Oral History Interview with Ronald J. Weinfurtner

[Interview Begins]

BELLORE: Today is 13th February 2020. This interview is with Ronald James Weinfurtner. I'm going to ask Mr. Weinfurtner to pronounce his name for me to make sure I've done it correctly.

WEINFURTNER: My first name is Ronald James Weinfurtner. For I did a perfect job.

BELLORE: I did. Okay. Who served in the United States Army from nine February of 1954 to thirty January 1957. Right?

WEINFURTNER: That's correct. It was January.

BELLORE: This interview is being conducted at the Wisconsin Veterans Home, Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin. And my name is Ralph Ford. I'm the interviewer. First off. May I call you Ron?

WEINFURTNER: Yes, you may.

BELLORE: Is that your preferred?

WEINFURTNER: Yes, I would rather. My mother only called me Ronny.

BELLORE: And when you were in trouble? Yeah. Okay. Ron, where were you born? Place?

WEINFURTNER: I was born in Stratford, Wisconsin, Marathon County.

BELLORE: And win.

WEINFURTNER: 5th month 27th 1935.

BELLORE: Okay. You know that I am.

WEINFURTNER: I am 84. My birthday will be May.

BELLORE: Okay. Obviously from birth until grade school, that whole lot of things going on, right?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah.

BELLORE: Well, tell me about the background of that time that you want me to know about.

WEINFURTNER: Part of it was depression. We didn't have a lot of money. Yeah. A 00:02:00lot of work to be done.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: As a young man.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: At all.

BELLORE: And father and mother's name.

WEINFURTNER: Mother. And father. My father's name was Frank Phillip Weinfurtner, and my mother's maiden name was Helen Harter.

BELLORE: And how do you spell.

WEINFURTNER: Harter. They were all of German descent.

BELLORE: Uh huh. Okay.

WEINFURTNER: My mother's parents came over from the from the old country of Germany. And, uh, my father's grandparents came over from the old country.

BELLORE: From Germany.

WEINFURTNER: Okay. And they were all farmers.

BELLORE: That was my next question. Is what did your father mother do?

WEINFURTNER: Well, my grandfather was a farmer, and my father worked for a 00:03:00waitress longer than here in Marshfield, Wisconsin. Yeah. During the war years. And the first part of that.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: There wasn't really a lot of work.

BELLORE: No, it was.

WEINFURTNER: It was hard times. But that all got better as the war ended.

BELLORE: Your father worked for Martys lumbar?

WEINFURTNER: No, Roddis lumbar and vernier.

BELLORE: And that was in Marshfield?

WEINFURTNER: Yes.

BELLORE: How about high school?

WEINFURTNER: Well, high school you know, I started playing football when I was 00:04:00in eighth grade.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: I was a tall kid, big kid. Okay. They used to come and get me to play with them. And then when I became a freshman, I was on varsity already.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. That was the sport that I liked the best. I think I was the best at that.

BELLORE: What did you do? What position were you?

WEINFURTNER: And the position? I was up the nose. The nose tackle on the defense. Okay. And I was an offensive tackle on offense. I was a 60-minute man. Worked both ways. We wore leather helmets.

BELLORE: At least you had helmets.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, no face mask.

BELLORE: Did you ever get hit in the nose?

WEINFURTNER: Oh yeah, lost a tooth too.

BELLORE: Those were the days.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah.

BELLORE: So, did you finish high school?

WEINFURTNER: Yes, I did.

BELLORE: Okay. And. And you graduated in what year, do you remember?

WEINFURTNER: 1953.

BELLORE: 1953.

WEINFURTNER: So you join, right? You know, the the I was still you know, it was right after that. I went to Canada up there and I worked up that same Marine. My dad was running the mill up there for Roddis.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: And I worked up in the same area. I did all kinds of work.

BELLORE: That was after high school and.

WEINFURTNER: After high school for just. I was only up there. Just. Just before Christmas, my dad came back to the States. Yeah. Anyway, I did everything up 00:06:00there, and my brother Dick and I, we every other day, we worked 16 hours. We were a night watchman at night and we worked during the day. But every other day, we'd switch to 16 hours, and the next day do it that way. We we had a pretty good check at the end of the week.

BELLORE: It sounds to me like you went into the service shortly after graduating from high school.

WEINFURTNER: I was.

BELLORE: Out of the front.

WEINFURTNER: Was from May till February.

BELLORE: Or May of 54 to February of 55. That or not.

WEINFURTNER: 53. February of 54. I went in. Right. And I graduated in 53.

BELLORE: May of 53.

WEINFURTNER: Got you. Yeah. The war was just. The treaty was signed then. You may not know what it was all about. World War wasn't over, but the treaty was signed. Right, right, right.

BELLORE: When you entered the service, were you. What were you doing that we are still working in Suzanne Marie or?

WEINFURTNER: No, I wasn't. I was kind of well laid off right then.

BELLORE: Getting ready to go.

WEINFURTNER: On. I we were at that day we went down and and decided we were going to go into the military.

BELLORE: And rest.

WEINFURTNER: Four of us in the pool hall, you know and.

BELLORE: This was in Marshfield?

WEINFURTNER: Marshfield, yes.

BELLORE: Pool hall.

WEINFURTNER: And when we went to Wisconsin Rapids and we were gonna get in the Marine Corps, but they couldn't take us right away. So what I, we did is the Army, they had an office across the street, so we said, Well, let's go over there. Maybe it'll take us today. So anyway, we went over and they didn't sign us right up, but they sign us up for the, I think it was the middle of next 00:08:00week, we went to Milwaukee and got swore in down there.

BELLORE: When when you entered the service, what next. After Milwaukee and the induction area was Milwaukee, then from there?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. We went right, right from there to, uh, to Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri.

BELLORE: Okay. But they have kind of a nickname for it, Leonard Wood.

WEINFURTNER: No, no just for Leonard.

BELLORE: Okay. I know of a nickname for him.

WEINFURTNER: Was you there?

BELLORE: I was not in Leonard Wood. No, I was at Fort Campbell.

WEINFURTNER: And Fort Campbell, what do you call it?

BELLORE: Lost in the Woods.

WEINFURTNER: Lost in the woods?

BELLORE: Fort lost in the woods. So what did you when you got to Fort Leonard? 00:09:00Was there anything striking about the place? Were they two story buildings, wood, concrete?

WEINFURTNER: They were wood.

BELLORE: One story, two story?

WEINFURTNER: No, one story. There was double bunk beds on both sides. You know, there was probably maybe I would say there was about forty men in there, maybe fifty. You know, in and out at the ends of the the the bunk sergeant and the corporal were in right. In a little, little shell rooms. Yeah. Open top or bottom.

BELLORE: Any of those instructors stick out to you or you remember any of the instructors from Fort Leonard Wood?

WEINFURTNER: Oh, I remember the company commander. And I was very I can't remember his name, but he was a captain.

BELLORE: Yup.

WEINFURTNER: And they were and I really did not the discipline didn't bother me 00:10:00that because I had been disciplined all my life.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: And, you know, I just did what they told me to do.

BELLORE: How long were you in Fort Leonard Wood, you remember?

WEINFURTNER: Well, I was there till I know we got on the ship in February of. Oh, 55. No. February 56.

BELLORE: Those 56 then were missing.

WEINFURTNER: We go all the way through. Wait a while. We were there 54 all the way to February of 54.

BELLORE: February of 54 is when.

WEINFURTNER: When I went overseas.

BELLORE: In February of 55 is when you went overseas?

WEINFURTNER: 54. No, February of 55. Oh 55. And I was in until end of 56.

BELLORE: 56, right?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. 56.

BELLORE: Right. So you spent two years overseas?

WEINFURTNER: Just about.

BELLORE: We will get to that in due time at the people.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, you got.

BELLORE: That right. Try and keep it logical. Yes. So how many weeks at Fort Leonard? I'm just guessing. And you were trained to do what?

WEINFURTNER: Well, there's a lot of things. You know, I first of all, I was in the combat engineers. They called us.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: We built Bailey Bridges. We blew up. I was I actually actually trained in explosives too. To use dynamite, right? No, we didn't. We used C-3 and primer coordinates. They taught use how to rig a steal beam, to break it. 00:12:00The primer cord was used to cut a tree off.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, we we would learn how to dismantle mines, stuff like that, you know, all of it that learned about how to set dynamite or primer Cord and all that stuff. We learned that, too. That was part of my training at Fort Leonard Wood.

BELLORE: And I don't know what what infantry was there over here.

WEINFURTNER: We We did the combat course, you know, the platoon. So whether they called an obstacle course, we did the rifle. You know, I was a sharpshooter.

