Memo To: All the U.S. Marine Corps Birthday Party Participants

Happy Two Hundred and Twenty Nine Years!

Again all will have the opportunity participate in a local Marine Corps Birthday Celebration.  Several members will have the opportunity to attend formal affairs at their local Marine Corps League Detachments.  These events bring together Marines from the local area, as well as, former residents who return just for the affair.

Foster Cummings will be hosting his annual Marine Corps party on 7 November and will have several 613'ers in attendance.  They will be coming from out of town, some from quite a distance and others just a few miles north from New Hampshire.

Herb and Sue Haroldson send their best to all.  Sue is recovering from eye surgery and is having trouble reading off the computer.  When e-mail is sent to her please use large font sizes.  They also have a new computer address which is located in the membership e-mail directory on the website. 

Due to poor telephone connections I have had to wait for members to try their luck and inform us of what happened in their sections of Florida.

Wayne Noble reported that he and his wife Freda are fine and have not had any damage to their property.  At the time of the telecon they were waiting for Hurricane Jean to show up off Florida and hopefully miss their living quarters.

Heard from Vern Beggs and he reported that in their section of Florida thee was damage.  They received some roofing damage which his son repaired.  It will take him a few more weeks to get a roofer to get over and make the repair permanent.

Hurricane Charlie missed them in Inverness, but Frances came closer.  They were without power for twenty three hours.  The eye of Jean came through the SW corner of their county -  Citrus County.

They were also visited by Hurricane Ivan which came close to them but no further damage.

They had gusty winds much stronger than the other hurricanes with a lot more rain but no more damage or power outages.  Their yard was littered with trees after every storm and all are waiting for the big piles of debris to be picked up the county for burning.

Anne’s brother Hugh Bothwell whom we met at the Peoria reunion passed away. He was a retired Naval Chief Warrant Officer and had an interesting war career.  He was on the Cruiser Nashville that escorted the Doolittle Tokyo Raiders and was in the European Theater serving on the battleship Texas during the Normandy invasion.  He got a dud German artillery shell in his stateroom during that battle.  That dud is on display on the deck of the U.S.S. Texas which is permanently located in Galveston, Texas.

Vern and Anne went to Illinois to attend the funeral and burial.

Stan and Peaches Richardson send their regards to all.  They reported that they were evacuated four times due to the hurricanes.  Their home did not suffer any damage but the trees in t he area took a beating and a lot of trash came on the scene.  They are still in the process of picking up the trash.

Wayne and Quen Youngren send their hellos and regards. They wish everyone good health and a great holiday season.  They are doing really well up in the Northland - they have had a good year and now with the fall they are getting pretty fall flowers rather than an early snow. 

Wayne reported that the officers had several members in attendance at their reunion in Pasco, WA not as many as they had thought would show up but they had a great time.  The weather was great and Carl and Dorothy Klingeman did a great job in setting up and event.

Nick Dudo sends his best to all.  He is still taking things easy due to some past physical problems but hopes that time will help to alleviate all.

Heard from Ed Alling who reports that all is well in Maryland and regards to all.  They have had good luck in missing the storms this season in Maryland.  Future storms may turn in their direction but he hopes that they don’t.

He sent along a picture of a hurricane showing its eye.  His son who lives in Sacramento, CA. E-mailed it to him. If possible I will try to get it into this letter as an attachment.

Sandy Hudspeth sends his regards to all.  He sent along more pictures of the hurricane damage in Florida.  If space permitted they would make an excellent addendum to the newsletter.

Several of the pictures were from around the area of NAS Pensacola where 613 held their reunion in May of this year.  The super highways were twisted, distorted and plain wrecked by the winds and the rain.  The same could be said of the many buildings that were damaged or  submerged in several feet of water.  He also included pictures of areas in Alabama which took a similar beating by the hurricane.

