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00:00Welcome to Operation Healing Heroes. Join me in the boat today as we feature 98-year-old
00:10World War II Navy veteran Bill Crucial. They served for us. They sacrificed for us. Their
00:24stories deserve to be told. Every military veteran has a story to tell. Join our host,
00:36Jay Garstecki, as we honor the stories of our true American heroes, one soldier at a time.
00:45The mission today is Operation Healing Heroes.
00:52Brought to you by Great Clips.
00:59White Bear Lake, the ideal destination to explore the beauty and excitement of Minnesota. It's
01:08here that Bill Crucial calls home. At 98 years young, Bill is part of a quickly dwindling
01:16number of World War II veterans, also known as the greatest generation. They were ordinary
01:23people who did extraordinary things, courage, sacrifice, and bravery, that will withstand
01:30the test of time.
01:30You must be Mr. Bill Crucial.
01:32Yes, sir.
01:33I'm Jay Garstecki. Nice to meet you.
01:34Hey, nice to meet you. Good Irish name.
01:36Yeah. German.
01:37Dutch, huh?
01:38No, Polish.
01:39Polish?
01:40And Italian.
01:41You want to come on board and catch some fish?
01:46Growing up during the Great Depression and serving our country during World War II, Bill
01:53has no shortage of stories to tell, stories that need to be heard.
01:58Do you know where the fish are?
02:00Not really.
02:01I don't fish out here.
02:02No?
02:03I don't have a boat.
02:07And to this day, Bill will happily tell his stories to anyone who will sit and listen.
02:14So tell me about life growing up.
02:16Well, it's a long story, but I'll try to make it as short as possible.
02:22My mother and dad both came from Germany.
02:26They met in 23, got married in 24.
02:29I was born in 25, my sister in 26, and my brother in 28.
02:34Wow.
02:35I grew up right in St. Paul, Minnesota, born on the east side on 6th and Mendota.
02:42We lived there until 1933, when unfortunately my father passed away.
02:50Not knowing what his biggest medical problem was, they found that he was born with a hole
02:54in his heart.
02:55He was 42 years old and left my mother a widow in the middle of the Depression.
03:03You know, Mom being a widow, the people of the community really went to bat for her, to
03:07help her.
03:08And, you know, it was all hard work back in those days.
03:11There were no tractors to speak of.
03:13During thrashing season, you had a team of horses, and all the grain was shocked in the
03:18field.
03:19He put it on the wagon, and he brought it up to the thrashing machines, and I know this
03:24is hard to believe, but in 1937, I went to work for this farmer, and I got 10 bucks for
03:29the whole summer and room and board.
03:30Really?
03:31Yeah.
03:32And I never worked that hard in my whole life.
03:34And how old were you?
03:35Twelve.
03:36Twelve years old?
03:37Yeah.
03:38It was bad enough that I don't want to talk about it, you know.
03:39Yeah.
03:40But then, every summer after that, I worked for the farmers in the local area, and then
03:45in 19...
03:48For instance, in 1941, Hastings was right down the road, you know, about eight miles.
03:53And I found out I could go down there and set pins Friday and Saturday night.
03:57So I'd hitchhike down Highway 61 every Friday and Saturday.
04:01Really?
04:02Setting pins down there.
04:03At the bowling alley?
04:04Yep.
04:05Got...
04:06You ready for this?
04:07Three cents a line.
04:09You had to set two lines to make any money, you know.
04:12Well, you never know.
04:14There's nice bass that are in here.
04:15Oh, you got one.
04:17That didn't take you very long.
04:18Well, you know what you're doing.
04:20That's right.
04:21Well, you got a largemouth bass.
04:24I don't think it's going to set any world records, but you know what?
04:29We'll take it.
04:32First fish of the day on the second cast of the day for you, huh?
04:34It'll work.
04:35Throw her in.
04:36All right.
04:37You want to get a bigger one?
04:38Sure.
04:39Operation Healing Heroes is brought to you by Great Cliffs, the Yance Valor Foundation,
04:51and by the Al Lynch Foundation.
04:55Operation Healing Heroes is a nonprofit organization dedicated to documenting the lives of our U.S.
05:04military veterans.
05:06In addition, we also provide financial support and treatment for post-traumatic stress.
05:11Your donation will help heal our heroes.