BELLORE: That was quite a wide variety of things they were trained to do from the blowing up things and even the.

WEINFURTNER: You know, we even took bayonet training yet. Yeah, we all had bayontes when I was there. They took them away after a while.

BELLORE: Did you have any recreation time when they were in basic training?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, we went to Rally Minnesotta. There was a girls college there. That was recreation.

BELLORE: Rally Missouri?

WEINFURTNER: Yes, Missouri that I said Minnesota. Yeah. And I hope you had you know, we went down to the Ely young club and drank beer, you know, stuff like that.

BELLORE: So you got you got a little bit of time.

WEINFURTNER: Oh, yeah. We get a little high once in a while. We weren't old enough to drink yet, but oh yeah.

BELLORE: Probably didn't take a whole lot then. Oh. I'm just a little confused 00:14:00about the time frame. It was from induction. You went to Leonard Wood?

WEINFURTNER: Yes. And I stayed there till. Oh, well, I took a little leave, you know, in January of that year. And I think I got on a train. And what I remember sort of, you know, went all the way out to Fort. Out to, Washington State.

BELLORE: Okay. And why should it.

WEINFURTNER: In a name of the Boot camp? Well.

BELLORE: You know, I've had another interview that had that name and I've got 00:15:00the same senior moment. So we'll just suffice it to say that you were on leave where you were.

WEINFURTNER: You were? Oh, yeah. I took the train all the way out.

BELLORE: It wasn't a change of duty.

WEINFURTNER: No.

BELLORE: It was just a leave from Leonard Wood.

WEINFURTNER: No no, I went over to Wisconsin. I'm gonna leave that out. I think I had a week off now. And then after I left there, they took me to the cities, and I caught a train to go out. Fort Lewis was.

BELLORE: Fort Lewis okay?

WEINFURTNER: Fort Lewis, Washington.

BELLORE: So that was a change of station.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, it was just. Whoa. We were long overseas.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: We stayed out there about maybe nine days at the most, but they were shooting us for all different kinds of it. We only get half a day. They shot us up with different vaccinations.

BELLORE: Oh.

WEINFURTNER: Vaccinations and stuff. Yeah. That. You felt so damn bad. 00:16:00They let you have a half a day on that. Then the next day, they started it over again.

BELLORE: That would be in January of 1955 or thereabouts.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, well, I. We left the States in February.

BELLORE: I remember that's what I had written down here.

WEINFURTNER: We were telling me we were only over there about nine days.

BELLORE: Fort Lewis. Yeah, that was it.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah.

BELLORE: Replacement because.

WEINFURTNER: Well yeah. With those, all the guys were all going over to the Far East.

BELLORE: Okay. From Fort Lewis. You went to.

WEINFURTNER: Japan.

BELLORE: Where abouts? In Japan?

WEINFURTNER: Well, we landed at Yokohama.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: They took us to, uh. Uh, well, what we were in a repo depot. you know? Yeah, there was about 600 guys and the MM Patrick, and one stack 00:17:00troopship. The voyage was not that great. We got in some real bad water. It took us 24 days to get over there. Oh. One day we made, think it was four days, we made 50 miles and we got bounced around out there pretty good. And anyway, a lot of guys got sick, but they had to take four guys off the ship that couldn't walk off.

BELLORE: Wow.

WEINFURTNER: You know, and I never did get sick, you know, but I didn't feel good.

BELLORE: Right. But, yeah, 24 days from the time you left. Well, I used to get to Japan. Yeah. Yokohama.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. It was a repot depot. Yeah. Half of us went to Korea and half of us went to war was Northern Island of Japan. And we were at a place called 00:18:00Sotoshi, Japan.

BELLORE: And can you spell that? I can't.

WEINFURTNER: I can. Think it started with an S, you know, it was Japanese, Sotoshi, something like that. And then we were there. I that's where I got to go. And I don't know how they figured out where you had to go, but.

BELLORE: So half of those 600 guys went straight to Korea from that at the people. And the other half went to.

WEINFURTNER: It was I think I think some of them might have got some place else, but the first cab was up there and that's where I went through the first half. And the others might at once. Yeah. Other stations in Japan, some went to Korea.

BELLORE: Tell me about the place in Japan that you went to.

WEINFURTNER: It was cold and there was snow on the ground. And it was really close to Korea, about three miles across the water. And I could see I could see the checks Oh, marching over there, walking guard duty.

BELLORE: South Korea?

WEINFURTNER: No, North Koreans. That was just across the straits there. But anyway, the MIGs were flying in, and you know, that was still pretty hot, they trained us pretty hard. And then from there, I think we were only up there about two months. And from there.

BELLORE: What were you doing? What we are doing, doing the.

WEINFURTNER: Training, you know, we did just training every morning. We got up. We had to run five miles.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: And when they said it was a quick walk, what would it take us? It 00:20:00took us almost fifty minutes to go five miles. But anyway, that while we did our training, you know, now like I was in headquarters, headquarters company and I really wasn't trained in that part of what I did.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: I was put in a platoon that had three squads. Yeah, they called it counter fire. Everyone at the counter fire is up. Oh, you're almost like your advanced observation.

BELLORE: Tell me about that.

WEINFURTNER: Counterfire is. Oh, you're almost like your advanced observation.

BELLORE: Observation, right.

WEINFURTNER: And there were three platoons that we all had an instrument that was a picked up sound, and we would put it shot at azimuth. And on that, as with 00:21:00those three azimuth that we had, was put out a map, you know, where that crossed, you know, that sound machine we had would pick up like a machine gun or whatever was making such a big gun barrel, a tank or whatever, and that we'd call it back to the artillery or the. I'm sorry. Okay. Or, or or or the Air Force. And they could knock, knock that.

BELLORE: That gun out and whatever was making the noise. Yes. Okay.

WEINFURTNER: Okay. That was yeah, that's what I was trained. And then.

BELLORE: After the counter fire.

WEINFURTNER: Call for.

BELLORE: Fun. Interesting. That then was while you were stationed, you say northern Japan, you remember.

WEINFURTNER: Sotoshi one it was called. Sotoshi two up there too.

BELLORE: Sotoshi one. Okay. That being the base name.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, that was that first gal was out there and that's what I went to see. And then from there we went south.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: After we, we took the deuce and after that I, I slept in a town in a ditch that night, the first night. And that, that was that town that got hit by that big tsunami. Yeah, but they had that, that, not then they did, but they had that here. They had a nuclear plant then. Yeah, but what they had was that Sendai was the name of that.

BELLORE: You have a wonderful memory of. Yeah, wonderful. So when you headed south and out in the deuce and a half. When you got to where?

WEINFURTNER: To Sendai first. Just slept overnight. Yeah. I thought it was that's I think that's kind of interesting because of the fact that that big 00:23:00tsunami hit there and they had that camp there. You know where that left the nuclear nuclear plant. Yeah. And then from there, the next day we got north of Tokyo was about 60 miles. There was a place called Camp Wittington, and that was an old camp. It was old kamikaze base camp. Wittington Yeah, I think it was named after a general. And there I stayed the rest of my. Well, there's a lot of things we did.

BELLORE: Yeah, but your air base, your base.

WEINFURTNER: My base was camp Wittington.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: And.

BELLORE: For the entire time that you were in Japan.

WEINFURTNER: Well yeah, I'm still in Japan and I'm in the next island which is 00:24:00Hanshu and I never got any further south than that.

BELLORE: I noticed it in your DD-214. The location Hokkaido. Yeah. Where did that come in.

WEINFURTNER: I think Hokkaido was that that that first island.

BELLORE: Okay, that's for that. That's good. Okay. That's where that.

WEINFURTNER: I think. I'd have to look at that.

BELLORE: So. Sotoshi Base one. Okay.

WEINFURTNER: I'm pretty sure. Or its Hokkaido. What the heck? We got a pretty good idea. I maybe got them turned around.

BELLORE: Its not going to, What you remember of it is what's important.

WEINFURTNER: Hokkaido and Shotoshi one. Maybe that was Honshu up there. You said Hokkaido.

BELLORE: Hokkaido yes.

WEINFURTNER: Well maybe that's the way it was.

BELLORE: Well that's the only location mentioned in your DD-214.

WEINFURTNER: See I wasn't up there a long time. But I was there.

BELLORE: Yep that's the only thing mentioned.

WEINFURTNER: And then from. Well, that was about see if I got there probably in February, sometime in February, maybe the end of February. That was on the water 24 days and that. Well, it was the first winter I was there.

BELLORE: Which would be the winter of 55.

WEINFURTNER: 55 is what we want to Mt. Fuji and it had to be either 55 or 56. 00:26:00Wouldn't have been 56.

