Veterans Day Salue 2022 - part 1

A special publication by the

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WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2022

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VETERANS DAY

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Honoring all who serve We’re pausing, reflecting and saluting America’s veterans—who work hard to defend our freedom, every day.

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park rapids enterprise | Wednesday, November 9, 2022

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Petersens dedicate themselves to Honor Flights

By Shannon Geisen Park Rapids Enterprise Bob and Debbie Petersen will tell you there has always been a thread with uniforms in their family, whether it was as military serviceman, paramedic, wildland firefighter, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officer, Cub Scout leader or Boy Scout.

“We’ve always served in that capacity in the community in one way or another,” Bob said in a phone interview. “We’ve always been a family that’s really felt this country has given us so much, we want to give back to it.”

The Petersens have been recognized for their dedication to the Mid-Michigan Honor Flight program since 2015. Bob is vice president, while Debbie handles registration, lanyards and bookwork.

“We’re honored to serve with them. Within our team, we have to raise over $250,000 in volunteer donations, so it keeps us very busy doing that,” Bob said.

Park Rapids connection

A 1973 Park Rapids High School graduate, Bob was born and raised in Park Rapids.

Debbie was born in

of Fort Ord, Calif.,” he explained. “When I got out in ‘78, I came back to Park Rapids and I joined the active Army reserve and was stationed out of Walker. I was assigned with the unit in Fort Wainwright, Alaska.

That was our sister unit.

I did four years with the active Army reserve.”

When he graduated from Brainerd tech school, he moved to Michigian where he got a job as a research diver for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service working on invasive species.

In 1999, he joined the Army National Guard.

“I always say I had a mid-life crisis, and rather than get a younger woman and a motorcycle, it was safer for me to go back into the military,” he said.

He served for five years at the Camp Grayling Military service Joint Maneuver Training Bob served in the U.S. Center at Grayling, Mich.

Army infantry.

It’s the largest National “I did four years in Guard training facility in active Army. I was with the U.S. the 4th Infantry DiviBob worked on the M1 sion during the Vietnam Abrams tanks. era, then I was with the He was sent to Califor2nd Infantry Division up nia, Germany, Afghanion the DMZ in Korea. stan and a couple locaContributed/Bob and Diane Petersen Then I came back state- tions stateside.

1973 Park Rapids Area High School graduates Debbie and Bob Petersen are side and went with the 7th Infantry Division out PETERSENS: Page B4 devoted volunteers for Mid-Michigan Honor Flight.

Minneapolis. “I moved to Park Rapids when I was in ninth grade and graduated from Park Rapids High School in ‘73 also,” she said.

“I didn’t like girls until she walked into the room,” Bob recalled of their ninth-grade encounter. “What’s the Bambi thing? I was twitterpated. I had my horses and my hunting. I was OK. Then she walked in and rocked my whole world.”

They’ve been married for 48 years.

“I always say I get five years’ extra credit because it took five years to get her to like me,” Bob said.

During their married life, they have lived in numerous places, including Park Rapids.

They currently reside in Michigan.

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Capturing history

ing their service to the war.

“This Vietnam veteran turned around and pinned it on my grandson. My grandson said, ‘Sir, I need to earn this.’ And he said, ‘Son, you earned it,’” Bob recalled.

From Page B3

All told, Bob spent 13 years in the military.

The birth of their first grandson was pivotal.

“I kinda decided that family was more important than having a few more years of military, as far as retirement.”

The Petersens have two daughters and four grandchildren.

Honor Flights

There are 138 Honor Flights hubs across the U.S. Mid-Michigan Honor Flight hosts two flights each year, one in the fall and spring.

“We take over 100 vets per flight to Washington, D.C.,” Bob said.

Fully committed to this cause, the Petersens have forfeited vacations and donated their energy to raising funds.

Everything they do is voluntary. They do not accept reimbursement for their time, gas expenses, hotels, meals or other expenses.

“We cover 51 counties, so we’re very mobile,” Bob explained.

It is a nonprofit organization, so “almost every penny that we earn goes toward accomplishing this mission,” he said.

“Why do we do this? We’ve seen what it’s like to live outside this country. We’ve seen the impact the veteran community has had on this world. If it wasn’t for them and their service, we wouldn’t have the lifestyle that we have. We need to do it. We owe it to this country,” Bob said.