I also received a copy of a written report issued by the staff of the Commanding Officer of NAS Pensacola.  It is much too long for publication at this time, but the description of the damage means a lot of funds will have to be allocated to get the base brought up to some type of living standards for all personnel.  In addition road and bridge repairs will also be a priority.

Hopefully the hurricanes have had their day in the sun and will stop harassing the public.  The wind doesn’t show any let up regardless of how it shifts in its movements.

Jerry Gutshall says hello and regards to all.  Things are progressing for him slowly but surely he reports.

Foster Cummings sends his regards to all.  All continues well with he and Doris and they have only had to contend with some rain storms from the Florida hurricanes.

He spoke to D.C. Clay and reported that all was well with him.

Bill and Marian Kehr were on a western trip to Colorado and on their return to Georgia they drove down to Santa Fe.  We were able to get together for dinner one evening and had a great time.  My daughter was also visiting me and she enjoyed the visit with them. 

Bill said that they had traveled over 4000 miles on the trip and had around 3000 to go on the  rest of the trip to get home.  On the way home they drove into some severe rainstorms, remnants of the hurricane weather from Florida.  This caused them to go north for several hundred  miles and then south to Georgia.

They said to say hello and regards to all.

Heard from John "Chico" Duarte who sends his best to all.  He was scheduled to go into surgery on the 21st of October.  Hopefully the operation will not be too complex and he will be home as soon as the medical schedules allow it.

Alex and Jennie Ohlson send their regards to all.  They left for Florida on the 9^th of October via Ohio to visit with Alex’s sick sister.  From there onto Venice, FL.  They will be there until Mid May and then back to Cape Cod.

Alex retired from the South Port Golf Club as their P.G.A. Professional and Jennie will be returning to the Woods Hole Golf Club as the L.P.G.A. Professional in May.

They would both appreciate receiving visitors in Venice, Florida and their Florida address is listed under Roster Addendum at the end of this letter.

Lloyd "Mac" McDaniel says hello to all 613'ers.  He and Edna received tickets to the President’s Own, The United States Marine Band in Concert which they attended on October 7 at the Ben Davis High School, which is located on the west side of Indianapolis, IN.  They were of the opinion that the event was greatly enjoyed by all attendees.

He also had some of the pictures from The Leatherneck Bombers WWII reproduced and sent them along.  They came out very well and will be distributed in the coming months so that all can see them.

Heard from Willis Roose who sends his regards to all.  He enjoyed reading about the VMB 613 boxing talent and reminded us of Bo Bohannon of Titusville, FL.  Bo had many pro fights prior to his joining the Corps.  He was on the card when VMB 613 visited Burton Island (Ebeye) facing a well respected opponent and Willis reported that a vicious blow to the body of "Nat The King" ended the bout.  At that time King was the light heavy weight champion of the Pacific.

Willis and Betty left on 1 October for a trip to Finland, Russia, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.  They should have a great trip since it is still fall season with little or no snow to hinder their moving around the various countries.

Robert Akerman says hello and regards to all.  In his state of New Hampshire politics continues to be on the menu at all times.  He hopes that the election will arrive as scheduled and put an end to the chatter.

Received an e-mail from Ross Bennett’s grandson-in-law who said that he was fascinated by Ross’s experiences in the Pacific.  Particularly when he found out that Ross flew the Mitchell with the Howitzer.  He was entranced and decided to build a model of the PBJ-1H that is accurate to the type he would have flown.  He wanted to correspond with a squadron representative to learn more about the aircraft and the squadron.

I asked Robert Yanacek to assist him in his endeavor.  Robert sent along a lot of information regarding the aircraft and the grandson is satisfied that he has adequate information to complete his task.

While moving a stack of papers I came across a letter from the 12^th Defense Battalion Reunion Association written in May 1993.  This letter was in answer to my query regarding the address of George Richard "Dick" Long. 

The letter was interesting and I have included it as an attachment to this news letter.

The association member was also, under separate cover, able to get me the Florida address of Stan Richardson at the time of the letter writing.