BELLORE: Well, 56 from what I can recall here and see. You were in Japan the entire year from from the 1st of January to the end of December for the entire year.

WEINFURTNER: Of 56.

BELLORE: 55

BELLORE: 55.

WEINFURTNER: 55, 56.

BELLORE: 55.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, so I had been there about two years on.

BELLORE: That word of your your date. When you were in the?

WEINFURTNER: Well the first year or now. I'll take that right from I figured around February.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: Well right away we got trained on straw with skis. And then we went 00:27:00to Mount Fuji and we skied up there and lived up there in those snowbanks.

BELLORE: How long were you?

WEINFURTNER: Well, we were up there till the spring, you know, until the snow started. Well, we weren't right at the top, but we were at about 2000 feet anyway, that we learned how to ski. We learned how to survive in winter.

BELLORE: So. Right.

WEINFURTNER: Okay. Yeah. You know, like sleeping in snowbanks and doing cross-country downhill.

BELLORE: Why what did you think was the reason for you being taught ski in in that what way.

WEINFURTNER: Well in Korea there's a lot of snow.

BELLORE: Okay yeah.

WEINFURTNER: And.

BELLORE: So you had heard rumors were.

WEINFURTNER: There was it over. Yeah. And we we were actually always on alert. 00:28:00And when they when we went to when we went to Mount Fuji, they didn't tell us where we were going. So we're gone. The only thing we know was we had been trained to maneuver on skis. How to turn around or how to fall. That's what we did. But they didn't tell us where we were going.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: And then after we got there, we had everything there. We got our mess kept there. We had we had five man of tents there when we were in camp. That's all we slept in. And it was cold, you know?

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: They they had like a gas depot there. They had 55-gallon drums and we could either burn gasoline, it had a stove or wood. And I remember at first 00:29:00day up there, I was about 40, probably maybe 40 yards from that good gas depot. And I went down to get to jerry cans for gasoline or gasoline for our stove and I had to set them to can start up pull at six times going up the hill at 40 yards. I was in pretty good shape, but I wasn't used to all skiing

BELLORE: Well, you're you're burning gas in your stoves.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: Eat outside. And usually cold.

BELLORE: This training that you were doing with Yeah. Furthering the preliminary ski training that you had on straw. How long did that last?

WEINFURTNER: Well, until spring. Couple months.

BELLORE: The whole spring, I, I don't know. Do they have the same fall and spring?

WEINFURTNER: It was about the same as the only thing is like we're a Camp 00:30:00Whittington was like we could see Mount Fuji, but that never really got rid of all that snow that you got. All the top part of that was always snow.

BELLORE: Try to get a feel for how your day--

WEINFURTNER: We are.

BELLORE: How your day went from when you woke up until?

WEINFURTNER: We had vehicles they were called weasels and otters.

BELLORE: What's the difference in the difference?

WEINFURTNER: One was bigger than the other. They all hit tracks on, like rubber tracks like a tank or like the keep we keep you up on the snow or not get stuck. And they used to drag. My platoon leader, We had a First Fleet that took the up on those weasels and otters, and we'd go up the mountain. Right. There was a ski 00:31:00lodge up there. They didn't have a lift or anything, but they had a rope pull. And we'd go up in the morning early, and then we at lunchtime, we'd ski all the way down, which was about eight miles. Well, maybe out of that eight miles, probably two miles was cross-country and a rest was downhill.

BELLORE: So you said weasels and otters? Yeah. Which was bigger?

WEINFURTNER: The otter.

BELLORE: Otter is bigger. How many men?

WEINFURTNER: Well, you could probably get nine guys in there, you know, but then we had ropes and you grab that and your skis on, they pull you up.

BELLORE: So you were nine men inside and some of them being pulled on a rope?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah.

BELLORE: I think that's an Environmental Protection Agency nightmare. Yeah. 00:32:00Okay. The training lasted until spring. Okay. Yeah, there was some training until spring. Then what?

WEINFURTNER: Well, then summertime time. We went back to Camp Whittington took everything back there and then we started. They brought in cargo nets and we're climbing on these cargo nets.

BELLORE: How did that make you feel?

WEINFURTNER: Well, we didn't know what the hell was happening either, you.

BELLORE: You know what cargo nets are for?

WEINFURTNER: Oh yea.

BELLORE: You know, going up and down cargo nets.

WEINFURTNER: Oh I suppose its probably to, you know, maybe make a landing on Korea or whatever? Well, anyway, then, of course, after we did enough of that, the longer work went on, well, they were all moving out, you know, everything 00:33:00had to go. And we ended up getting landing craft, bigger boats and.

BELLORE: Bigger boats.

WEINFURTNER: There. We had all were they had the landing crafts, you know, they had a I think they were call it had a doc, the name of the landing craft, Doc, where they had the equipment they had there. And, you know, we slept, you know, you know, kind of like a troop ship with a lot of men in there. We went floating around out there.

BELLORE: So you were just between Japan and Korea in ships.

WEINFURTNER: And Korea. We were headed actually for Iwo Jima, which at the time they didn't tell us, you know, we went down and we crossed the dateline that that boats got by. And all my credentials.

BELLORE: Right.

WEINFURTNER: Here. Yeah. Anyway, somewhere in there, I can't remember what year was. Well, but anyway, I.

BELLORE: I had to be 55 or 56.

WEINFURTNER: But somewhere. Somewhere in there. I went to leadership school.

BELLORE: Right.

WEINFURTNER: And I can't remember what date that was, but it should be on the slip in that book.

BELLORE: Early in the year. This is when you were in Japan?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, I was. I was a PFC at the time. And then I became a corporal.

BELLORE: Right.

WEINFURTNER: I think it. I don't remember. I'd have to look.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: But anyway, I'll talk about that. That Korea deal. Our mean that landing, you know, we made, you know, we floated around out there for about 30 days. Yeah. Anyway then they. Well, we had Navy ships with us too. They, they 00:35:00fired on islands, you know, they make believe like they were shelling someplace. And then, well, we made the landing on the Iwo Jima. We couldn't take cameras or anything. They did not want us to take pictures because everything.

BELLORE: Did they tell you why?

WEINFURTNER: Everything was still landing crafts or rusting in the bay or on the shoreline.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: There was some stuff.

BELLORE: From 10 years before.

WEINFURTNER: All everything was laying on the shore. Yet, you know, the shells didn't go off. It was a mess yet. Anyway. We had to mark some of them, but we could only go so far. They wouldn't let us go to Mount Suribachi. You know because we tried to sneak up there and we got caught.

BELLORE: What happened when you got caught?

WEINFURTNER: Well, we were we had a deuce and a half was our our truck that we had for our platoon. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And anyway, there was another deuce and a 00:36:00half with a three-quarter ton.

BELLORE: Right.

WEINFURTNER: Canvas back for a quarter. Yeah. Anyway that we were going on the way to Mount Suribachi, we thought we could get it, we had our Lieutenant with us too. Yeah. You're down the road coming at us with a one star general and the [Teep?]

BELLORE: You were probably the first group that thought they could make it up there, you know?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. Anyway, we had to take a look at it. Yeah, but I think there the reason they didn't want us out there was because those Japs committed suicide and they never cleaned anything up, see. But anyway, yeah. Generally stopped and our first lieu, he jumped out of the [inaudible].

BELLORE: Then.

WEINFURTNER: Ran over by him and saluted him and everything. He said the right words. Where the hell are we?

BELLORE: Lost. Uh huh.

WEINFURTNER: We're looking for C company. And anyway, he he right away said, you guys turn around, he says and don't go any farther, he says, and get back and find it. God damn it, you're already. Yeah, but he didn't do anything to us. We just turned around and went back. But that was one story there.

BELLORE: How long were you there?

WEINFURTNER: We were running around two days.

BELLORE: Two days is all you were there?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah yeah. We landed and took things back, you know. The day we landed the day we landed, it was kinda rough. Yeah. We came off on Jacob's Ladder instead of the car. Yeah, I did. Yeah. Our outfit did. Some of it came off the cargo nets. But one of the guys with us, he got caught between the net 00:38:00and the boat with one leg and broke his leg coming down that Jacob's ladder. And that's all, you know, not a very good wide ladder. That's in the Bible that Jacob's Ladder somewhere where it's got its name.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: Anyway.

BELLORE: Can you give me any idea of anything in there, in your recollection that can tell us when, I mean, what what months or a year, spring or so?

WEINFURTNER: I would say.

BELLORE: Or what year.

WEINFURTNER: I would say that went on like maybe of that year, which would have been the first winter, the next would be the first summer. It would have probably been around right after that should have been July or August.

BELLORE: July or August of 1955.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. Okay.

