Just go to the image source and drop them a line.
Posted on 02/18/2005 12:29:49 PM PST by SwinneySwitch
Mission resident Richard Kemp is used to people stopping and staring at his Madeline.
The 53-year-old, in fact, relishes the attention he gets when people ask him about the companion that he has shared his life with for the past 11 years.
Of course, this one doesn’t spend money.
She just demands it.
Lots of it. About $90,000.
Madeline is no lady; she’s a tank. A 1944 olive-drab Sherman tank with twin diesel engines that rattle when she starts up. She doesn’t purr like her successors; instead, she lets out loud gurgles and burps — symbolic of an era when military machines were less about stealth and more about utility.
"She gets loud," Kemp said of the tank, which he named after his mother several years ago.
Kemp began restoring Madeline nearly 11 years ago, after he saw an ad in the Military Vehicle Preservation Association’s magazine, Supply Line.
"It was $30,000, and $5,000 for the freight," he said of the initial investment.
Madeline’s parts have been imported from across Europe and Asia. In fact, Madeline’s engine was originally used on a Sherman in Russia during World War II, Kemp said.
Of course, Kemp said he didn’t know it would take him 11 years to rebuild her.
"It looked like junk," he recalled. "But I was told all I had to do was put it together — like a puzzle."
Several puzzle pieces (and $60,000) later, Kemp is driving Madeline in local parades and military air shows.
He’s also taking her out to her first battle re-enactment this weekend in Doss, a tiny town northwest of Fredericksburg. He left this morning for the five-hour trip.
The re-enactment will commemorate the Feb. 23, 1945, raising of the U.S. flag on Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima, immortalized in one of the most famous photographs in history. A Rio Grande Valley Marine, Cpl. Harlon Block of Weslaco, was one of the handful of Americans who hoisted the Stars and Stripes that day, but he was killed in action before the battle was over. This year is the 60th anniversary of the battle, which secured the strategic island for Allied forces in 1945 near the end of World War II.
The event is organized by the National Museum of the Pacific War in Fredericksburg, the only museum dedicated to combat in the Pacific Ocean. The museum is often referred to as the Admiral Nimitz Museum, named after Chester Nimitz, the Fredericksburg native who commanded U.S. naval forces in the Pacific during much of the war.
Organizers are expecting more than 300 re-enactors from 22 states including Ohio, Florida and California. There’s also expected to be 80 re-enactors from Japan.
The battlefield will also include several Japanese pillboxes, or concrete defenses the Japanese used to secure limited safety during the battle; a dozen World War II aircraft; and 50 military vehicles, including tanks, halftracks and flamethowers, said Helen McDonald, the museum’s assistant director.
Michael Faubion, a military history professor at the University of Texas-Pan American, said historical re-enactments like the one this weekend are important because they bring history alive.
"History in a textbook can be really boring," he said. "(History) comes to life with re-enactments and makes it more interesting than just words on a page, which can be really abstract."
Of course, re-enactments can never compare to being there to talking with someone who was, he said.
"It’s never as realistic as possible," he said. "But it’s just as relevant and important."
The 36-day battle for Iwo Jima was one of the Pacific theater’s most deadly. Only 1,000 of the 20,000 Japanese defenders survived, while 6,000 Americans were killed.
Most people think the battle was over when the U.S. flag went up on Mt. Suribachi, Faubian said. However, Americans didn’t secure the whole island until three weeks later, March 16.
The re-enactment also honors Iwo Jima veterans like Donna resident James Bell, then a Marine corporal who was shot in the head during the battle.
Bell, 81, was saved by two sugar packets he placed between the lining of his helmet and the metal. When the bullet hit his helmet, it glided through the sugar and out the back of the helmet, grazing his hair, now snowy white with the passage of time.
Bell is expected to be one of the speakers at the five-day event. The patriotic spectacle also includes a parade, USO-themed musical and the battle re-enactment.
This will be Madeline’s first appearance in a re-enactment, Kemp said.
