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WILL-TV
and Radio Look at Ordinary Lives Made Extraordinary by War
They came
from Arcola, Rantoul, Springfield, Bloomington, Champaign and Urbana.
From all over central Illinois, they were swept up in one of the
greatest cataclysmic events in history. It transformed them and their
communities.
More than
70 World War II veterans, their families and others involved in war
service have volunteered to be a part of WILL’s Central Illinois World
War II Stories, an effort to capture and share stories of central
Illinois during World War II.
In conjunction with the airing of Ken
Burns’ The War on WILL-TV, WILL reporters, producers and oral
history interviewers talked to local men and women, who describe how the
war altered their lives and the lives of their families. Stories begin
Sept. 26 on WILL-TV and the week of Sept. 17 on WILL-AM 580, with more
stories featured on the WILL Web site at will.uiuc.edu.
On WILL-TV,
stories will air immediately following the 7 p.m. airing of The War on
the following dates. They include:
Wednesday, Sept. 26: Yukiko Okinaga Llewellyn of Champaign spent the
war at Manzanar where she was interned with her family. A retired
assistant dean of students at the University of Illinois, she returned
to Manzanar last fall for the first time since she and her mother left
it in October 1945 with $25 and a pair of government-issued bus tickets.
Sunday, Sept. 30: Sparky Songer of Danville served in the
infantry in Europe and was captured by the Germans in the Battle of the
Bulge. Now curator and president of the Vermilion County War Museum, he
spent six months in German camps before escaping and finding his way to
American lines. Jill Knappenberger of Champaign served on the front
lines during the Battle of the Bulge, working for the Red Cross driving
refitted truck dubbed a “clubmobile,” equipped with donuts coffee and
cigarettes.
Tuesday, Oct. 2: When the USS Indianapolis was sunk by Japanese
torpedoes in 1945, only 316 of 1,196 soldiers on board survived. Three
of those survivors live in central Illinois: Art Leenerman, Mahomet; Don
McCall, Champaign; Earl Riggins, Oakland. Theodore Freeman of Rantoul
was on board the USS Missouri when a Japanese kamikaze pilot crashed his
plane into the ship.
On WILL-AM,
local World War II stories will air on Morning Edition and The Afternoon
Magazine. Stories include a pair of profiles on men who chose different
approaches to church teachings about fighting. Merlin Taber of
Champaign, who comes from a Quaker background, obtained conscientious
objector status after being drafted, and served in the Civilian Public
Service. Delbert Augsburger, of Flanagan, comes from a Mennonite
background, but he and his brothers went into the military against the
teachings of their church.
Other
stories include a German POW camp at Hoopeston, where prisoners were
taken to area farm fields and factories to help during packing season
for corn and other vegetables, and a visit to the Indiana War Memorial
for a piece focusing on the tragedy of the USS Indianapolis. In
addition, WILL-AM and WILL-FM air one-to-two-minute segments of oral
history interviews with central Illinois veterans beginning in
September.
WILL’s
Central Illinois World War II Stories Web site includes oral history
interviews with Merle Roughton of Decatur and Ralph Woolard
of Tolono,
along with a diary kept by Merle “Bud” Mingee of Champaign, who used a
small brown memo book to record the daily events aboard the light
cruiser the USS Houston, including the fierce Battle of Formosa, in
which the ship was torpedoed several times. As an electrician, Mingee
worked to keep the ship afloat. Few, if any, U.S. Navy ships operating
in the open sea survived such massive underwater damage and flooding.
Mingee died in 1963 at age 42, but his children treasure the diary.
“Many generous
veterans and others involved in the war have offered to record their
oral histories,” said Kimberlie Kranich, WILL outreach coordinator.
“They’ve really stepped up. They're ready to tell their stories on camera so future
generations will know about the lives of ordinary men and women during
the war. We still have many more to record and will add them to the Web
site as we complete them so anyone can watch them.”
All of the WILL
television and radio stories will also be archived on the site, along
with photos of those featured.
Central
Illinois World War II Stories are sponsored, in part, by WETA, the
Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Supervalu, East Central Illinois
Building and Construction Trades Council, Flooring Surfaces, Clark
Lindsey Village, Ecowater Systems, International Brotherhood of
Electrical Workers #601, and Strawberry Fields.
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Contact: Mary Barrineau
WILL AM-FM-TV
217-244-5080
barrinea@uiuc.edu
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