05:19The Great Depression was a daunting time, and losing his dad at an early age made it even
05:25more difficult for Bill.
05:27You see, Bill had to forego his senior year in high school and join the workforce.
05:33Off to California he went, at the age of 17 in his 1931 Model A.
05:39And of course, being that the war was on, I knew I was on the list to be inducted, and
05:44I didn't want to...I wanted to enlist.
05:48And the Navy just seemed to be the one opportunity that I wanted to jump onto because when I drove
05:55back from California and saw all the Marines and the Army guys in the desert learning how
06:01to run, why it didn't appeal to me at all.
06:04What was going on in the world during that time?
06:07Well, it was almost beyond imagination.
06:09Like, for an example, the night of Pearl Harbor and when President Roosevelt announced it,
06:16I was sitting in the pin setter shack at the bowling alley, all alone listening to it on
06:21the radio.
06:22The next thing I know, I'm on a train going out to the only boot camp that was built during
06:29World War II was a place called Farragut, Idaho.
06:34Were you nervous?
06:35Were you scared?
06:36No.
06:37When you're young and dumb, you know.
06:39The big thing was marching.
06:41You know, and then because it was in such a mountainous area, boy, we took hikes like
06:46you would not believe.
06:48Bill finished boot camp and was able to visit home for a couple of days before having to
06:53return to San Diego.
06:55The Marine Corps is under the jurisdiction of the Navy.
06:58So they have no medical department.
07:00That's how all of us guys ended up with the Marines.
07:04How they determined we all were going to be pharmacists mates or medics in the Navy is
07:10beyond me.
07:11The nurse running the ward that I worked on insisted that I wear white Navy clothes for
07:18cleaning the floor.
07:19And I insisted that I needed my jeans on.
07:22And the next day I was on my way to the Marine Corps.
07:27That was my introduction to the Marine Corps.
07:28You know, the first thing they did is took all my clothes and gave me Marine clothes.
07:32Because I wore them.
07:33I even got discharged in a Marine Corps uniform.
07:35Did you?
07:36Yeah.
07:37Not in the Navy, huh?
07:38Nope.
07:39And then all of a sudden, I think there was 400 of us on board.
07:44The USS Robin Doncaster, a troop ship.
07:49We all went across the equator.
07:52And you've probably heard that you're a Pollywog until you go across the equator.
07:58All the Navy guys on board the ship put you through a physical routine you wouldn't even
08:01believe to make you a shellback.
08:06Newly minted shellback, Bill and his crew arrived at the islands of the South Pacific,
08:11where he would get more training as a medic and eventually head to the front lines.
08:17While I was there, I got a, I don't know if you've heard of anything like called phlebitis?
08:21Uh-uh.
08:22It's a blood condition.
08:24I had a blood clot right here in my groin, or my calf, that made the lymph node in my groin
08:32so bad I couldn't walk.
08:34And that was just before I was ready to go to Pelletoo.
08:38And the next thing I knew, four guys came in with a stretcher, put me on it,
08:44drove me right up and carried me right into the hospital into surgery.
08:49You know, I'll always remember the physician said, I see you're a corpsman.
08:53Yeah.
08:54Well, he said, this isn't much of an operation.
08:56If you want to watch it, here's a mirror.
08:59And three days later, I went back to duty.
09:01Really?
09:02Yeah.
09:03Did you watch it?
09:04Oh, hell yes.
09:06You watched the whole thing with a mirror, huh?
09:08Yeah.
09:09Having a medical problem like that is something that most people have no concept of.
09:14But it was my good fortune to have it at a time that kept me from probably being wounded
09:21or killed on Pelletoo.
09:24Operation Healing Heroes is brought to you by Great Cliffs, Power Pole, and by St. Croix Rods.
09:35And Eunice Shriver was our speaker.
09:44What do you say to Eunice Shriver?
09:47Boy, she looked at me with those steely blue eyes, you know.
09:50All I could say the words, God bless you, Eunice.
09:53And she wouldn't let go of my hand.
09:55If you'd like to see more behind-the-scenes footage, follow us on social media and subscribe to our YouTube channel.
10:02If you're a U.S. military veteran in Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, or beautiful sunny Florida, log on to our website.
10:10Take it at fishing.org to find an event near you.
10:21Bill's medical emergency kept him from joining the first Marines as they attacked the island of Pelletoo
10:27and what ended up being one of the deadliest battles in the history of the Marine Corps.