"I just hope it doesn’t rain, I don’t want the OD to run," he said jokingly of the tank’s olive drab paint. "I just don’t like for it to get wet."
As for the drive, Kemp said, it won’t be too bad — most of the time people just stop and stare.
"The real fun is at the checkpoint," he said, coyly. "All those Border Patrol agents want to see it."
———
Dulcinea Cuellar covers entertainment and features for The Monitor. You can reach her at (956) 683-4427.
Most definitely they were used. The most effective being the Shermans with the flamethrower built in. The tanks helped provide cover for the Marines and soldiers while they were stuck along the beaches trying to move inland.
I told a history teacher friend of mind this week I would have gone over if they would have let me dress like the Japanese and shoot at marines! ;-)
I read Flyboys. Highly recommended !
*!*
Restored tank?
And I missed it?!
A great person gave me "Fly Boys" on tape just before a long drive last year. It is an amazing work, and parts of it made me want to weep. I have shared that work with a few persons. I have also since heard the author speak of the subject in interviews.
I have been to the Iwo Jima Monument in Arlington a few times and I was quite impressed each time. Still, I have not researched the subject of the actual event.
I simply never thought about tanks being used on South Pacific islands. The logistics of getting such equipment there in those days seem quite formidable to me.
Incidently, I saw recently that Clint Eastwood is preparing to make a new movie on the Battle of Iwo Jima!
BTW, Ping!
Flags of our fathers is a good read too. Great premise: what the five guys were like before, during and after the war. Young puppies like me (age 54 and younger) need to learn what the country was like in the 30's and what our fighters were like in WW2. It is very humbling.
.
(except from Mrs. Curmudgeon)
Just go to the image source and drop them a line.
I think it depends on the variant. The M4A1 had a Continental R974 C4 9 cylinder 4 cycle radial gasoline motor. The M4A2, a GMC 6046 12 cylinder (6/engine) 2 cycle twin in-line diesel. The M4A3 a Ford GAA 8 cylinder 4 cycle 60° V gasoline. The M4A4, a Chrysler A57 30 cylinder 4 cycle multibank gasoline motor. The M4A6 an Ordnance Engine RD-1820 9 cylinder 4 cycle radial diesel.
The Marine Corps variants had some interesting features, some of which you can see in the photo, like the thick wooden boards on the sides to deter magnetic mines, and engine snorkels.
I have part of a T-72. Does that count?
All I can add to this discussion is my husband's childhood memory of watching the manufacturer testing the Sherman tanks as they came off the assembly line at Chrysler.
My husband grew up in Detroit. During WWII all the auto manufacturers were converted to military production. Chrysler had a "proving ground" in his neighborhood with bleacher seats and the neighbors would bring the kids over on Saturday mornings to watch men test the tanks. The earliest models didn't work very well, according to my husband.
Can you imagine a show like that with military hardware production today?
My father in law worked for GE during the day, but at night he had his own machine shop in the basement where he and a couple of his friends milled precision airplane parts for the Army Air Corps on a sub-contract basis. I think they were for the P-38.
My husband's first job was sweeping the shop for his dad at about age 7. My husband is now 67 and we own our own manufacturing company -- but he still sweeps the shop from time to time.
Geez, looks like the tank the cooks used to drive over the meat to tenderize it. Leftovers we used for armor plating.
The Shermans in Europe were extremely vulnerable. German tanks were generally much better armored and better-armed; the long-barrelled 75mm gun on the later Panzer IVs and the excellent Panther, the 88mm gun on the Tiger, and especially the infamous Flak 36 88mm antitank/antiaircraft gun, could all shred Shermans at fairly long range. Plus they caught fire easily.
But the Shermans were much more mechanically reliable, and most importantly, there were a lot more of them. It was said that a Tiger could kill four Shermans...but there was always a fifth one there to finish off the Tiger!
}:-)4
There were God knows how many engine variants.
If the Germans hadn't been so obsessed with technology (read:constant upgrades and "improvements", and constant introduction of "newer" models of all their major systems), they might have been a little more of a problem.
Treadhead Ping
Marine Sherman bump!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.