75 years ago

June 6, 1944

Last night at the Grays Harbor Toastmasters club dinner meeting at Hotel Emerson Lloyd White presided and Charles Rasanen discussed the topic “Helicopters.” Carroll Agee, Don Rogers, Virgil Carlson and Dan McGillicuddy discussed government regulations of labor organizations.

Rev. S. Charles Shangler, Robert Ross and Weston Dailey were guests. McGillicuddy, who has been commissioned an ensign in the navy, will leave Sunday for training in Tuscon, Arizona.

June 7, 1944

In solemn supplication for God’s blessings upon relatives and friends in the armed forces and for a speedy Allied victory, Harborites last night knelt humbly at special D-Day services in many churches.

Most sanctuaries remained open all day, and relatives of servicemen overseas were particularly invited to attend the evening prayer meetings.

The call to worship was sounded by church bells and chimes, and the grateful pilgrimage of prayer continued well into the evening. Special musical numbers and singing psalms marked most services.

As clergymen called upon the entire city to beseech the blessing of Almighty God upon the boys “over there” and the Allied cause, that benediction was reiterated by hundreds in simple, silent prayers of their faith.

50 years ago

June 6, 1969

Ninety-six Montesano seniors are ending their carefree high school days at the 77th annual commencement exercises of Montesano High School in the school gymnasium tonight.

The salutatory and valedictory addresses will be delivered by Joan Hardy and Linda Boyer, and the commencement address by Mrs. Helen Gallagher, University of Washington Law librarian.

June 7, 1969

Saturday, no newspaper published

25 years ago

June 6, 1994

• “Big John” Reynolds, 73, doesn’t usually think about the war.

But with all the coverage of the 50th anniversary of D-Day, the harsh memories have been shooting through his mind. On June 6, 1944, the Harborite was a 22-year-old Army medic who had begged for an overseas transfer. He had visions of something swell in England but ended up on Omaha Beach, the site of D-Day’s bloodiest battle.

Reynolds had worked in a hospital for a few years and had seen injuries before. But nothing prepared him for what he had to do that day.

“I’d never taken a leg off with a pair of scissors before,” he recalls, tears filling his eyes. “I’d never pulled a man’s teeth out with pliers.”

“When it’s happening, you don’t have time to think about what’s going on,” said the 6-foot-6-inch retired Aberdeen longshoreman. “You’re busy. You’re cold. You’re scared. You’re wet. You’re hungry. But 40 or 50 years later you think about it, and it just shakes the hell out of you.”

• If cats have nine lives, Louis Sajec must have 99.

The Hoquiamite, who will be 77 on July 4, feels lucky to have survived the D-Day invasion on the coast of France 50 years ago today.

About 10 members of his platoon of 30 men died, some before arriving at Omaha Beach.

Sajec was in the Army’s First Infantry Division — “The Big Red One” — of the 16th Regiment, Second Battalion.

He nearly never made it to shore. The “duck” landing craft Sajec’s platoon had boarded at sea sank some 10 miles from shore in deep waves.

Sajec figured his life was over.

“We were instructed if we saw somebody in the water, don’t stop and pick them up. We never thought we’d get picked up. But the guys on this one boat knew us and rescued us.”

Those of his platoon who did arrive on Omaha Beach did so without guns, queasy from bobbing and weaving through the waves.

It was not for nothing that they called it “Bloody Omaha” Beach. There were 3,881 casualties there by the end of “The Longest Day.”

June 7, 1994

A new high school, a new elementary school and a new pool will be on the ballot in the Aberdeen School District Nov. 8.

School board member Jim Brown’s motion last night, which was quickly agreed to by the other four board members calls for the following:

• An elementary school to replace the aging McDermonth Elementary School building would be located in West Aberdeen above Grays Harbor Community Hospital.

• The high school would be built on the South Side off Huntley Street near Miller Junior High.

• The new swimming pool would be constructed below Sam Benn Gym.

Compiled from the archives of The Daily World by Karen Barkstrom