Debbie said, “And we owe it to these veterans. When we go on these flights, it’s amazing. Some of them say it took 60 years for this healing to happen.”

One vet described it as “getting his soul back,” she

Begins with Boy Scouts

The Petersens’ commitment to Honor Flights began in 2015 when their oldest grandson, Tyler, wanted to complete an Eagle Scout Project.

Tyler decided to partner with Mid-Michigan Honor Flight “because he wanted to do something with the veterans,” Debbie explained.

“That’s when we started getting involved.”

Bob said Tyler wanted “to fund four combat Vietnam veterans to go with four WWII veterans to Washington, D.C. to see the memorials this country built for them.”

Tyler raised $13,000 to accomplish this goal.

He was paired with a vet on the trip who was a POW in Vietnam.

“Tyler was his guardian.

So you have an honoree and a guardian,” Bob explained.

“Through this project, he was able to lay a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier with this veteran and a colonel who had been in WWII, Korea and Vietnam.”

Later that evening, the Vietnam veterans were given their 50-year pin commemorat-

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All told, Bob served 13 years in said. “A lot of these veterans have carried the pain from having to be in war and kill people for a lot of years. Once we take to them to D.C., the healing has finally started.”

You can see the external scars, but not the internal ones, Bob added.

Bob shared the story of an American soldier in WWII who took a Belgian woman, recently liberated from concentration camp and still wearing prison rags, to a dress shop and bought her a new dress.

“He told her, ‘Put this life behind you. Go ahead.’

Fast-forward. For 50 years, she always talked about the Holocaust and mentioned this soldier,” Bob said.

An Honor Flight veteran revealed that he was this unnamed soldier. But he’d never told his family. The guardian contacted the Belgian and arranged a conference call.

“Lo and behold, it was this gentleman. So 50 years later, she got healing and he realized that his kind gift was important. Five days later, he passed away. That history would’ve been gone without Honor Flight,” Bob said.

A Vietnam vet attended Honor Flight with his daughter as guardian. The vet handed Bob his cell phone, saying he has trouble telling people how he feels. A note on the phone explained that the vet was a sniper in Vietnam. It read: “My buddy and I were under attack.

He tried to save my life. I tried to save his life. He did a better job, and he died in my arms.

I’ve not made a friend since Vietnam, but I made friends on Contributed/Bob Petersen Honor Flight.” the military.

Mid-Michigan Honor Flight The names on memorial and the Petersens have received walls are not simply names, awards. he continued. “Those are their But the focus is the veterans.

19-year-old comrades that “We’re just kinda the wheels saved their lives or gave their under the bus,” Bob said. lives and sacrificed, whether “They are the bus. It’s all about it was to the country or what- them.” ever your belief is. You still Shannon Geisen can be reached at served.” sgeisen@parkrapidsenterprise.com.

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VETERANS DAY

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Army vet didn’t see combat, but did see its cost Despite being a resident of the Cottages at Heritage, a memory care unit, Robert “Bob” Linder has a lot of details of his military service at ready recall, and according to Heritage staff, he loves to talk about it.

In a recent interview, the Hutchinson native shared some memories of his U.S. Army service from 1953-55.

“I served in Germany (in) regimental personnel,” he said, explaining that he “sat in the office and cut orders for anybody going anyplace in Europe, or back to the United States.”

Despite having a desk job, he took an interest in his basic training, where he was taught “to hit something with a rifle or with a howitzer.

We learned how to fire the 105-mm howitzer, the 155-mm howitzer and rifles, you name it.

Throw a hand grenade.”

As for his regular job, it was all about cutting orders, every day, for anybody traveling on assignment, on leave or

being transferred. “If the colonel went some place, you cut an order for him to go.”

What he enjoyed the most, Linder said, was traveling around Europe when he could get away – “which wasn’t very often.”

He recalled being in England, Scotland, France, Belgium, “right up the line” as far as Finland and Sweden. “I got to sit on the shores of Sweden,” he said, “but never to get up into their large cities. I’d like to because that’s where my dad was from.”

He also saw a great deal of Germany, and spent more time in Rome than anywhere else. “That’s a beautiful city,” he said. “Oh, man!

