It’s been over 70 years since these Sycamore veterans served in World War II, Korea: ‘We lost some men’

SYCAMORE – It’s been more than seven decades since Jim Tull, Ken Cooper and Richard Korleski served their country in World Ward II and Korea, respectively.

Now residents of Grand Victorian of Sycamore, an independent senior living facility, they’re sharing their experiences from their time in the U.S. military ahead of Veterans Day this year.

Cooper, 96, was a soldier for the U.S. Army in the summer of 1945 and served in the Pacific theater. He said he volunteered when he was 18 because he “was ready” and “wanted to get into it.” When the first atomic bomb was dropped by the U.S. on Hiroshima, Japan, Cooper was on a ship anchored near the Hawaiian Islands. By the time he made it to the Philippines, the war was over.

Although he never saw the combat he’d prepared for when he enlisted, Cooper said his relief at the war’s end was present.

“Well, I was glad the war was over because we knew what was next,” Cooper said. “‘Cause the Battle of Okinawa was over then so we knew what the next battle was going to be.”

Cooper left the Army in November 1946, however, so his service in east Asia didn’t happen as he expected.

However, his Grand Victorian neighbor, Tull, found heavy combat during his service in Korea 3½ years later.

A medic in the Second Division of the U.S. Army, Tull spent 15 months in Korea after the U.S. draft enlisted him in 1950. After undergoing basic training with four other men, Tull was entered in a drawing to see where they’d be stationed.

“Three went to Europe and two went to Korea, and I was one of the lucky ones that went to Korea,” said Tull, 91.

When asked what made him lucky, Tull smiled, and responded that his fellow servicemen went off to Europe and “had fun.” Meanwhile, he went to Korea and was the target of gunfire.

At times, Tull said, there wasn’t much happening, but other times he and the unit would be frequently shot at. One experience involved a 2-mile road between a couple of U.S. Army camps that wasn’t drivable because of its close range to the Korean Army’s artillery fire.

“They could hit that jeep from 2 miles away,” Tull said. “No matter how fast or slow you went, they could hit it.”

A new road was eventually built between the two camps. That didn’t end what Tull endured, however. During the three-year war, Tull said his unit was overrun by Korean soldiers a couple of times.

“They came charging in and went through us, and even then at that time the cooks and everybody had rifles,” Tull said. “We lost some men and they lost quite a few men, twice.”

U.S. Navy Aviation Ordnanceman Korleski, 93, also lives in the Sycamore facility, and served in the Korean war.

Korleski enlisted before the Korean War began. Korleski said he was increasingly hearing talk of war while he was living in Sycamore in 1949, so he decided to enlist to give himself a better chance of doing a role he wanted to do.

For Korleski, that meant being an ordnanceman on a P2V Neptune, a reconnaissance aircraft that regularly flew over the Bering Sea in the northern Pacific. His role put him in charge of the aircraft’s ammunitions.

Korleski said sometimes, if his aircraft went across the international date line, Russian fighters would intercept him and the eight other people on the plane he flew with.

“You would never think there’s another aircraft in the world up there, but all of the sudden there’d be two or three jets right on your tail,” Korleski said. “And so help me, sometimes they [get] up close enough to where we could look into their windshield and they’d be going, shaking your finger at us like ‘You shouldn’t be here,’ you know.”

It’s been 69 years since the Korean War ended, and Korleski said he doesn’t do anything special to observe Veterans Day.

Tull, who saw the most combat of the three veterans, said he also no longer does much to commemorate Veterans Day.

“Well, we used to have parades,” Tull said. “They’d have parades for the veterans to go out to the cemetery and different activities, but now it doesn’t seem like there’s much of anything going on.

“Nowadays it doesn’t seem like ... everybody says ‘Thanks for your service,’ but it’s pretty well meaningless,” Tull said.

On the contrary, Cooper said he thinks the country does a good job of appreciating World War II and Korean War veterans – although he does think veterans of the Vietnam War haven’t been afforded the same respect he was.

“I think the country as a whole is trying to keep World War II veterans in mind. I think they’re appreciated,” Cooper said. “I get a lot of people saying, ‘Thank you for your service,’ and the same with Korea. It’s the Vietnam veterans that I feel sorry for because they don’t. They didn’t get a lot of respect.”

Tull said he doesn’t know how the public can do a better job of supporting and giving thanks to veterans because he thinks Veterans Day is looked at like any other holiday.

“Happy Halloween, no happy Veterans Day. It’s all the same,” Tull said. “The people don’t really care. I mean, there’s a lot of talking but it’s meaningless. We had a lot of parades and activities and stuff years ago, but now it’s just another day.”