Community Corner

Memorial Day Memories: Tosa Veterans Recall Service in WWII

For these two men, the war did not wait. They were in it from the beginning.

Some 16 million Americans served in World War II. Most of them were very young men and women when they entered their country’s service in the largest conflict the world has ever seen.

We are now entering the year that, on Dec. 7, will mark the 70th anniversary of the United States’ entry into that war. Survivors number fewer each year, and fewer yet are those who were in it from the beginning.

For Arnold Olson and Leonard Naeser of Wauwatosa, the war did not wait – it came to them.

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In 1941, Olson, now 94, had just finished his schooling as an assistant pharmacist in September. When war broke out, the U.S. Army was desperate for men with his kind of training. He was called up and entered service the day after Pearl Harbor.

The Army also came looking for Naeser, now 88. He had graduated from Custer High School in 1940 and wanted to fly. At that time, the Army Air Corps would take only those who had at least two years of college, and Naeser didn’t want to wait. He joined the Royal Canadian Air Force.

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After Pearl Harbor, Naeser said, “The military sent a train from Halifax to Vancouver, picking up interviews with U.S. citizens. Most of us decided to return. I elected to fly in the Army. Most guys didn’t like to fly over water.”

At that time, the crisis was in the east. Olson was sent to the China-Burma-India Theater, where a ragtag army under U.S. Gen. Joseph Stilwell was trying to hold the Japanese at bay.

“It took 62 days to get there,” Olson said. “We were in a big convoy; as far as you could see was ships, all around the horizon. We stopped in South Africa for a week, then went on to Karachi, in India (now in Pakistan).”

Olson would be assigned to a 1,000-bed military hospital in Karachi, treating casualties of all kinds from what amounted to jungle warfare. Men were brought in with wounds, burns, strange tropical diseases.

“We weren’t issued guns,” Olson recalled. “I had to stand guard with a stick. About three-quarters of the town was off-limits due to leprosy.”

Naeser was sent to the Pacific Theater after he finished pilot training, assigned to fly B-25 “Mitchell” bombers. The plane, named for Milwaukee native Gen. William “Billy” Mitchell, had been designed as a medium-altitude bomber.

“I had special training in ground and air gunnery,” Naeser said, “so I thought I was going to be selected for the A-20, a ground attack plane. But I was surprised to be sent to B-25s.

“I was with the 38th Bomb Group, 405th Bomb Squadron, the ‘Green Dragons.’ We hit the Japanese air force just as they were losing their supremacy. So we played an important role.

“I guess I got my wish, because they turned the B-25 from a medium bomber into a strafer and skip-bomber. We hit the target at 300 miles per hour; the B-25 supposedly red-lined at 285.”

Olson would spend two years in the Karachi hospital before being sent to New Delhi. Surrounded by disease, he somehow survived the war without contracting any persistent illnesses.

Naeser was not so lucky. He got pneumonia with complications that kept him hospitalized for six months and “played heck with my vascular system,” he said.

When he finally was discharged from the hospital, still wearing leg braced, he wanted to fly again but had to seek waivers all the way to Washington. Finally, he was given back his wings and because of his experience was made a test pilot for the Far East Air Service Command.

“I flew 26 types, everything with a propeller,” he said. “We would check them out, test them, prepare them for combat.

“I amassed over 1,500 hundred hours, most as a disabled officer. I was a medical mess, flying, wearing elastic bandages over my legs.”

After the war, Olson returned to Milwaukee to pursue his profession. As a pharmacist, he managed Triangle Drugs in West Allis until he retired at the age of 88. He now lives with his son, Phil Olson, in Wauwatosa.

Naeser got a business degree in Madison and ran a number of businesses in the Milwaukee area. He now resides at Hart Park Square in assisted senior living.

Both men were once again guests of their government in November when they went on a Stars and Stripes Honor Flight to Washington to visit the World War II Memorial and other national historic sites.

For both men, the trip was interesting, but the highlight was coming home.

“When we got back to Mitchell,” Olson said, “there were people lined up 10 deep on each side. I think there were 6,000 people there to greet us.”
Naeser was greeted by his own throng.

“There were several thousand people there, but what I remember best is that 12 of my kids and grandkids all surprised me. They all came up from Florida.”

Nearly two years of work to showcase the stories of local veterans such as Olson and Naeser will come to life in November with the premiere of the documentary, "The Story of Stars and Stripes Honor Flight."

Stars and Stripes Honor Flight is a branch of the National Honor Flight Network that was started in Wisconsin by Port Washington resident Joe Dean.

The program has flown about 1,250 veterans from the Milwaukee area to see their memorials since it launched two years ago, Dean said; there are now a total of five branches in Wisconsin.

Daniel Hayes, the producer of the documentary, has traveled with the veterans from Milwaukee to Washington D.C. on several flights, collecting 90 hours of emotional material for the film, Dean said.

Hayes is hard at work editing the video, which Dean said they hope to premiere on Veteran's Day. The trailer is currently posted on You Tube.


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Stars and Stripes has a Facebook page, and here is their website.


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