipped to Naples and remained in Italy until December 1945.

Fluent in Italian, Cpl. Prestia led patrols from Naples through Rome and the northern Apennines, searching for Germans. He carried a Thompson submachine gun and a .45. “Well every nighttime, they wanted somebody to lead a patrol to talk to the Italian people; that was me,” he says. “We’d go around to the Italian people and ask them ‘Did you see the Germans? Were the Germans here?’” Most of the patrols were at night to avoid being seen by the German soldiers.

Day and night, Prestia and his fellow soldiers were always on the move looking for the enemy, in and out of many towns, taking shelter when and where they could. “Sometimes you slept; sometimes you never slept and sometimes you didn’t get anything to eat,” he says. After about 30 days on the line, the soldiers were pulled back. “If you’re lucky, you get a rest … a shower and something hot to eat,” Prestia recalls. In the mountains, they ate K rations. “You got to eat it,” he says, “or starve.”

Going through the mountains was treacherous, and, “It was cold, plenty cold,” says Prestia. One night they came across a bomb-damaged house and the lieutenant told his men to go inside. Prestia noticed a wood-burning stove along the wall. “Boy I wish this thing would throw some heat,” he said to the others. “No sooner than I said that a bomb comes through the roof, lands about two inches away from my stomach, never went off,” he says, shaking his head in disbelief. The soldier next to him gently picked it up and carefully carried it outside. “There was a whole bunch of us in there. If it went off, I don’t know how many would have been killed,” Prestia says. “I tell you, I prayed to the Lord. I said, ‘Give me another day.’ When you go to war, it’s day by day. You live today, you don’t know if you’re going to die tomorrow.”

He had many close calls. One night, Prestia took his turn in a foxhole. “All of a sudden someone takes a shot at me, and I could feel that thing a couple inches from my head,” he says. “I could feel the breeze alright.”

Another night, taking shelter in a dark barn, Prestia lay down to get a few winks, felt someone next to him and said, “Hey, move over!” No response. “I was sleeping next to a dead German!” he says, voice rising with emotion. “I didn’t know that. Yeah, I had a lot of fun,” Prestia adds sarcastically.

Walking through a town where the Germans had fled, Prestia suddenly heard someone call out behind him, “Comrade!” He quickly turned to find a German soldier surrendering to him. “I didn’t know where his gun was. Maybe inside the house where he was hiding,” he says. “But he could have shot me.”

One night, the soldiers took shelter in an empty cow barn. “We go in, take our stuff off. I don’t know how long we stayed, until the lieutenant says ‘Saddle up men, we’re going out,’” Prestia says. They were about 50 feet away when a bomb flew in and flattened the building. “If we were in there, God knows how many would have got killed.”

One of Prestia’s cousins was also in Italy, and on a particular night they were both under attack on the mountain. After a gruesome shelling by the Germans, Prestia’s unit was pulled off the line. He was handed a note from his cousin that read, “I’m hit! I’m in the hospital.” Prestia hitched a ride to the hospital in Naples for a quick visit with his cousin, whose leg was torn up by shrapnel. Unfortunately, the doctors couldn’t save his leg. Prestia later spent six weeks in that same hospital when he became ill with hepatitis and jaundice.

Prestia remembers being at the Piazzale Loreto in Milan, where he saw the bodies of Mussolini and his mistress, Claretta Petacci, a horrible sight. “They were on the ground. They tied their feet with rope and upside down they hoisted them,” he says.

When the war ended, Prestia became a mess sergeant and cooked for the soldiers but was rotated home before he could receive his sergeant’s stripes. Prestia was discharged on Dec. 31, 1945, and returned home to Chicago. He married his wife, Jeroma “Jerri” DiGangi in 1946, and they have two sons and two grandchildren. They were married for 72 years until Jerri recently passed away. Prestia is retired from the car parts business.

“I was lucky in a lot of ways; survived about four times that I should have been dead. You worry about your life everyday, one day to another,” Prestia says. “War is hell! I don’t want to see anybody go to war.”

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Linda Grisolia

June 24, 2021

Navy Corpsman Rich Morbidoni

Assigned to Plane Captain School after boot camp during the Korean War, his dream of entering the medical field came true when he transferred to Hospital Corps School.

The oldest of two children, Richard Morbidoni was born at Norwegian American Hospital in Chicago. His parents, Alfredo Flora (Ricci), were both born in Castelfidardo, Italy, the accordion capital of the world. Alfredo came to Chicago when he was 17 years old to work in his uncle’s accordion factory. Flora immigrated with her mother and siblings when she was a toddler, taking a train from New York to San Francisco where her father was working. Morbidoni’s grandmother didn’t speak English and made the long voyage alone with three children under the age of 5. “You talk about pioneers and heroes, those were the pioneers and heroes,” Morbidoni says. “My grandmother was really a super, super person.”

Morbidoni grew up in the Logan Square neighborhood and attended St. John Birchman Grade School and Tuley High School, graduating in June 1952. He remembers Sunday gatherings with his aunts, uncle and cousins. “My mom was the best cook and baker,” Morbidoni recalls. “My sister and I always called her the Queen of the Raviolis; nobody made them as good as she did.”