10:33At battle's end, at least one out of three troops was either injured or killed.
10:39Most of these islands nobody had ever heard of.
10:42Even to this day, when I ask anybody, have you ever heard of the island of Pelletoo, 90% never, ever heard of it.
10:54Bill and the 1st Marine Division headed to Okinawa to join in on an ongoing battle that would last 82 days.
11:02And it, too, came at a high cost.
11:05At one point, Bill worked alongside other medics for three days straight without relief,
11:11treating wounded as they came in off the front lines.
11:15The casualty right there was quite high as well.
11:18And you really don't understand war wounds until you see them.
11:24Because, boy, when you're in combat, you know, on the front lines, you don't have much in the way of bandages.
11:30You know, the best thing you got is morphine and a tourniquet.
11:33Yeah.
11:34So you guys would bandage them up before they went out to the hospital ship.
11:37Depending on the severity, you know.
11:39Yeah.
11:40And the worst ones were guys that nobody ever talks about.
11:44That psychologically, they were having a hell of a time.
11:47Mm-hmm.
11:48Nobody ever thought about the psychology of war and how it affects the guys.
11:53And if they did, there wasn't anything they could do about it.
11:56And I felt so damn sorry for those guys because we didn't have anything to help them.
12:00You know.
12:01And that was basically PTSD at that point.
12:03Sure.
12:04And they didn't even know what it was back then, right?
12:06I don't know.
12:07Combat fatigue.
12:09Yeah.
12:10That's what they called it.
12:11Combat fatigue.
12:13Yeah.
12:14Then we were getting all ready to go to Japan.
12:19The whole division.
12:21We were going to attack Japan.
12:24And they dropped the big one.
12:26You never saw so many happy men in all your life?
12:28Yeah.
12:29Yeah.
12:30We had to treat a couple of guys from gunshot ruins because they shot in the air, you know.
12:35God.
12:36Most of us had been in the Pacific at least a year and a half to two years, but a lot of them
12:42had years.
12:44And we finally got to civilization.
12:48You know, number one, the war was over when we went to China.
12:53It was one of the happy days of my life.
12:56You know, it was for everybody that was on that ship.
13:00So how long were you on that deployment before you got to go home?
13:03Well, I was over there two years.
13:07We left China maybe about 8th of December of 1945 in the middle of a typhoon.
13:15It was so bad the props come out of every wave, you know.
13:19And it was a horrible ride.
13:21Oh, God, it was horrible.
13:23And we finally ended up in Guam on Christmas Day.
13:27And it was so hot there that we had to eat our dinner, our Christmas dinner, on topside.
13:33We went down to the mess hall to get it and come back up.
13:36And from there, that ship never stopped until it got to San Diego.
13:40So I got over to the Naval Air Station in Minneapolis.
13:45And it was a great experience.
13:49Three days we were there.
13:50And then my mother and sister were brought out by friends.
13:54And when we got done crying and hugging, my sister shoved me away.
13:58And she looked at me and says, what the hell is wrong with you?
14:01I don't know.
14:02She said, your skin's all yellow.
14:06We all took Attebrun every day to keep from getting malaria.
14:10And it turned the pigment in your skin yellow.
14:12So we were all yellow.
14:13Really?
14:14Wow.
14:18It was an incredible experience with my mother and sister, you know.
14:23You can't see much through tears.
14:27Is it a big one?
14:29No.
14:30No, a small one?
14:32Oh, it looks like a sunfish.
14:36Oh, that's not a bad one.
14:38Oh.
14:39And there was a few of them that are even chasing it.
14:41Good heavens.
14:42You had three of them that were chasing them.
14:44Should have put a treble hook on there.
14:46Yeah, if we'd have had trouble, we might have gotten all of them, huh?
14:49That's not a bad one.
14:50Look at that.
14:51No, that's nice.
14:52It's almost a handful.
14:53I don't know if it'd be a neater or not.
14:54Maybe a little bit too small, but let's see if there's some bigger ones out there.
15:05The Arc Minnesota promotes and protects the human rights of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities,
15:12actively supporting them and their families in a lifetime of full inclusion.
15:19If you'd like to personally thank a veteran that you've seen in one of our episodes or nominate a veteran to be featured in a future episode,
15:26log on to our website, OperationHealingHeroes.org.