BELLORE: Just so I get some frame of how your.

WEINFURTNER: Oh yea, yea yea. Anyway and then like I said we, we just did, we didn't do a lot of maneuvers or anything. Yeah. It was because it wasn't that big. We believe we were to mark, they told us to stay out of the look tunnels and stuff because they never read the booby traps. Okay. And they we was not to take anything with us either. You know, off the island. Yeah, well, I had that helmet, which they took away from me, that Jap helmet that had a bullet hole through it. And I, the only thing I really do have from there is two pieces of 00:40:00coral. You know, when we went in I picked them up, it was a white coral. But I don't know why I even did it. I just picked it up and threw it in my pocket.

BELLORE: Well

WEINFURTNER: Well my daughters have it now.

BELLORE: And then I think those things happened a lot, too. Why you do it.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, I know. That night we slept on that. The first night we were there, you know, squalls came up during the day, and that was a volcanic ash island it's all kind of black and that's that one. And squalls came up to showers squalls, and it was hot. Yeah, it's almost like you're in a sauna and you'd be just sweating like mad. Yeah, that was a shower came and cooled you off. But then you were ringing wet and then you dry it off that way and then it went back to all that steam and heat. But we had to check for stuff at market, 00:41:00like for if there was a shell wave, then we had to put a circle around it or if there was.

BELLORE: How did you put the circle around it and.

WEINFURTNER: Put some we had some like plastic that we could put.

BELLORE: Out was.

WEINFURTNER: Like deep red or orange.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: Whatever on it red, you know. And then we would mark if there was a, if we found a cave or something, we'd market it. We could not go in, it was not to go in.

BELLORE: And probably a good thing, huh?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, probably. That's what we did. Then when we left, we got everything back in a boat and went back to Japan.

BELLORE: Camp Whittington.

WEINFURTNER: Camp Whittington again.

BELLORE: From returning to Japan any more training, any more?

WEINFURTNER: Oh, well, you know, I, I want to that that the leadership school 00:42:00somewhere in there I.

BELLORE: Went okay and how long was that.

WEINFURTNER: It was six weeks or longer. Six weeks about I'd say.

BELLORE: Where was that leadership school?

WEINFURTNER: You know, I think it was

BELLORE: Same place?

WIENFURTNER: I think it was in Camp Drew. It was where the hospital was. Camp Drew in Japan. See, I can't I don't really it maybe says in that sheet of paper.

BELLORE: Probably.

WEINFURTNER: On two sheets.

BELLORE: We'll take a break in a couple minutes and then we'll look at it. All right. We'll that will, but we'll take a break.

WEINFURTNER: It seems to be the end of it. And then right at that time, too, that's kinda interesting. Maybe I'll tell you about my buddy and I. They started air assault. The first Cav did okay. And they they were looking for helicopter pilots.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: My buddy and I always thought it'll be fun. So we were going to reenlist and go into that. That had to be at the end of my

BELLORE: Toward the end of 1956.

WEINFURTNER: Because of the fact that he he got in because he was not as big as I was and I weighed about 190lbs, you could be over 200lbs but I was six foot four and the guy said that he's like, look I'd take you on, but your too damn tall. He said, If you're six one, I'd still take it. But he's like I can't take you at six four. Well then of course I didn't reenlist, but my buddy did and he got in, but he went home and I never saw him after that.

BELLORE: Well, you know your buddies name?

WEINFURTNER: Carl S Brown.

BELLORE: Carl S Brown. Do you remember where he's from?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, Hagerstown, Maryland. I tried to look him up after a while, but I could never. I called 50 people in Carl S. Brown in Hagerstown, I think half of them were black. But anyway that I shouldn't say that that way but that's what happened.

BELLORE: Where in Maryland was it?

WEINFURTNER: Hagerstown.

BELLORE: Hagerstown. Okay.

WEINFURTNER: You know, we were good buddies all over there. Yeah.

BELLORE: Both of you in headquarters and headquarters. Yeah. During the time you were there. I mean, I've got to some.

WEINFURTNER: After I was after I was in that leadership school. Right. I was a PFC. And then they made me a corporal. And that's highest rank I held.

BELLORE: I know. I've got written down when you made Corporal. Well, that would be not be that bad would be the end of hell.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. Towards the end of that. Not right away after that, but shortly after that.

BELLORE: This probably a good place to take a break. Okay. How is the food? How is your meals? When you were in Japan, did you have any native food?

WEINFURTNER: When we were out when we were out in the field, you know. Well, we were on well, we like did some aggressor force, too, you know.

BELLORE: What was that?

WEINFURTNER: Well, that was training.

BELLORE: Now, you.

WEINFURTNER: Know, make believe. You know, we're the aggressor. We are aggressors.

BELLORE: Okay?

WEINFURTNER: We weren't.

BELLORE: You weren't the defenders?

WEINFURTNER: No, they were the you know, like our regiment was was out there, but we were our. See, we were actually infantry and we were an aggressor force. 00:46:00Okay. And what we did is we made believe, you know, we were the enemy were. And anyway, there was a little bit of a story there, too, that happened. Friendly fire. We were on a down a ditch and they had a 30 caliber machine gun that shot blanks. And my ammo barrel was behind me. And he he said, we stop and set up. And, you know, basically we were shooting at them. And anyway, he said, You're on. He said, They're shooting at us. I said, Oh, Jesus. I said, they ain't shooting at us. And he says, Yes, they are there's dirt kicking up all over you. And just set them up all around you. I said, You know, and we sat up again. They shot some more on the 30 caliber at all. And anyway, we got up and we ran down this gully again and all of a sudden I hear hit and he got shot right up here in 00:47:00the leg. And anyway, well, I got all of my commanding officer there, right. And he shot a flare up and it was over. They stopped it. But what they were doing is we had in one rifles, you know, the most of the guys did okay, you know, that were in the infantry part of it. Yeah. Anyway they, they had grenade launchers on the end of that. That rifle.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: You know it's a grenade on that. You could put it in the heel of your boot and you could shoot it out at a tank or something. And knock a tank or knock a position. No. And what they did is if guys whittled wood bullets, they stuck it down that grenade launcher and that would make it projectile. That's 00:48:00what they shot that kid with, huh? Shot him with wood bullet.

BELLORE: Why?

WEINFURTNER: Just for the hell of it.

BELLORE: This was our guy.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, they stopped it. I don't know, but I never heard ever. Another story about that. If they caught a guy or two guys or three guys, but they never heard about that after a while. But I think they kept that kind of quiet, too. Yeah.

BELLORE: [Inaudible]. Did you find out what the unit was?

WEINFURTNER: They were they were they were the 1st Cav Division. Yeah.

BELLORE: Okay. Yeah, that's not very friendly. Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: Well, you know, that's uh. Strange guys.

BELLORE: Yeah. When you were. Did you have bunks or did you have to sleep in a sleeping bag?

WEINFURTNER: When we were out in the field, we slept in the sleeping bag.

BELLORE: Yeah, but you had permanent. You had permanent barracks. You were there. For all.

WEINFURTNER: We had the barrack was like. Our whole platoon was in one room. And we had.

BELLORE: Had your own.

WEINFURTNER: The bunks were on the floor. We didn't have anyone above us. Drill well out of the box were on the floor. Right. We didn't have anybody above us. They were all old Japanese buildings, you know.

BELLORE: You get any time off when you were there. I mean, it was.

WEINFURTNER: Nearly four days. You know, I got tattooed in Yokohama, you know, and uh we go drink sake in Tokyo. They had a place down there. It was called. It was right downtown, down close to downtown.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: It was a four-square block area, a lot of houses of ill repute there. And they had a thing in there. They call it the showboat. And it was it 00:50:00was like a like one of these paddle boats. They had I think it was there was a big dance floor. And, you know, tables are all on the outside. And then there was a.

BELLORE: Stationary.

WEINFURTNER: Stationary for the dance floor. And then up above there was another big oval up there that was a walkway all the way around. And it was open and it was tables up there where you could sit in. And then every table was waited on by a Japanese girl, you know, she'd bring the sake, you know, whatever, you know. But we used to go there once in, all out and all this kind of oh, well, it was so exciting. Young man, bunch of young men. Yokohama was always different to. It was kind of dangerous though. I know one time we were going down an alley.

BELLORE: Why was that day more dangerous?

WEINFURTNER: Well, they they just. Well, even the Japanese that lived there. You know, one day, my buddy and I, we were going down an alley, kind of. Yeah, it was dark at night out. And there was eight of them Japanese that came up. And I said to my buddy, I said, we had cameras, see? And I just said to my buddy, I said, if they want them, we will give them.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: You know. 8 against 2.