With a 1A draft status and knowing he could be called up at any time, Morbidoni joined the Navy, leaving for boot camp at the United States Naval Training Center in Great Lakes, Ill., on Sept. 4, 1952.

It was the first time he was away from home. “I thought I might be homesick,” Morbidoni says, “but I felt fine.” After four weeks, his parents were allowed to visit and came every Sunday.

Morbidoni was interested in becoming an aviation photographer, but because there were no openings at the school, he transferred to the Naval Air Station in Pensacola, Fla., for Plane Captain School after graduating from boot camp. He was responsible for two planes, keeping them fueled, cleaned and ready to go. He would have the plane up and running before the pilot instructor and student came and then went through the checklist with them, signing off on it. Once the plane was in the air, Morbidoni had free time and became bored with this type of work. As a kid, he wanted to be a doctor, pharmacist or a dentist. “I always had a thing about the medical field,” he says.

When he learned of an opening as a striker for on-the-job training in sickbay, he interviewed and was accepted. He worked in the treatment room for three months, learning the basics of patient care, including giving shots.

Next came 20 weeks of intensive training at Hospital Corps School in Portsmouth, Va. A Navy corpsman cares for the sick and the injured. Morbidoni studied anatomy, physiology, pharmacology and lab work every day. “I loved it; that’s what I always wanted to do,” Morbidoni says. At night, he did chores and studied. Rules were strict, with lights out at 9 p.m. because the day began at 5:30 a.m. “We went to the head (bathroom), sat on the floor with our coffee and studied until 11 or so,” Morbidoni recalls.

He was assigned to the contagious ward at the naval hospital in Charleston, S.C., for a short time and then transferred to the “dirty surgery” ward. Patients were treated for such ailments as pilonidal cysts, hemorrhoids and vein strippings. “Well, I loved it,” Morbidoni says. “You really had to know what you were doing. This is where I learned to be a corpsman.”

After six months, Morbidoni was assigned to serve as the master-at-arms in charge of security at the Corps quarters where he lived. He periodically checked the grounds and buildings to make sure lights and plumbing were all in tip-top shape, and kept records in the logbook. “At first I kind of enjoyed it because it was a little less intense,” Morbidoni says. “After a while, I wanted to go back to corpsman work.”

In October 1954, he was transferred to Camp Pendleton, Calif. “I thought, for sure I was going over to Korea,” Morbidoni says. Instead, he attended Marine classes with other corpsmen for four weeks, learning how to live and practice medicine out in the field. Next he trained on the obstacle course and the infiltration course. Cold-weather training took place at Pickle Meadows, Nev. “That had to be the worst week of my life,” recalls Morbidoni. Finally, after more drills, exercises and class work, Morbidoni shipped out on the General AW Brewster, a troop ship. Recalling the crowded, horrible conditions on the ship, he says, “I wasn’t really happy about it.”

The ship entered the port in Kobe, Japan, on Feb. 14, 1955, after 17 days at sea. Morbidoni was on deck as the sun rose. “I remember thinking, ‘The Land of the Rising Sun’ and here I am experiencing the rising sun.”

Morbidoni was stationed at Camp Fuji, attached to the Third Marine Division in the C Med outfit. Initially he worked in supply and records and then became an X-ray technician. “I liked that because I was taking care of patients,” Morbidoni says.

Occasionally, Morbidoni’s outfit left camp. “We would do whatever we had to do and then come back,” Morbidoni says. LSTs (Landing Ship Tanks) took them to such places as Chigasaki Beach, Iwo Jima, and Inchon, Korea. They carried the casualties on cots from the LSTs to the hospital ship.

During one of these landings, Morbidoni’s foot slipped on the wet rope ladder while climbing down to the landing boat in the rolling sea. His buddy, Felix Valdez, lifted his legs back onto the ladder rung. His quick actions saved Morbidoni from being crushed to death between the two ships.

Morbidoni was the lead petty officer one night when he made the call for a chopper, saying “I have a guy that if he doesn’t get to the hospital soon, he’s gone.” He loaded the patient into the ambulance and headed to the landing area where vehicles waited to shine their lights to guide the chopper in. Morbidoni rode along with the patient as they flew through the mountains, with its lights off to escape enemy detection. He got the patient safely to Yokosuka Naval Hospital and then had to find his own way back to camp. “I felt good, that was my job,” Morbidoni says. “I just was doing what I was supposed to be doing.”

After 18 months in Japan, Morbidoni departed for the states on Aug. 1, 1956, and was discharged on Aug. 23, returning to his family in Chicago. His rank was 2nd class petty officer.

Morbidoni served in both the U.S. Navy and U.S. Army Reserves from 1976 to 1987 and remains active in numerous veterans as well as Italian-American organizations. He had a dental supply business for 30 years and was employed as superintendent of the Veterans Assistance Commission of Cook County for two terms.

Morbidoni loved his time in the Navy and remains in touch with several of his fellow corpsmen. “The military is a brotherhood that nobody understands unless they’ve been in it,” he explains. “It’s something special.”

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