Submitted Article
Over the past year, since Veterans Day 2019, the Journal has run a feature called, “Veteran Stories,” each week in these pages.
Mostly, these features have highlighted the military service of soldiers who are from Crofton, or those who made Crofton their final home or are buried in Crofton area cemeteries. The story of American history and courage under fire could be told from the stories of these veterans.
True heroes have always walked among our midst, but we often don’t realize it. Veterans from Crofton have fought in every American war since the Civil War. So far, we’ve featured veterans who have served in many theaters of action during different eras including the Civil War, Plains Wars, Spanish-American War, World War I, World War II, Korean War, Post-Korea and Vietnam.
We thought it would be interesting for our readers to see again all of the veterans who have been featured. We have tried to spread out the features through various branches of military service through different periods of time. We have attempted to tell stories that haven’t been heard before, and to dig up facts and tidbits of information about the military service of these soldiers that even some family members did not know.
As we look into the next year, we thank the many readers who have submitted information about veterans in their own families. We continue to work through that list, and our own list of Veteran Stories as we head into the next year.
In next week’s Journal, we will discuss how you can help contribute to this ongoing series by sharing stories within your own family, and we will talk about how some of our research is conducted and the information that is most helpful in writing Veteran Stories.
As we head into another year of Veteran Stories, here is a list of those veterans we have featured since November 2019, the war era in which they served, and the date when their Veteran Stories article was published in the Journal.
We honor these soldiers and all veterans who have served our country so faithfully throughout our history.
Civil War (1861-1865)
John Buhrow (Jan. 23, 2020)
Nelson Campbell (Jan. 30, 2020)
John Carter (March 5, 2020)
Fred Douglas (Nov. 14, 2019)
Durs Miller (Apr. 2, 2020)
John “Dad” Russ (Dec. 19, 2019)
Francis Shuman (Apr. 16, 2020)
James Stokes (Jan. 2, 2020)
Plains Indian Wars (1850-1890)
George Whistler (Nov. 28, 2019)
Spanish-American War (1898)
George Meier (Feb. 27, 2020)
John Watkins (Apr. 30, 2020)
World War I (1917-1918)
Ray Avenell (Oct. 29, 2020)
Arnold Bickett (Aug. 6, 2020)
Ralph Brown (May 7, 2020)
Howard Everton (May 14, 2020)
John Filips (Dec. 26, 2019)
Carl Hansen (July 9, 2020)
John Heick (June 11, 2020)
John Merchen (July 2, 2020)
Ellis Tucker (March 26, 2020)
John Van Heek (Feb. 20, 2020)
World War II (1941-1945)
George Arens (June 18, 2020)
Alphonse Ausdemore (Aug. 13, 2020)
Bernard Ausdemore (June 25, 2020)
Raymond Bart (Dec. 12, 2019)
Irvin Buschkamp (July 16, 2020)
Glenn Carr (Sept. 24, 2020)
Ralph Dickes (Jan. 16, 2020)
Paul Donner (May 21, 2020)
Loren Everton (Oct. 15, 2020)
Ralph Heger (Apr. 9, 2020)
Clyde Johnson (July 30, 2020)
Henry Kremer (Aug. 20, 2020)
Norman Kube (Oct. 22, 2020)
Cyrus Mischke (Nov. 5, 2020)
Fred Plantenberg (Aug. 27, 2020)
Lawrence Rothluebber (Oct. 1, 2020)
Lyle Sawatzke (May 28, 2020)
Arthur Schieffer (June 4, 2020)
Raymond Steffen (Sept. 10, 2020)
Linus Welchert (Feb. 13, 2020)
Alphonsus Wiebel (Oct. 8, 2020)
Walter Wiebelhaus (Sept. 17, 2020)
Warren Zart (Feb. 6, 2020)
Korean War (1950-1953)
Gerald Foxhoven (July 23, 2020)
Daniel Steffen (March 12, 2020)
Gerard “Jake” Van Heek (Nov. 12, 2020)
Post-Korea
Lyle Leader (Dec. 5, 2019)
Vietnam War (1955-1975)
Roger Bartz (Nov. 21, 2019)
Jack Frady (March 19, 2020)
Herbert Hilfiker (Sept. 3, 2020)
Marlow Loecker (Jan. 9, 2020)
Gary Pautler (Apr. 23, 2020)