BELLORE: Did they want them?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah they took them. The cameras were cheap over there at that point. And then we we went to Nagano, that's where they had the Olympics that one time.

BELLORE: Time because that was a four day.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah that was a four day pass. We went to it, it was in the mountains there where they ski that winter training or that Winter Olympics was 00:52:00there and that that city had the biggest Pagoda in Japan. That was. Church or whatever you want to call them, a Buddhist place. Yeah. And they had a big gongs there, you know, they'd hit the gong with what they wood thing back and forth up there. And it was a big building there on a nice-looking building. I don't I used to have pictures of that. I did see a.

BELLORE: Buddhist temple.

WEINFURTNER: Buddhist temple. And then the other thing that was interesting is that all the hot water came from out of that mountains and uh they had.

BELLORE: Hot water.

WEINFURTNER: It was warm water. And they had them mountain monkeys there. They were about when they were sitting, they were about this high. And they ran 00:53:00around that town and it steal stuff from them Japs. Yeah, it was their little stores. Now monkeys would be in there. They take trinkets and stuff, you know. And those Japs, they'd be coming out of there, chasing them monkeys, all the time. But they're monkeys with soak in that hot water out of the mountains.

BELLORE: Uh-huh.

WEINFURTNER: Or hills. They weren't mountains, they were more of hills. But anyway, then that town, they had bathhouses there. They run that hot water in the middle. There was a big, big building and in the middle they had that big tank. And around the outside, they had wood floors that were kind of open. Yeah. And when you went in there, if you wanted to take a bath, you had to strip down bare naked, and they had wooden pales there, and you had to take in the wash 00:54:00yourself down, huh? You know, private parts and your, and then you could go in the water. And one thing about it is like the first thing I seen when I was in Japan is a woman going to the bathroom right out in the town. Just walked over by a bush and got rid of it. You know. Yeah, they were not. If they were in the water swimming or doing something like that, they're always naked. It was just the way it was. It was kind of hard at first to get used to that. Yeah. But after a while, it was just like you became part of that that area.

BELLORE: Let me ask you that.

WEINFURTNER: Yes.

BELLORE: A little over ten years after we use the atomic bombs on Jap Japan, how 00:55:00are you perceived? The Japanese people?

WEINFURTNER: They were great. They were pretty good. You know, they were, you know, like the guys from the South, we're kind of, uh, let's see, I was in in when the blacks were integrated into the army.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, that didn't work very good with. Didn't bother the guys from the north.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: As far as the guys of the South, they never. I don't know. While I was in here. I don't think that ever straightened out real good. Because you had a colored sergeant. A colored corporal? Yeah. That guy was from the South. It was hard for him to honor that. And, you know, there was always a little tiff between that. Okay. Even when you went to town or, you know, all that, you had 00:56:00to be careful where you went because the colored guys hung out in one spot. And, you know, well, even if you were a marine, you did going into a Marines tavern. You know, it was kind of really the first thing, you know, that the tavern wasn't there anymore.

BELLORE: Well.

WEINFURTNER: You know, they were okay. But that that.

BELLORE: You you really never perceived that the Japanese people were.

WEINFURTNER: No, they were pretty decent.

BELLORE: They weren't holding an internal grudge?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. And, you know, the older Japanese, too, they'd always bow, you know.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: And to show respect, they were always the last one to pull straight, you know, in other words they'd keep bowing and bowing. And, you know, I'll tell you straight, no matter what, they respected you. Because we had a colored kid, not a color kid, but his name was Prince Kinnick. And anyway, 00:57:00anyway, he picked on those Japanese, you know, he'd knock them off, if they were on a bike. Mm-hmm. And I would get out after him. And I had to take him to Fort Levin, it wasn't Fort Levin, but they had a place in Tokyo where they'd put all the guys that didn't behave and stocking arcade.

BELLORE: Now, we, during our break had checked on your leadership time that you had from March the 19th of 1956 to April 15th. And shortly after that, you were promoted to corporal in August. Did you know that you were going to be in 00:58:00overseas for a set amount of time, or did you guys.

WEINFURTNER: They never said anything.

BELLORE: So you never knew? And you had enlisted for three years, correct?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. Didn't get any. In those days they didn't give you anything for enlisting, you just did it.

BELLORE: Yeah. Was there a draft then?

WEINFURTNER: Yes. But that didn't come into our mind. The four of us that went in were all about the same age.

BELLORE: And you were going to enlist.

WEINFURTNER: Just kind of a kind of a. Oh, how should I put it? Little exciting, but maybe.

BELLORE: Let me go back.

WEINFURTNER: Was a good score.

BELLORE: Excuse me. Let me go back to this is retracing, but I want to get the names of those people that you enlisted with. You remember.

WEINFURTNER: That? Yeah.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: Connie Dischinger. He is dead. Like, Don't ask me to spell this.

BELLORE: I kind of got something. Dischinger.

WEINFURTNER: Dischinger, okay yea Connie.

BELLORE: Connie Okay. He was from from Marsh Marshfield also. All these are for Marshfield.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah yeah.

BELLORE: Connie Dischinger.

WEINFURTNER: And the HEINY Sen and it's, you know, Heiny would have been Herman, but they called him Heiny, which is a nickname for an old German.

BELLORE: That I know.

WEINFURTNER: And then Sen, I think was spell S-E-N.

BELLORE: Okay. Gotcha.

WEINFURTNER: And the other one was a Terry Jarrence. Terry Felafur.

BELLORE: Felafur?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. Yeah, something like that.

BELLORE: So we're we're going to be close on it. Yeah. I just was curious. Yeah. Whatever happened to those guys? You. Did you. Well, some of them are.

WEINFURTNER: Kindisnure's dead. Felafur's dead. Now. Now, I they all died.

BELLORE: In the service?

WEINFURTNER: No, they died old age.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. 97. He's in a hospital at Tomah. Yeah. Oh, yet. And I'm here.

BELLORE: Did you. Did you serve with them at all?

WEINFURTNER: No. I was with Connie Dischinger, he got left out of there because he joined the air force first. He was a little older than the other three, other two, but yeah. But he had a bad knee and he went to the Air Force and they they discharged him. But then he went down to the Army and he passed. He was in there 01:01:00for about two months and they discharged him because he couldn't do everything.

BELLORE: I was just curious of many of the people that you enlisted with, served with you. That was the only reason.

WEINFURTNER: I think I was the only one that went overseas. Okay. I don't know. I know. I know that Jerry fellow. Forgive me, but Heiny Sen I don't think one overseas.

BELLORE: How did you get until the end of 19 or toward the end of 1956? How did you feel you did you know you were going to be heading home?

WEINFURTNER: Well, no, I really, I well, I knew what the end of it if I was there.

BELLORE: How long before you were actually returning?

WEINFURTNER: Well, I was still there. And I went right up to the end, because when I when we came back home, I was on another troop ship, two stacker, what they call the Breckinridge, you know, and back of Breckinridge and I, I had 01:02:00charge of the dining hall on the way back every other day.

BELLORE: How long did it take you to get back?

WEINFURTNER: 14 days.

BELLORE: Not the 24 that it took to get there. That's good.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, that was a good travel.

BELLORE: Better than 24.

WEINFURTNER: Well, we ate good every night when I got done with take care of the kitchen or the dining room, I went in the freezer and got myself a big container of ice cream after a container of frozen peaches. Frank Sandwich said it, set it at the table and all our guys did that.

BELLORE: Where did the Brackenridge land? Where did they.

WEINFURTNER: Eat? We came over the Golden Gate Bridge in Frisco. All of us.

BELLORE: Go. Okay.

WEINFURTNER: It was seven degrees and froze my ass off. I can remember that. Then we spent the day there. You have a date?

BELLORE: You have the date?

WEINFURTNER: Just a. It was it had to be the end of July or just January. If you want to say something, then it was towards the end of January. Yeah. Not because I like the date that I got out. It says on.

BELLORE: The 29th.

WEINFURTNER: 29th. Yeah. And we only stayed there through that just that day till we've been we flew out of there that night and went all the way up. Fort Lewis, Chicago. Okay. Not Fort Lewis- Chicago.

BELLORE: Chicago.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. What's the name of that again? Now [inaudible].

BELLORE: Fort Sheridan?

WEINFURTNER: Fort Sheridan, Yeah. And anyway, then we stayed down there. We were down a good week before we got discharged.

BELLORE: Because that gives me an idea. I'm gonna go out there.

WEINFURTNER: And right at the end of that is when I tried to get that that.

BELLORE: Helicopter.

WEINFURTNER: Helicopter school. Yeah. And see if my buddy was gone already.

BELLORE: You know, you have been you've been right smack in the middle of the Vietnam War.

