Mission Accomplished

The era that Elvin Tannatt grew up in was one where men were being drafted and men getting shipped off to war was all too common, but it was the collective sticktuitiveness of the entire nation in that time that has left a lasting impact on World War II’s veterans who are left.

Tannatt, Milo Petersen, Bob Warrior and Durwood Purdy are all graduates of Fontanelle High School from the early 1940s, and they all served their country in the war.

“People have no idea. Everything was rationed, like your food,” Tannatt said. “Going to high school, we had three gallons of gas a week. How far would that get you today? You couldn’t even get to Creston or Atlantic.”

Tannatt graduated from high school in May, 1944, and was drafted five months later, three months after he married the love of his life, Shirley.

“We had training in California for 12 to 14 weeks and then they sent us home for 10 days or so, and Shirley came and got a job on the base,” Tannatt said. “We came back and they put me on a ship to the South Pacific.

Tannatt’s ship had a final destination of the Philippians. He remembers of the wide array of men he served alongside.

“You never saw the men who took training with again,” he said. “I ended up in the Americal division. The war with Japan was over in August, so in two or three days we were on a ship to Japan, and in September of ‘45 we landed in Yokohama, Japan.”

Tannatt’s division was deactivated a short time after they arrived in Japan, they dispersed further and Tannatt was assigned to be a criminal investigator in downtown Tokyo.

After spending a whole year in Tokyo, Tannatt returned stateside and went on a train to Illinois, where he was discharged in November, 1946.

“I went right back to farming. I was born and raised on a farm and Shirley and I spent 50 years there. We’ve spent 24 in town but still have all our farms,” Tannatt said. “All of us [who fought in the war] couldn’t wait to get back home to get back to work. Everybody was wanting a job and everyone was wanting to get back to normal.”

Purdy was much the same, wanting to fulfill his calling but get home, back to normal.

Although he didn’t see much combat during his service, entering the Navy in March 1945, just five months before the atomic bombs rained down on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, Purdy was honorably discharged in mid September 1946.

After attending boot camp at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center, near Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Purdy returned home for a 10-day leave, and he returned to some great news.

“All the papers were flying out of the windows that the war with Germany was over,” Purdy remembers. “I stayed in what they called OGU [or Outgoing Unit] at Great Lakes, and then over the public address system they said there were 11 guys who were to report to the office. Us 11 guys, they sent us to Bunker Hill, Indiana.”

At Bunker Hill, Purdy was a maintainer for a small airstrip that was used to train pilots.

“I was driving down the road and had a breakdown on my tractor, and the guy that came out to help me said the war with Japan was over with,” Purdy said. “My service career was kind of short.”

Purdy and Tannatt are merely highlights among a multitude of others from the Fontanelle and surrounding areas who have served their country.

Petersen graduated from Fontanelle in ‘43 and spent two years thereafter serving as a jeep taxi driver in the Philippines. He had the honor to taxi General MacArthur around. Warrior served in the Navy, and then the Coast Guard, giving s total of over 25 years of service. He was a Morse code operator on a plane that flew many high ranking officers to their destinations.

Kay Jensen, Donald Winters, Eugene Jensen and Gene Jacobsen are all names that emerge when talking about the Korean War. David Homan, who graduated from Bridgewater-Fontanelle in 1964, served in the Air Force, then the National Guard, giving a total of 26 years of service to his country.

As for World War II veterans, many of them just wanted to return home to farm. Tannatt sought that ending to the story, and so did Purdy, who farmed for a few years near Exira with his brother, Ronald, and then farmed land near Fontanelle for many years after.

“I wanted to be on the farm, my brother had a farm, so I was happy to have a chance to farm with him,” Purdy said. “I wasn’t a military-minded guy. I went and I did everything Uncle Sam asked me to do.”