I ' ve been privileged for the last year or so to visit with an elite group of citizens. Assigned the task of wr i ting about what life was like on the home front during World War II, I began reading old news clippings and chatting with folks who could recall the war . And the more I d i d so, the more I began to feel a sense of urgency in capturing these folks ' stories before they're no longer around to tell them. I 'm afraid I've been like the child who lets his grandparen

Petoskey WWII veteran never had to leave the U.S. By Tamara Stevens Hubert Hayes, 95, a retired dentist in Petoskey, is extremely modest about his service to his country during World War II. “I never left the U.S.,” he said, laughing. “I went where they told me to go and I did what they asked me to do and it worked out.” Where the military sent him was Biloxi, Mississippi, to Keesler Air Force Base. That was the first Hayes knew he was in the Air Force, he said. He didn’t req

Petoskey man took part in the Battle of Midway in 1942 Anyone who has seen a movie about the Battle of Midway during WWII has a fairly good understanding of what Winfield Josiah Sluyter’s experience was like. “Win,” as he is called, served as an aircraft mechanic in the U.S. Navy during WWII in the Pacific Ocean aboard an aircraft carrier. He was assigned to a Casablanca-class escort carrier named “U.S.S. Savo Island,” a CVE 78. Win Sluyter pictured in his living room, 2019.

Emmet County man recalls his WWII mission on the island of Iwo Jima Lawrence “Larry” St. Clair may be legally blind at 98 years old, but there is nothing wrong with his hearing. Having a strong sense of hearing at an early age is one of the factors that determined Larry’s direction in the military, and ultimately led to him serving in World War II on the island of Iwo Jima. “I was in the Army, but they assigned me to the Air Force communications because my hearing was so good