WEINFURTNER: I would have.

BELLORE: At least the first half.

WEINFURTNER: Probably saved my life because a lot of guys got shot out of the air.

BELLORE: Careful what you wish for, you know.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah because you know they were tin cans.

BELLORE: Yeah, I was in em. I was. How did you I mean, how did you perceive your return home for homecoming that you said you were at the Golden Gate? You stayed there for a couple of days, you know. Was there any civilian? Anybody?

WEINFURTNER: You know, it was really kind of funny at all. My buddy, there was a guy that I was friends with from Okanagan and I bumped into him. We were in 01:05:00Chicago together when we got discharged. And I had a pretty good chunk of change saved because I didn't take any leave. You know, I just had a good chunk of change. And, you know, he wanted. He wanted to. He wanted to go out at night. And I says, All right, I'll wait for the bus. I'm getting out of here. I said, If I go out tonight, I'll probably be broke by morning. But, you know, and anyway, I did do that. And then when I got to Marshfield, it was kind of funny that it was still dark out. And I went up to where my dad lived and my dad and my mother and I had a hard time walking in the door, or knocking on it.

BELLORE: Okay. How come?

WEINFURTNER: So I just felt I didn't belong there. Really? Yeah. I had a funny feeling, but I did get over that.

BELLORE: How quickly?

WEINFURTNER: Oh, pretty quick, like. Yeah, but I didn't feel in the right place. You know, you kind of miss a lot of your. You know, I was with a lot of guys for a long time, and now guys are pretty important.

BELLORE: Yeah. Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: See, I like being in there. You know, I, I never well, in my life time, I was. I was. I took care of a bunch of bricklayers, too, for a long time.

BELLORE: Right. We're when I want to talk to you about.

WEINFURTNER: Anyway, I always. My men came first, I learned that in leadership.

BELLORE: Well, you're brothers in arms.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. And an army, too. You know, your. Even if a guy is here. Yeah. Or the guy that has got palsy, he's only 56. Yeah, I, I kind of, I would kind of watch over and, you know, see what he is. If they don't cut his food up, 01:07:00he can't use his arm. I say, Jesus, girls, I know that he needs to have his steak cut up. He can't cut it up. Yeah. Or it can open up like a milk carton or. Right. You know, you got to look out for your buddy. Yeah, you know. Anyway, you already learned that in the military.

BELLORE: Did you knock on the door at home when you got your.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. A lot. My dad locked everything up all the time now.

BELLORE: Yeah, so you had to knock.

WEINFURTNER: I rang the doorbell.

BELLORE: Who answered the door?

WEINFURTNER: My dad did.

BELLORE: What?

WEINFURTNER: Boy was he glad to see me. But he knew I was coming. Okay.

BELLORE: Okay. How did he know you were coming?

WEINFURTNER: Well, he knew I was about ready to get out.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: But um.

BELLORE: The army didn't send him any notice or?

WEINFURTNER: No, I don't think they did. Yeah, the only thing I could tell you about. Yeah, that's really kind of funny at all. My mother never wrote me a 01:08:00letter she could write, but she didn't. She had third degree education, and she had beautiful penmanship. But I don't think she could put a letter together.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: You know, and I never thought about that until I got older. And my dad, I think you wrote me about maybe two or three. He wasn't educated either. But, you know, I got to thinking about that. You know, that was they just didn't do that, you know, because they didn't have that. They couldn't do it because they couldn't couldn't say what they wanted to say. But my dad did write me a letter. I have big feet. I didn't have any combat boots. When I first got in there, I wrote a letter to my dad, and I was complaining about my little cutters getting kicked full of gravel all the time. But anyway, my dad wrote me a 01:09:00letter. He says, Ron. He says, Don't worry about them combat airports, he says. A train just went through town and two gondolas and they got two pair of boots.

BELLORE: Oh, it's got to be very nice. Yeah. I've got to backtrack. Just down here, it was I forgot to ask you about brothers and sisters.

WEINFURTNER: Well, I had two sisters and a brother.

BELLORE: They're older.

WEINFURTNER: I had a sister older than me. And a brother and sister younger than me. And my brother and I were 16 months apart. And we were close all our lives. We started a business together after I got through laying brick.

BELLORE: So older. Older sister.

WEINFURTNER: And about 18 months older than me. Yeah. And then my youngest 01:10:00sister was eight years younger than me.

BELLORE: Did any of your family enter the service besides you?

WEINFURTNER: No. My brother Dick was in the naval reserve.

BELLORE: Okay. That's the younger brother. Yeah. Okay.

WEINFURTNER: Obviously, he got married young, and then that was over with.

BELLORE: Naval Reserve?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, Naval Reserve.

BELLORE: Mom and dad or their dad was in the service and all it was.

WEINFURTNER: No, no. He got called down, but he had four kids. Yeah, they didn't draft him.

BELLORE: Okay, good. Okay. So after you were. We're getting progress nicely here. So when you got home. And were there any problems readjusting, adjusting to civilian life?

WEINFURTNER: Well no. I didn't have money at all. Now I did. I bought a 1956 Buick that it was. But it was new that year. Well I got out 57.

BELLORE: Yep. 57.

WEINFURTNER: Well this was a 56. And I think like 11,000 miles on, it was brand new, just alone. Anyway, I bought that and had enough money left and bought an aluminum boat, oars. Or is it a small engine? And I put a trailer hitch on the Buick, and then I went fishing for about maybe six months.

BELLORE: Every day?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, well, I would travel around and go fishing, stuff like that. Maybe work a little job. But I didn't work a lot.

BELLORE: Had money? Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: I went bow and arrow hunting with an old buddy I knew in high school and played football with. He was a truck driver. Then he was off work and we spent a lot of time together and I got to be an archer. And then I goofed 01:12:00around and then I went to a years college. Then I was going to.

BELLORE: And where was that?

WEINFURTNER: At Stevens point.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: And I was going to become a fish biologist. I've got scuba. But what what what happened to me is I was going to have to switch colleges to get my degree. So I had to go to Michigan State. And those days you could take your credits with you. And what it did is that I got disgusted by the like, jeez, I spent the year here, and it's not going to do me any good. Um, I had to spend another four years over there, and I quit, which is probably the dumbest thing of my life. But maybe not. Maybe not. Yeah, but they were.

BELLORE: Using the GI Bill.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, I was using the GI Bill there. And anyway, you know what, though I, I did some construction work on and off. Like I bumped into a bunch of 01:13:00bricklayers. They were building a funeral hold up in Marshfield. Okay, well, they needed a labor, so they hired me, and I was taking care of them, building scaffolds and mixing stuff work. And then that job got done, and I was laying around again, not doing a heck of a lot. I loved to hunt and fish and I love the outdoors. So anyway, that. One of the guys that built that funeral home. He ran the hospital job. It's a great brick job on that hospital where he called me up one day and he said he needs a labor. Well, I wasn't a union man, but he says, well, I'll get you in there. And I thought, well, it's a good job and makes good money. So that's what I did, went up there. I went to work, and after about 01:14:00three months, one of the bricklayers said to me and I never realized it, but he was head of the Apprenticeship Committee. And he says, Ron, he says, if you going to goof around with this construction trade. He said, Why don't you become a bricklayer? He says, you'll make more money. And he says it will be a trade. So I thought, that sounds good to me. But I had to get indentured. But the guy that was the superintendent on the job, I knew him because I tended bar too. Anyway, I want to talk to him. He said, Sure, we'll put you on Ron. So that was J.B. Cullen out of Janesville, Wisconsin. JB Cullen.

BELLORE: J.B. Cullen.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah.

BELLORE: Janesville.

WEINFURTNER: [He step??] The company is still in business. In fact, when I worked for them it was third generation already.

BELLORE: You mentioned, uh, after the funeral home hunting and fishing and then, 01:15:00somebody said do you should become a bricklayer but going into apprenticeship on to a master or whatever whatever the category you mentioned up there. Yeah. What, what, what did you mean by up.

WEINFURTNER: Well it was a hospital at Marshfield. Work started and then after that, I just stayed with these people and worked for them, and that's all they made me a brick foreman and uh yeah.

BELLORE: Where you stayed at home or on?

WEINFURTNER: On and off you know, but I was traveling most of the time.

BELLORE: When you were back in Marshfield, you would?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, I did buy it. I worked out of a hospital down in Rock, in Des Moines, Iowa.

BELLORE: Yep.

WEINFURTNER: And we were working 10 hours a day, seven days a week. And I when I come off that job at $9,000 in the bank.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: So what I did is I went by I bought a piece of property up north.

BELLORE: Where about?