15:30Operation Healing Heroes is brought to you by Recon Boats, Thorn Brothers, and by FVP.
15:43While Bill's retirement has brought him joy and serenity in White Bear Lake, his commitment to serving his country has extended far beyond the war.
15:56Devoting his life and leaving behind a lasting legacy, Bill has dedicated himself to furthering the advancement of special education,
16:04a pursuit fueled by the remarkable strength and bravery of his mother.
16:11The best thing in my life was my mom.
16:14You know, when you're eight years old and you lose your dad, it's a whole new world.
16:19Yeah.
16:20What happened to mom?
16:21She lived to a hundred and one and eight months.
16:25Wow.
16:26Well, my little sister is 97 and my little brother is 95.
16:30So what's your secret to staying this healthy at 98 years old?
16:34Well, the first thing is my faith.
16:37You've got to have faith.
16:40The second thing is you've got to be positive about life because there's nothing on the other side.
16:47Negative is nothing.
16:52So did you return with any battle fatigue or PTSD?
16:55No.
16:56No.
16:57Anything you saw while you were over there?
16:58I was just so busy in my life.
17:01Fell in love with a gal and we got married in 48.
17:03I moved to St. Paul Park, my old home.
17:06When I look back on my whole life, it couldn't be better.
17:10Now, let me give you one example.
17:12My youngest son is a mentally challenged man.
17:15He's 66 years old.
17:17Back then, they only had two ways of identifying those children.
17:21They were educable or non-educable.
17:25Jeff was educable, but there wasn't a class.
17:30So I really went to work in the community to put it all together to convince the school board to get one.
17:37They did.
17:39And so I established an elementary school class.
17:45And then in 1967, I got a $70,000 a year grant to run that thing.
17:51And it's still running today, Jay, up in Winstead.
17:54That's amazing.
17:56But, you know, the inspiration that having a handicapped child brings into your life is beyond imagination.
18:02Like my son and his wife both had their master's degree in special ed and spent 70 years teaching.
18:12They have a daughter that's all involved in it today as a special ed teacher.
18:18She's 41 years old.
18:20They got a son that just got his master's degree and just started a full-time job
18:28in one of the great little communities just west of Minneapolis.
18:33Wow. Talk about paying it forward, huh?
18:35Oh.
18:37Just think about what that means to my life.
18:41You know, it's a miracle in a sense.
18:45Little did you know that that school that you'd start would end up...
18:48Oh.
18:49Today, it's one of the premier classes in special education in the United States.
18:54Wow.
18:55There's a part of life that most people never get to know that I lived to see the evolution of that whole process.
19:04And Barb and I led a life that you can't even imagine.
19:09Just a great lady, mother of seven children.
19:13When she told her children she met a guy with a motorcycle, they said, you're crazy, ma.
19:18And once I got her on it, I couldn't get her off the motorcycle.
19:22It was a great life.
19:24A great life.
19:25So on behalf of Operation Healing Heroes and St. Croix Rods and also Thorn Brothers who custom-made this rod for you, it's a red, white, and blue rod.
19:38It's got your name on it here.
19:39Oh, my God.
19:40It says, Bill Crushle, an appreciation of your sacrifice and service.
19:44That's a rod that hopefully you catch many more fish with.
19:4798 years old.
19:48I figure you're only about halfway through, right?
19:49Yeah.
19:50So you still got another 98 years left in that bad boy.
19:53And in order to make you look a little bit better, and I don't even know if that's possible, I got you your own Operation Healing Heroes jersey here with your name on it.
20:03Thank God, Jay.
20:04And Crushle on the back, I hope you wear that proud at your VFW meetings.
20:08Oh, boy.
20:09Let them know that you're a TV star now.
20:12Thank you for your service.
20:13Can I give you a hug?
20:14Sure.
20:16Thank you very much for your service.
20:18We appreciate it.
20:19You're known as the greatest generation for a reason.
20:22Well, you know, there was a bunch of us.
20:24There's not many of us left.
20:25I know.
20:26And so we have the most people here.
20:33If you'd like to personally thank a veteran that you've seen in one of our episodes or nominate a veteran to be featured in the future episode.
20:36Log onto our website, operationhealingheroes.org.
20:39And click on the nominate button.
20:44You
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