A welcome tribute: Local WWII veterans eager for unveiling of D.C. monument

Friday, May 28, 2004 | 11:08 a.m.

Army Pfc. Larry Bauer was 19 years old and the second oldest man aboard an amphibious transport heading toward Omaha Beach under heavy fire at 6:40 a.m. on D-Day, June 6, 1944.

"There were about 60 of us -- me, a 21-year-old second lieutenant fresh out of West Point and the rest buck privates," Bauer, a Las Vegas resident of 31 years, said. "Before we stepped off the transport, I looked at the lieutenant and he looked at me. He had three eyes -- a bullet lodged in his forehead.

"He fell dead and I just ran for the shore. It could just as easily have been me who was killed that day."

Bauer took two bullets, one under an arm, the other in the side. Still he managed to crawl up the sand and fire at the enemy, though he admits that from his vantage point he never saw those upon whom he was firing.

For 79-year-old Bauer and many other veterans, the dedication of the National World War II Memorial Saturday in Washington, D.C., is not so much a tribute to men like him, alive today to view the honor.

He said the hallowed place is for that second lieutenant and the nearly 400,000 other U.S. soldiers, sailors and marines who lost their lives between 1941 and 1945.

Bauer says he is not going to the World War II monument dedication, preferring instead to remain in Las Vegas and attend a local Memorial Day weekend event Saturday at the Gobel Lowden Veterans Center and Museum, where the monument dedication will be simulcast on a large-screen TV.

Mitch Kuhn, 82, a Las Vegas resident of 15 years, also was wounded during the war. He will attend the ceremony in the nation's capital as Nevada's representative among 50 Military Order of the Purple Heart Veterans -- one from each state -- whose expenses are being paid by the organization.

"This is really our last hurrah," said Kuhn, whose brother, Ernest, was wounded in the Battle of the Bulge about a week after Mitch, an Army infantry private, was shot in the back by a sniper while on patrol in France.

"I believe this will be my last visit to Washington, D.C. It is a shame it took so long for them to build this monument, but I'm glad they finally did."

Paul Schultz, a Las Vegas resident of 42 years and a Navy veteran of World War II and Korea, said he visited the memorial two weeks ago to avoid the huge crowds expected this weekend.

"It's a lot bigger than I imagined," the former aviation first class aerial gunner said. "It is very impressive and honors all of the services."

The column-lined monument is between the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument. It is the first national memorial dedicated not only to the men and women who served in the U.S. armed forces during that period, but also the Americans who supported the war effort on the homefront.

That's important to eight-year Las Vegas resident Billie D'Entremont, 84, who served in the Coast Guard as yeoman second class recruiter in the Great Lakes region and as a receiving station clerk in Hawaii during World War II.

"During that period there was a great swell of patriotism, and we all joined together to help the war effort," she said. "If you didn't join the service like I did, you worked for the Red Cross or you were an air raid warden. Everyone did something to help the war effort.

"That's probably why it took so long for us to get a monument because it would have to be a monument that honored every American who lived back then. We never thought that was necessary because we were just doing what we thought we should have been doing."

Marjorie Bowman Tantlinger, 79, a Las Vegas resident of two years, joined the Navy during the war because she felt it was her duty to replace her brother, Harland, when he was killed in 1943 in Germany.

"I felt so bad, I had to do something to help," said Tantlinger, a nurse's aid apprentice first class who performed duties such as reading to the wounded soldiers to keep their spirits up. Among them was a young man who lost both arms and legs, she recalled.

While some local veterans like Bauer recalled the horrors of the war, others say the wartime memories that most stick with them are of a different nature.

"I was an aviation mechanic in Dayton, Ohio, the day Pearl Harbor was attacked," said Schultz. "As a newsboy on the street corner yelled 'Pearl Harbor Invaded,' P-40 Tomahawks flew overhead and guns were mounted on government building rooftops. You knew something really big was happening."

Tantlinger recalled taking a bus to Washington, D.C., after boot camp. Admittedly naive, she showed up at the back door of the White House and told a guard, "I just stopped by to wish President and Mrs. Roosevelt a Merry Christmas," she said.

One of Kuhn's most lasting memories was of him recovering in a British hospital from a bullet wound that barely missed his spine, and receiving a small packet of mail.

"They were letters from my brother Ernest, who I later learned was wounded and captured by the Germans," Kuhn said. "The letters had piled up while we were in combat. I read everyone of them, word for word, several times.

"It was a sad time back home for our parents who in the same week got two telegrams -- one telling them I was wounded and the other telling them Ernest was missing in action."

Ernest Kuhn also survived the war and today lives in California.

D'Entremont said she believes the lasting lesson of World War II is that "if the American people have a good cause, they will rise to the occasion."

Schultz said, "We learned isolation is not the preferred way to deal with the world's problems."

"I don't think we learned anything," countered Bauer, who has a son, Col. Michael Bauer, who graduated from West Point, and a grandson Matthew Gonsalves, a Navy hospital corpsman who was wounded in Iraq earlier this year.

After the war, local veterans said they simply picked up their lives from where they had been interrupted and moved on.

Bauer, who served in the Merchant Marine from 1941 to 1942, remained in the Army until 1972 and then served in the Coast Guard for two more years before retiring. A widower, he is a father of three, a grandfather of three and a great-grandfather of four.

After Kuhn left the service, he graduated from the University of Southern California and became a certified public accountant. A widower who is remarried, he is a father of three -- one of whom served in Vietnam -- and grandfather of six.

After the war, Schultz became a pilot for the Federal Aviation Administration for 38 years and today collects artifacts from European World War II battlefields. A widower, he's a father of two, grandfather of four and great-grandfather of one.

After the war, D'Entremont became a longtime auditor for the Internal Revenue Service. A widow, she is a mother of four, grandmother of seven -- one of whom served in Iraq and returned home this year -- and great grandmother of six.

Tantlinger wanted to become a nurse after the war, but a leg ailment prevented her from fulfilling her dream. She instead went to bible school and raised a family. A widow, she has three children, one of whom became a nurse, and six grandchildren.

Several of the veterans interviewed said their health would not permit them to make the lengthy trip to Washington for the dedication ceremony.

The official national memorial Web site says because many World War II veterans will not be able to make the trip for the monument dedication, "We encourage organizations and communities across the country to schedule local events and activities that pay tribute to them."

To that end, the Gobel Lowden veterans museum has moved its annual Memorial Day ceremony up one day from its traditional Sunday slot to make the World War II monument dedication the focal point of this year's event.

"We decided to do the ceremony and simulcast because a lot of our World War II veterans are either not in good enough shape to get on a plane or just cannot afford such a trip," said Caryl Gobel, veterans museum spokeswoman.

"But we still wanted to provide them a way to celebrate the thrill of the dedication of this monument to them. We thank them for their contributions and the spirit they pass down to veterans of other wars. We always say that in our museum veterans live forever."

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