Among the 100+ pictures supplied by JL and Mary Catherine were some military pictures. I have never seen these before and they will all go into the book really well. I also received a picture of Raymond Savat in Korea from Sandra.
Sandra Savat-Mann: “Daddy in the Korean War. He sure was a fine looking man with a heart of gold!” Sandra is the granddaughter of Onene Littrell-Curtis.
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Its a safe bet that this picture is not state-side. The only thing that could get four GI’s so interested in milking a cow would be a long-term shortage of milk. The GI in the middle/background holding the cow by the horn is Red. The architecture suggest Europe and since Red served in Italy with the 91st Recon., that would be my conclusion.
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Don’t know who the three in front are but that’s JD standing in the carriage. The only clues to where this might be in the South Pacific is the dress of JD and his ‘CB’ (SeaBee) buddies, Wong’s Bakery, a stained un-readable note on the back and the bottle in the one sailors hand. Wong’s bakery would probably take some serious research and I can’t imagine Wong's bakery would be significant enough outside of its location unless it had actually survived 66 years. I tried to focus and enhance the photo to identify the bottle but the image was in too low of a resolution. The only thing that the sailors dress might tell us is that they probably were in the vicinity of their duty station as opposed to shore leave in New Zealand, Australia or somewhere similar. (Don’t even know if that was an option for sailors in WWII).note 1 what was a CB?
JD’s CB unit was in New Caledonia and the Fiji Islands; Tetere Beach, Guadalcanal, Emirau, New Guinea and then to Manus, New Guinea; and then Manila, Philippines
Hello! On a whim after writing the above I started to do a little research and discovered a Wong’s Bakery in Romblon, Philippines which is an island about 200+ miles from Manilla. Wong is probably a very popular name but this was the only reference found in New Guinea, Guadalcanal and the Philippines.This is a long shot but the bakery was still in existence in in the 60s and 70s. I’m sending an email to the blog that had this reference:
Anonymous said... …thanks for posting something about romblon. My grandparents used to own the Wong's Bakery in Romblon - probably known in the 60's and 70's but i have never been there and there is no one left in the family to tell me which building it is. I know its near the Plaza and the church. Would love to know about it and a photo of the place....thanks..
The only thing readable on the back of the picture was JD’s name and “Taff Ave.”
Hopefully we might get JL to bring the picture to next years reunion and we can get a better scan.
note 1: just discovered that JD’s battalion was on leave in New Zealand from 1-26-1944 to 3-7-1944 (excluding travel time) so will have to expand search while waiting for response from the Philippine blog.
The 1944 War film The Fighting Seabees, staring John Wayne, tells a heavily fictionalized story of the formation of the Seabees and their first taste of combat.
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