WIENFURTNER: Up out of Park Falls. Called Pike Lake Chain. What I did then is I bought a piece of property. It had a shack on it. The reason I bought it, it was 3800 dollars, which was a lot of money at that time.

BELLORE: Right.

WEINFURTNER: He wanted seven, and I just. And I didn't get it right away, but about four months later, he called me up and he said, You can have that lot if the price is still good. So I bought it and I had damn near 50 years.

BELLORE: Wow.

WEINFURTNER: You know, 40, 40 some years. It was a really, really I stuffed a lot of money into it. You know, I put the couple bedrooms. Didn't have a toilet. I had an outhouse, no water, no electric. And the thing is, I was on 01:17:00construction, so it was kind of handy. I did the electrical, I did the plumbing and a little bathroom in there and a shower. I put on two bedrooms and expanded it a little bit there. All this little shack I had. But uh, it took me a long time because I did it all on my own. I changed the roof, you know, because it was kind of a flat roof and I wanted a more pitched roof. And I did build a big garage up there, but when I sold it here five years ago, I got $170,000 for it.

BELLORE: That's a return on investment.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah.

BELLORE: You know.

WEINFURTNER: So I did some things right in my life.

BELLORE: Yeah. Did you have any injuries while you were in the service?

WEINFURTNER: No, no, I broke a wrist.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: I did that. Lifting weights.

BELLORE: Did you keep any close friends after the service?

WEINFURTNER: No really, No. I would do my best, buddy. And he left and I left and just never gave mine. I want to see, you know, a couple of days after I was in the athletic business. Okay. I just saw Buddy. He was. He had his own business up there. Yeah, we never got close yet again, you know?

BELLORE: How long did you spend in the brick laying?

WEINFURTNER: Brick laying? Yeah, well, probably maybe 15.

BELLORE: Years or 15 years or better. 15 plus doing bricks. Then what? Anything after bricks?

WEINFURTNER: My brother Dick and I started an athletic business.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: We both invested five grand and had never spent another nickel on it. But we built a big warehouse

BELLORE: An athletic with?

WEINFURTNER: So I sold shoulder pads and helmets and all tapes and all that to work towards all the football pads, football jerseys and then when Title 9 when in the girls got started atheletics they got I don't know why I did it, but whenever I went into school, I always used to stick my head in the the by the Phy Ed department where the girls were.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: They didn't have the purse strings at the time but I just asked them all the equipment as you know, the balls, jump ropes and other they used in Phy Ed.

BELLORE: Right.

WEINFURTNER: And the men always had the purse strings. But what happened is when the timeline came in, those girls that were in the Phy Ed knew that they know me, you know? And I had that all tied up. You know, they when they wanted something, they'd say, Ron will you stop off for me.

BELLORE: Right.

WEINFURTNER: I'd sell the whole works for my job, you know, like they needed track uniforms, basketball uniforms, volleyball uniforms. You know, they needed it all, you know.

BELLORE: And they used to be cordial and.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, but I didn't really do it for that. They just did it because they were using my equipment and I figured I should at least tell them who I am.

BELLORE: Time wise, you're about 15 years as bricklayers, so we're more probably at 1970 there. Sure.

WEINFURTNER: So that's when our business started.

BELLORE: Business started.

WEINFURTNER: In early seventies.

BELLORE: Early seventies.

WEINFURTNER: And I when I was in it for just about 25 years. Pretty close to 25. And I sold it to my, and my brother died.

BELLORE: Oh. Sorry to hear that.

WEINFURTNER: He was 59. And I was, you know, you.

BELLORE: 18 months older.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, it was hard because him and I spent a lifetime together and, you know, from little after you slept in the same bed. Right. Imaginary line down the middle.

BELLORE: Yeah. Yeah. And.

WEINFURTNER: You know. Yeah. The thing is, too, we fought like cats and dogs. He was quicker, and I was. But I could run further than he did. So I would chase him till he fell over.

BELLORE: Not always the rabbit, its sometimes the turtle.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, it is all.

BELLORE: So mid-nineties. You sold your sporting goods to who?

WEINFURTNER: I sold it to my nephew and another guy we had hired there.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: I sold it right away after my brother died because I, I was 61. I 01:22:00think I was 60. I was right around 61 or 60 years old. Yeah. Anyway, he I thought, you know, I don't want to run this business.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: So we talked about it. Yeah. We were smart enough to. It was an insurance insurance policy on Myself and my brother who's survivor. Yeah. So that, that came back to the business so that it would, you know, like if you lose some top notch sales people that all at least you've got to come up with some money. And we, we invested a lot like an insurance policy on each man. Yeah.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. That's what kept that business going. And that's his wife got half. Yeah, I got the other half, you know, because that's all that was set up. 01:23:00And but anyway that, that made it easier for the guys that bought it to, you know, we didn't have to.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: You know, it was a smart move.

BELLORE: Well, sure sounds like you made some smart moves.

WEINFURTNER: Anyway, but it was a lot of hard work.

BELLORE: Looking back at your time in the service. Anything. Stand out. Really stand out as a good memory.

WEINFURTNER: The leadership school.

BELLORE: Leadership school, you mentioned that a number of time. And you have.

WEINFURTNER: It. It made me. It helped me all my life. Yeah. Because I could read even when I was a bricklayer, a brick foreman. I can read a man first time I meet them.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: If he's going to make it or not and you know it and there's a place for everyone. Well, I had bricklayers that could lay brick, but if I was on a job and he'd come up, I always had a place for them.

BELLORE: Yup.

WEINFURTNER: There's someplace I could use them, you know, like maybe on the saw or maybe up where they don't see it, you know, after you get it up, two stories. The only person that's going to see that brickwork, brickwork is a bird. So it doesn't have to be perfect, you know? You know, you learn a lot of things in life. So, you know, I was always the person that even, you know, like plumbing, electrical work or carpenter work. You know, I always watched them. If you if you can do that in life, you can do anything. You know what I told my brother to when I got in the athletic business because he was in that seat and he needed somebody to come along with. And I think he just hired me because I had five grand. But anyway, we got along together good because we were close.

BELLORE: It all sounds to me like you've left the I don't know what the old adage is, that you listen to people. I did. You listen to people. Some people think that listening is just waiting for their turn to talk. You know, it sounds like you listen to people and that.

WEINFURTNER: You know.

BELLORE: I always.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, if I hired a man, I'd sit you down and talk to you for like that. It's or 15 minutes. That's a lot to expect and I dunno, but we go to work at 8:00, not ten after five after, but 8:00 this is we get laughs, we get 15 minutes for coffee. I said, yeah, at the end of the day, get a half hour clean up. I don't want you leave on the job until 4:30 because we get paid until then. Basically, I don't care if you're standing at the gate to get out of here, but 01:26:00that's what I expect to you. And I said, if I don't expect 500 record here, I just expect that you do a good job with what we're doing now. And I said, if you do that, you got three strikes. It's just like playing baseball. If you get me, if you can't do that, you're out of here. And they did they have a lot of trouble because, you know, and I was like, you know, some of those guys taught me how to lay brick.

BELLORE: Get on and then you became their foreman.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, and I was kind of lucky that I was a bigger man. Yeah, I get a challenge sometimes physically, too, from those old-time bricklayers. I had a guy chasing me with a brick every one day, and they told me, it's going to be hard for brick hammer it, you know? But it it was it was a real I had a really 01:27:00enjoyable life, you know, so little was good, but most of it was good.

BELLORE: We haven't touched upon marriage.

WEINFURTNER: Oh, marriage. I had some bad luck with that. Okay. The only good thing about that is I raised my two daughters.

BELLORE: Two daughters?

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, I raised them from my youngest daughter was in second grade then my oldest daughter was in fifth grade and I was already 56 years old when I got divorced. That was 41, I got married. I raised them. Best thing I ever did.

BELLORE: They're here.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, they're here in Eau Claire. I got those four grandchildren there.

BELLORE: Yesterday she was here. How did that meeting go? Pretty good.

WEINFURTNER: Good? Yeah. She brought me that book. I some of them, like my 01:28:00mother did that that some I didn't even know they had.

BELLORE: Let's take a moment here and acknowledge those people that you just said, your daughters, but you want to name them by my name and you that pictures up like that all later. Oh, so that's why. All right.

WEINFURTNER: My daughters. My oldest daughter are the one that really, really takes care of me good. And I trust her with everything. And I love my other daughter, too. But my oldest daughter is Courtney, and her last name is Fabisch. C-O-U-R-T-N-E-Y, C-O-U-R-T-N-E-Y and her last name is F-A-B-I-S-C-H.

BELLORE: If you don't feel comfortable with last names, it's fine if you are just saying

WEINFURTNER: Any my other daughter is Paige.

