The Salamanca Press ■ Nov. 7-13, 2013 Hometown Heroes ■ C1

C2 ■ Hometown Heroes Nov. 7-13, 2013 ■ The Salamanca Press

Submitted photoHoward Gunsolus (center) and his granddaughter, Chief Master Sergeant Jennifer Hutcherson, hold a box of Gunsolus’ medals and campaign ribbons. Accompanying them are (from left) Gunsolus’ son-in-law and daughter, Tom and Gail Swierkowski and his wife, Pauline.

“He recently turned 90 and during the party he started talking about his service,” Hutcherson said about her grandfather. “He mentioned he didn’t get anything when he left the service, except for his discharge papers. He gave me a copy and I was able to put togeth-er a shadow box with the medals he earned.”

Gunsolus said the medal presenta-tion came as a surprise. His trip includ-ed a front row seat with other veterans in the POW/MIA ceremony, an oppor-tunity to meet Secretary of Defense Hagel, a tour of the Pentagon and visits to the World War II Memorial and Arlington Cemetery.

But the real story begins decades ago, when as a young man Gunsolus first heard word from his father that Pearl Harbor had been attacked.

“I can just remember that my dad heard it on the radio and came in and told us kids,” Gunsolus recalled in a recent interview. “A year and two months after Pearl Harbor I went in the service. I went in with a buddy — we went in together — but I don’t think we were together more than six weeks and we were separated.”

A series of tests Gunsolus said he took at Fort Niagara concluded he would serve as a radio operator.

“I can remember putting these ear-phones on and listening to these sounds and asking questions,” he said. “Apparently they thought I could do radio. Morse code is what it was.”

Gunsolus spent three years in the service, from 1943 to 1946. After train-ing in the states — including frigid basic training in February on the board-walk in Atlantic City — the young sol-dier followed orders that sent him to the war’s Pacific Theater, where he served often as part of a crew that “island hopped” and built airstrips.

His time in the service included a multitude of air raids, some which Gunsolus remembers well to this day.

“It was at night, after dark and I had gone down to the radio shack to talk with the lad who was on duty. All of a sudden the lights went out … the radio was still on,” he recalled of one raid. “We went outside and saw tracers being shot in the air. That was the warning — air raid, there was an enemy coming in.

“I went outside the radio shack … and started running. They had antennas all over the place and they have guide-wires; I tripped over one and went flat

on my face,” he continued. “I just laid there right there because I knew the next one was going to hit me in the back of the head. … (The raid) was a half-mile away, but you don’t realize how close it is. That was probably the worst scare I had while I was over there.”

Gunsolus also remembers witnessing a B-17 have engine trouble and what he thought was a man fall to his death.

The plane’s pilot, discovering a prob-lem with one of the plane’s engines, ordered those on board to parachute. Gunsolus, who was standing a great distance away, saw the men jump out of the plane and watched as one of the men’s chutes didn’t open.

“The third or fourth one out— his chute didn’t open, it was trailing behind him,” he said. “He sailed right by all the rest of those other guys. They looked like itty-bitty little things they were so far away from us. He came down so fast, but they said he did get his emergency chute open before he hit the ground.”

Those and countless other stories comprised Gunsolus’ military career, which concluded in January 1946. He said he made it back to the states in time for New Year’s and his official dis-charge came less than two weeks after.

Following his service, Gunsolus eventually started a 28-year career working as a truck driver for Nason’s Delivery in Springville and married his girlfriend, Gertrude Decot, who died of multiple sclerosis at 45 years old.

He would later marry Pauline (Westfall) Rupp. After living in North Carolina for about 10 years, Gunsolus and his wife bought a home in Cattaraugus and he later began working for the school district in 1990.

“It gets me up in the morning,” he said about his job. “Alarm goes off at 5:30 in the morning and it’s off to work. It’s been good for me.”

At its last regular meeting, the Cattaraugus-Little Valley School Board of Education approved a resolution that named Tuesday, Nov. 12, the day follow-ing Veterans Day, as “Howard Gunsolus Day” within the district to honor the well-known bus monitor.

Cattaraugus-Little Valley Superintendent Jon Peterson said the district is hosting a luncheon in the bus garage for Gunsolus on Nov. 12.

“He’s the nicest most humble guy you’ll ever meet,” Peterson said. “He loves coming to work, happy as can be. ... The kids love him and respect him.

“His reason for being recognized is a combination of his service to the county and his service to the district.”

Submitted photoHoward Gunsolus stands with and his granddaughter, Chief Master Sergeant Jennifer Hutcherson, outside of the Pentagon during Gunsolus’ recent trip to Washington, D.C.

Salamanca to host Vets Day ceremonies Nov. 11

Salamanca — Dennis Burger, commander of American Legion Post 535 in Salamanca, has announced Veterans Day ceremo-nies will be held on Monday, Nov. 11 at 11 a.m. in front of the Legion and VFW club rooms on Wildwood Avenue.

Burger encourages all to attend; it is a day of remembrance and to honor those veterans who preserved the freedom we have today.

VETERAN from A1

The Salamanca Press ■ Nov. 7-13, 2013 Hometown Heroes ■ C3

C4 ■ Hometown Heroes Nov. 7-13, 2013 ■ The Salamanca Press