Lots of money there, I’ll tell you. … Went on down, saw where Columbus was born and raised. I got to see a lot.”

He said it was a real learning experience for him. He also enjoyed working with a lot of “nice guys from all over the United States,” playing sports and staying in good shape.

“I have good feelings

about the service,” he said, particularly the guys in regimental personnel. “Most of us had at least a high school education. Some of the guys had a college education, or near completion. We were just a good bunch of guys. It makes all the world of difference.”

Linder, himself, later went to college in St. Cloud, earning a bachelor’s and a master’s degree. He taught in elementary schools from Plainfield, Iowa to Hutchinson, then at a small college in South Dakota, before spending the last 16 years of his career as an administrator for Special Ed kids in rural Grand Forks and Walsh counties, N.D. Eventually, Linder said, he settled in Park Rapids because his daughter lives here.

Asked what advice he would give anyone considering a career in the armed forces, Linder said, “I wish every person in the world could visit France and see where all the American soldiers lay in graves, thousands of them. Boy,

that brought tears to my eyes, just being there – to think they gave up their lives for the rest of us. It is something else.”

Linder said he also thinks young people should serve because of the discipline as well as the chance to meet people from across the U.S. and around the world.

“Just no end to the number of people that I think GIs could meet and learn about, and learn more about their countries and what they had to live with,” he said.

Acknowledging that he was drafted, so he had no choice but to serve, Linder added, “I was fortunate. I learned how to fire a lot of weapons, but I never had to fire them in combat.”

He said he didn’t always think his Army time was a good experience, but he does now.

“I often wish I could go back to Europe,” he said.

“I’d just travel, talk to people, see what they’re thinking. A lot of people in Europe speak our language very well. They’re very interesting.”

Frank E. Soukup Jr. USMC LCPL

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Sylvester Jacob Eischens Air Force Tech Sergeant, Staff Sergeant 1953-1957

Anthony J. Eischens U.S. Air Force Chief Master Sergeant Served 22 years

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Leah Bliss U.S. Navy Specialist Served 4 years

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VETERANS DAY

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Vet enjoyed variety of work in Vietnam-era service

By Robin Fish Park Rapids Enterprise

ing up at that time, Ronald “Ron” Goeh- he never ring, a resident at the s e r v e d Heritage Living Center i n - c o u n in Park Rapids, started try – but life in Akeley, but has his brothJim, Goehring lived “from there all the er, did. way to Florida.”

“I don’t think, back His career experience includes working at R.D. then, you could have Offutt Farms as well as more than one family Seagate Technology, a member in Vietnam,” Twin Cities-based firm he said. “He came out that made computer pretty bad.”

Recalling that Jim chips for satellites.

Part of that story was was bombed with poia stretch in the Army son gas, Goehring said National Guard, from his brother was shipped when he graduated high home and died six school in about 1966 months later.

Meanwhile, Ron was until October 1977.

“I joined when I was stationed at Fort Polk, in high school,” he Louisiana, where his said, “and the minute duties included driving I graduated, they flew an armored personnel carrier – an amphibious me off.”

Although the Viet- tracked vehicle used to nam conflict was heat- fetch soldiers back to

Combatcamerauk / Shutterstock.com

land after landing an airplane on water – as well as a “deuce-anda-half,” a 2-1/2 ton truck that was apt to get stuck in six-foot-deep mud holes. Sometimes,

he carried a .55-caliber machine gun around.

“It was a lot of work, but sometimes you had fun,” he said. “The thing that was important about it was about

the training, and all of the troops getting ready in case something happened.”

Goehring said it made him happy to think they were the backup for other troops.

“We were ready,” he said.

Despite serving stateside, Goehring recalled bringing home some memories he’d rather forget. “Some people got hurt,” he said.

“Some people got killed on the rifle ranges. They were all dumb accidents, like kids playing around. But then, we were all kids to start with.”

His advice to today’s young people who may be thinking about entering the service is, “If you don’t want to go in, don’t go in. Because

you have to want to go in and do what you do.

The people that were ordered in there, they hated every minute of it and you could tell by how they acted. But some of us, we liked it.”

Specifically, he liked the work. “It wasn’t just all one job,” he said. “You have a lot of jobs to do.”