BELLORE: Okay.

WEINFURTNER: And she has one boy he's in the second grade. She marches a different drum, but I talk to him on the phone. She's been here, her husband's been here. Yeah. His name is Adam, and Courtney's husband's name is. Is Jake. And he's got three children, Audriana and Jordan. And the little one was just born when I got here. So she's three months old and her name is Eleanor Rose. Eleanor Rose? Yeah, my mother's name isn't.

WEINFURTNER: But anyway, Paige has got a boy, by the name of Owen. Owen. That's 01:30:00it. And I got it. I got a younger sister that's 87 or 77.

BELLORE: Okay. I would remind us.

WEINFURTNER: That's about it.

BELLORE: Well, I don't want you to leave, you know, leave the room and say, I wish we had talked about it. It's just that they're they're.

WEINFURTNER: They're very good girls. Mm-hmm. You know, I remember when they were in their puberty, I thought, geez, I can wait till they get out of here. You know? But after that, it got kind of lonely or all of their. You don't know. But it's best thing I ever got out of, you know? At least you have that to look forward to. Yeah. And I got plenty young grandchildren now.

BELLORE: How you doing? And they're really still. They are really nice. Anything we can we're we're we're going to, you know, travel to stay up. We're going to do that.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, I have those big fish there.

BELLORE: A lot of them. And I've noticed I've noticed.

WEINFURTNER: The this one over here was 54 5/8 inches.

BELLORE: Where was that?

WEINFURTNER: That was up where my place was.

BELLORE: That's right. Pike Lake Chain.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. Yeah. That one there. 48 lbs 15 ounces. And this one was 40lbs and 50 inches. This one was 54. 54? Yeah, 54 inches. 54 and 5/8 inches long.

BELLORE: I can see the three of them there that are the two of the pictures of the same fish or is there.

WEINFURTNER: No, no, that that's a that's a that's a a well what do you call them. They're they're they're numbered. That big picture.

BELLORE: Oh, okay.

WEINFURTNER: That's that's a that's a.

BELLORE: That's a that.

WEINFURTNER: It's a print. Yeah, that's right.

BELLORE: That's what I was looking for.

WEINFURTNER: These are actual.

BELLORE: Pictures. Those are your fish. The one on the left. There's just one that. Yeah, look at them.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, I.

BELLORE: Fish.

WEINFURTNER: I won that one. And then I got another one that was given to me. But that one was that one point worth, about two grand. But I don't think they're worth that any more. You know, this one here was worth about that at that time, that was probably worth over 300. But I. I've been lucky in my life.

BELLORE: You were, according to the court in Katie, anxious for this interview. Why? Why? Why is it important for you to tell your story?

WEINFURTNER: Oh, I figured it'd be good for my little ones.

BELLORE: Awesome. Anything we haven't covered that you want to cover? Have you 01:33:00covered everything, I promise you.

WEINFURTNER: I'm sure I forgot something.

BELLORE: I promised you when we talked about this.

WEINFURTNER: I think we covered it pretty good. With the important stuff.

BELLORE: Pretty much. Pretty much did.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah, I didn't, you know, like I said. I, I, I'm a patriotic type guy. Yeah. You know, today when I was down in the, I had already played bucketball.

BELLORE: Right.

WEINFURTNER: I had coffee with the. With the Red Cross. Mm-hmm. First, then I played bucket ball. And then from there, I went over it. But I got a buddy here now that he's 96 years old and in the second world war.

BELLORE: Mm-hmm.

WEINFURTNER: And he a tail gunner on the bomber.

BELLORE: I know him.

WEINFURTNER: You know?

BELLORE: I know him.

WEINFURTNER: His name is Mac.

BELLORE: Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah.

WEINFURTNER: And they, you know, it's really kind of funny. I know a lot of people, he know, boxers and coaches. Now, he had a tavern. You know, I worked on the supermarket before I laid brick. We built and loyal. And he had a tavern there, a little nightclub. Wow. I'd eat hamburgers in there. You know, I didn't really ever know him until I got here. Yeah, he knows everybody that I know and. And coaches and stuff, and he's always been interested in that sort of thing. You know, like every morning I get up at six and he's always out there sitting, having coffee and breakfast. And I get I have to dress up because they don't stand well. And they anyway, he waits for me and we have coffee together. We spend a lot of times talking about what we all did. And, you know, it's kinda 01:35:00really. You know, I don't know. I. I have a knack with. With people.

BELLORE: Yeah you think. In fact I know that's a fact.

WEINFURTNER: You know, in fact, I hear I was sitting at one of these the hours that happy hour, you know, we can only have one drink. But then they got a music guy here, and this this guy, he worked for the metal shop in town here. I don't know what they call it. But his company donated the labels for that for that business. And he had his daughter there. I was like, you know, she was working with her dad, having all this food. Yeah. What he had done doing that, he sat back where we were, where I was sitting with some other guy. Hmm. And anyway, my 01:36:00eyes crossed with his eyes, you know, just trying to look at all those and probably looking over there. And pretty soon, he came over and he said to me, he says, Would you mind talking to my daughter? And I says, Oh.

BELLORE: How old is she.

WEINFURTNER: She's in second grade. But anyway, she came over and I said, No, bring and were talking and all. She says thank you for your service and everything. You know, I just made other small talk with her. Then we left and I asked him his last name and it was German so that I said something of it. That was it. And they left. I never asked him any more questions, you know. And about maybe three weeks later, it was getting to be close to Christmas time. I get ah. Somebody came up here and said, Somebodies looking for you down below. They said, We'll send them up. He says, No, you gotta go down. So I went down and 01:37:00here's this young girl, her dad and her mother and another guy that's [inaudible], I thinked he worked with his dad. . And then we just made small talk and her mother was German, too. And we talked about some of the food stuff, sauerkraut and whatnot. But anyway, and that little girl, that chair that you are sitting down there. Yeah, young girl. What's it like it for me that you there and that really touched me.

BELLORE: Nice and soft.

WEINFURTNER: Yeah. I just thought, you know, it was somebody I don't really know that, that I was so worked up about that I forgot to even get a telephone number address. So then I used Katie down below. That they found out they had resale and they really get that this year. Now about two, maybe three weeks ago, they 01:38:00came here playing cards with me one night.

BELLORE: Wonderful.

WEINFURTNER: They wanted to know if I'd be able to believe that in my lifetime were wonderful, you know? Well, that was one thing that I did have the service, too. I never told you about. About that. When I was in Japan there one Christmas, I had a little orphan boy come in and spend Christmas Day and for dinner.

BELLORE: Okay. And how old?

WEINFURTNER: He was just. He was his dad was black and he was in an orphanage, you know, he was know. And it made me feel good that day.

BELLORE: Well, you know.

WEINFURTNER: You know, you know, and that that that kind of. You know you, kinda 01:39:00get a look at things different in a toughest day. Maybe I really had in there. And the military was on one Christmas Eve walk at dawn to go with the enlisted men's club right in Japan. No snow. When we were walking down it was dark already they were playing Christmas music. It was Frank Sinatra saying that Dreams of a White Christmas. Oh, okay. That year we got an.

BELLORE: Sounds like you're you've had a really fruitful life. It sounds to me like you you have. And it also sounds to me like we've kind of got to the point where I need to thank you for, first of all, your service. Yeah. I need to thank 01:40:00you for this interview. Were agreeing to this interview.

WEINFURTNER: And I was. The other thing is, you could mention I was good at it. Yeah. Shooting a rifle, Anything with a gun, you know? Yeah. And I could I when I was in the first Cav Division, one of the first Calvary, and they had, of course, course company. We always got checked once a year. They had to fire their rifles.

BELLORE: Right.

WEINFURTNER: Anyway, I go to the the shooting range and set that all up. I could, hit a 20 inch bullseyes at 500 yards at open sites. Mm-hmm. You know, I was. I was good at it.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: No, I shot. I shot three perfect scores with an M-1 carbine. Never went one out 3 trophies over it. But I spent a lifetime hunting and fishing, and 01:41:00it wasn't happy at all. And I. I don't shoot like everybody else does. I can. I have a dominant eye. And I. I just can shoot with both eyes open, and it picks up that sight, and I can see the whole picture.

BELLORE: Mm-hmm.

WEINFURTNER: I can see the sight and see the deer. Yeah. I don't know, I. I'm good at shooting something moving.

BELLORE: Yeah.

WEINFURTNER: You know, so. I was really good at that. Yeah. You know, I had a good life.

BELLORE: Yeah, sounds like you did. We're going to wrap her up. I mean, I'm just so thankful for your service and for this interview.

WEINFURTNER: I thank you doing that. Thank you very much.

[Interview Ends]