Thursday, February 9, 2012

About That Listing

The other day, I mentioned our impromptu project using the Flip Pal Mobile Scanner to conquer a seventy-year-old rolled-up photograph of my father-in-law’s boot camp company. I say “conquer” because the thirty-two-inch photo would have been a bear to replicate any other way.

I had also mentioned that we discovered several signatures on the back of the far end of the photo.

I’m thinking now would be an excellent time to share what those names were.

I also think that, since it is near-impossible to discern which dot of a face was which on the group photo, shrunk to size in this itty-bitty blog space, that I’d like to post a sequence of the segments of the photo, as scanned in their pre-stitched format.

Of course, I’m hoping that some other genealogy researcher will stumble upon this post—aided, of course, by the ubiquitous Google traffic director—and be able to retrieve some memorabilia from their ancestor’s past. (I always like to play that “Some Kind Soul” role, hoping to stumble upon such a site with pictures of my own ancestors in some grand gesture of cosmic genealogical karma.)

I tried doing some research to find background information on any of these signatories, but without much luck. For some, the name is too common. For others, the name is too illegible. And some would be near impossible to track for sure, given only initials for first names. And for one, possibly, there isn’t much information now online because he made the ultimate sacrifice early on in his Navy career.

So here they are: the men of Company 162-42 at the Great Lakes Naval Training Station on April 6, 1942—and the list of the twelve close companions of my father-in-law, Frank Stevens, written on the reverse of our copy of the photograph.

May their pictures find their way into some appreciative descendants’ research files. For all they have done for us, they deserve to be remembered.


Sherwood J. Hanford – Rockford, Ill.
John O. Clark – Harvey, Iowa
Stewart MacIntyre – Chicago Ill.
Raymond R. Schultz – Chicago, Ill.
Gilbert “Bud” Becker – Racine, Wisc.
Harold Hinze [Hinz?] Chicago Ill.
C. F. Soucy   Des Moines, Iowa  “42”
D. R. Rickard – Rockford, Ill.
Edwin Alfred Warchol “42”  Tilden Tech
Howard Thomas Cunningham “Chi” Lane Tech
Robert James Stafford – Janesville, Wisconsin – Hospital Corps.
Fred Q [O?] La Norci    Winter Park Flordia [sic]



A note about recommendations: in mentioning the Flip Pal Mobile Scanner, this author has not, in any way, received any financial remuneration for this or previous posts regarding its use. There. Now I've officially said it.

7 comments:

  1. To further complicate any search for these gentlemen would be that if, like Frank, they became wanderers and never went home...

    I think I see if I can turn anything up --

    ReplyDelete
  2. CLARK, JOHN ORLAND
    Aviation Machinist's Mate 1st Class - US NAVY
    WORLD WAR II
    DATE OF BIRTH: 12/15/1922
    DATE OF DEATH: 01/24/2002
    BURIED AT:
    GLENDALE CEMETERY (Veteran's Cemetery)
    4909 UNIVERSITY AVENUE DES MOINES, IA 50311

    The 1920 US census shows him as the son of Marvin and Violet and living in Clay, Marion County, Iowa; 3 miles from Harvey, the nearest town.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Carl F. Soucy
    Birth Date: 11 December 1923
    Last Residence: Polk, Iowa 50311
    Death Date: 11 March 2003

    I can find nothing more on this gentleman.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Edwin Alfred Warchol
    Birth: Apr. 14, 1918
    Death: Feb. 4, 1998
    AMM1, US NAVY
    Burial: National Memorial Cemetery of Arizona
    Phoenix, Maricopa County, Arizona, USA
    Plot: 46, 0, 446

    Son of John and Anna Warchol of Lake County, Indiana (across the state line from Chicago).

    A note on Tilden Tech - Tilden Technical High School in Chicago, IL.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I've located Howard Thomas Cunningham son in California. Sent you an e-mail.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Hopefully, the descendants of these men will find this post and Intense Guy's bits of research. Good job!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Edwin was my great uncle (my moms uncle)he was such a nice man. Thank for sharing

    ReplyDelete