Later, Goehring participated in the Akeley American Legion post, carrying the flag in the parade and helping build a big horse trailer decorated with flags and flowers.

Overall, he said of the service, “I enjoyed it. I don’t think I’d ever do it again. I’m a little too old for it!”

Robin Fish can be reached at rfish@parkrapidsenterprise.com.

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VETERANS DAY

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Retired sheriff served with honors in Vietnam, Bosnia Editor’s note: The Park Rapids Enterprise interviewed Larry Johnson about his military service in Sept. 1993.

He worked for the Park Rapids Police Department in the early 1970s and was elected Hubbard County Sheriff in 1978, retiring in 1998.

That article was re-published in a Veterans Day tribute in 2003. Johnson was again interviewed in Jan. 2003 after returning from an 18-month United Nations peacekeeping mission to Bosnia.

Johnson passed away on Sept. 25, 2022. This article is a compilation of previous ones.

Born in Aitkin, Minn. in 1943, Larry Johnson enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1961. He served in Germany with the armored cavalry, spending 32 months overseas.

He was discharged in 1964, at 21 years old.

He volunteered for the Army again a year and a half later.

Before Johnson ended his stint in the military in July 1968, he had seen two tours of duty in Vietnam and earned two Army Commendation Medals for heroism and two Bronze Stars.

Contributed/Larry Johnson

During most of his years in Vietnam, Larry Johnson was in reconnaissance, but for one six-month stint he served as door gunner on a helicopter.

helicopters, but Johnson and others were pinned down for 30 to 45 minutes before the choppers arrived.

“They leveled the village,” Johnson said.

The incident took place Dec. 23, 1965.

One of the officers, who felt the team had saved their lives and recognized they didn’t have to accompany the medical detachment, put the team in for the Commendation Medal.

Each team member also received a Bronze Star.

“Basically, it’s because we survived it,” said Johnson.

After a year, the Army sent Johnson to Germany. He was assigned to a missile outfit and attended a telecommunications school for six weeks. “But it was all spit and polish,” Johnson said, so one night he and a buddy decided to volunteer to go back to Vietnam.

Johnson was reunited with his old outfit.

All the faces were new, though.

It was 1967. Johnson was 22. He was at Chu Lai on the coast, much

Johnson and others in the 1st Cavalry were deployed to Qui Nhon, which later became a key port for U.S. military operations in Vietnam.

About 15 miles inland, a clearing had been dozed and the area became home for the next six month. Johnson’s camp blocked a valley and

served as a supply base.

Johnson was assigned to a six-man reconnaissance team. Sometimes the men went off in pairs, but always worked in small groups to remain undetected. The teams checked out various areas for guerrilla activity. The recon teams also set up ambushes

and booby traps.

The 1st Cavalry moved to An Khe, about 100 miles farther north.

Johnson said this was thick jungle area, so dark you had to walk on paths and use a flashlight in the daytime.

While based at An Khe, Johnson earned his first medal. His recon team

was escorting a six-person medical detachment.

Part of their operations was to provide medical services to distant hamlets.

As they were leaving one village, they were ambushed by a company of Viet Cong and North Vietnamese. They immediately called for

Chad Sackett Minnesota Army National Guard Colonel

Lawrence Hensel Army Staff Sergeant

Margaret Hensel Air Force Fly Nurse

Leo Hensel Army Sergeant

David E. Zick Army Sergeant

Captain David Stowman US Marine Corps Vietnam Served 4 years

Matt Knott Army Infantry

Robert R. Natzel Navy PR3

Edward Guy Smith Navy E5

James Geisen U.S. Army Air Force SGT

Leo Wallnofer U.S. Army Private

Paul Bridwell Engineers 1st Lt

Russell H. Rasmussen Army Corporal

Zachary O’Hern Air Force Senior Airman

Tim Ranisate US Army Reserves Sgt Served 14 years Iraqi Freedom

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VETERANS DAY

JOHNSON From Page B7

closer to the demilitarized zone (DMZ), doing reconnaissance again.

The war had really heated up.

As a sergeant, Johnson earned his second Bronze Star and Commendation Medal on March 20, 1968.

The Tet offensive had begun Jan. 30 and was continuing, the 1st Cavalry wanted information from a village and Johnson’s recon team was sent after it. They were going from hut to hut when a Viet Cong tossed a grenade into a hut Johnson and his partner were in.

“All I really did was knock him out of the way, but it saved his life,” Johnson said.

Then one of the men on the team walked outside another hut and stepped

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Wednesday, November 9, 2022 | park rapids enterprise

appreciation he received from then U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, someone he greatly admires.

Johnson applied for peace-keeping duty via the internet. He was one of 170 selected for training from 5,000 applications. He thinks training he took at the FBI academy while he was serving as sheriff may have helped.

He was deployed in the summer of 2001. The first stop was in Sarajevo. Johnson was first stationed at Zvornik on the Serbia border as a civilian investigative detective.

“It’s where the mass United Nations graves were on the Serb side,” Johnson said.

Peacekeeper were Johnson became the Archaeologists the graves, only civilian in Bos- mining nia-Herzegovina in attempting to identify seven years to be deco- the thousands of bodies.

Johnson described a rated by the military.

Best of all, John- grave with 247 bodies. son said, is a letter of “The last four rows were on a landmine. Both of his legs were blown off.

Johnson went out and brought him back. “I walked in his exact steps – no farther.”

With sincere humility, Johnson said there were a lot of soldiers who deserved medals who didn’t get them because they either weren’t recognized by someone or weren’t seen.

After six months, Johnson had earned his three stripes. He decided he’d had enough. He was granted an early out.

Like many other Vietnam veterans, Johnson has never talked much about the war.

Charles M. Hensel Army Tech. Sgt. 5

Joseph Brumbaugh Navy Petty Officer 3rd Class E4

Diane Cole Air Force Sergeant

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all women and children.

That’s when I wanted to get out of there. It was the result of ‘ethnic cleansing’...all in the name of religion.”

Johnson’s request was granted and he was sent to Tuzla, north of Sarajevo, on the Muslim side.

His mission was to work in targeting major organized crime and

support anti-terrorism efforts.

For national security reasons, Johnson can’t say what he did to earn the extraordinary honors he brought home from his service in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

One of his honors is a North Atlantic Treaty Organization Medal for Services as a member of the International Police

Task Force Eagle.

He also received the Pennsylvania Commendation Medal for outstanding service to the Multi-National Division, an award from the 1st Battalion, 14th Infantry Regiment “Task Force Golden Dragons” and a UN Medal from the Tuzla region chief of operations and regional commander.

Allen Kruse U.S. Navy RM3

Fred Wallman III Army CW3

Harold Curtis Olson Army Staff Sergeant WWII

Donald W. Wiese U.S. Army Corporal Korean War Served 4 years

Anthony V. Eischens U.S. Marine Gunnery SGT Served 27 years

James D. (Jerry) Cole Air Force SSGT

Thank You for Your Service!

PARK AUTO SUPPLY TRACTOR PARTS AVAILABLE

801 East 1st St. (Hwy. 34) Park Rapids, MN 56470

(218)732-3371

THANK YOU

VE TER ANS Deputy Registrar #68, Inc. Motor Vehicle/License Center

Phone: (218) 732-4363

Thank you, Veterans!

322 Main St. S., Suite #1 Park Rapids, MN 56470 Fax: (218) 732-1460 Email: prdeputy@gmail.com Mon - Fri: 8:30 am - 4:30 pm PRIVATELY OWNED

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 Veteran Owned & Operated 

Whistle Stop Parcel Center

UPS

UPS Authorized Shipping Outlet prdeputy68@gmail.com

Owned by Local Firefighters!

1104 Park Ave. South • (218) 237-7378

MEET OUR HEROES! Our patient, Ring and his owner Tony Rouillard! Ring spent 3 deployments in Afghanistan as an explosive detection dog in the Military. After that Ring worked alongside

Dr Mia Long Dr Vickie Wang

his handler, Tony, while both in Washington for the Navy. In January 2019, Ring retired and was adopted by Tony. Thank you both, for your service and commitment to each other and our Country!

THE

“Skills That Heal and Hearts That Care!”

17261 State Hwy 34, Park Rapids • 218-732-3119 • arkanimalhospitalpr.com