January 3, 2014 at 4:27 p.m.
Local woman to travel to Belgium to walk in her father's footsteps
Local woman to travel to Belgium to walk in her father's footsteps
By Kayla Thomason-
The Badger State Chapter 82nd Airborne Division Association spearheaded a fundraiser that raised more than the $1,500 needed to get Peter to Belgium. Ralph Larson, Quartermaster of the Veterans of Foreign War Post 3143, collected the money and wrote a check at the end of the campaign. Some of the money was raised through a dinner put together by the American Red Cross and a number of volunteers. Peter is very thankful for the community's support in making her dream come true and for remembering her father's service and sacrifice.
"It was a gift beyond anything I could ever dream of and I'm 72 years old," Peter said. "I didn't think I'd ever be doing this."
Peter has received a lot of support from friends and family who are thrilled that she will come full circle with her father when she travels to Belgium in February.
"Judy is a wonderful person and I think she deserves to do this," said Dick Roman, Peter's lifelong friend since the age of 4.
Peter won't be going to Belgium alone. She will be taking her husband and one of her four children along.
"My son (Dr. Russell Durkee) and my daughter-in-law (Dr. Binu Durkee-Philip) and my husband (Bernard) are going with. It's too wonderful of a trip not to share it with family," she said.
Peter and her family will be flying into Amsterdam and traveling on to Vielsalm, Belgium where they will participate in the annual Return to the Battle of the Bulge program. The Battle of the Bulge was one of the major land battles fought in Belgium during World War II.
"My main thought that I've had all these years was to meet the people of Belgium and France because that is where our American soldiers went overseas to liberate those people and just to meet them and thank them for taking care of my dad while he was over there," Peter said.
Ward worked at the Rhinelander paper mill. When Pearl Harbor was attacked on Dec. 7, 1941 he went with another man and enlisted to fight for this country, leaving his 3-week-old daughter and wife behind. Ward had been overseas for 13 months before he was killed.
"This is a chance to honor someone who will lay down his life for his friends," said Tom Laney, another friend who helped organize the fundraiser for Peter. "(Glenn Ward) was out of the war really. He had been seriously wounded at Normandy and missed the airborne invasion of Holland because he was hospitalized and he didn't have to go back to the war. When he found out that the guys were going into the Ardennes he walked away from safety and the hospital, somehow crossed the channel and hitched a ride, found a way to his friends in the Battle of the Bulge and died there trying to defend them."
Ward's patriotism didn't stop with him, it has been carried down to his daughter.
Peter belongs to an organization called the American World War II Orphans Network (AWON), which was instrumental in raising money and placing the 4,000 gold stars at the National Word War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. Each star represents 100 soldiers. Peter is also a speaker for the 82nd Airborne Division's Badger Chapter and she and her mother, Evelyn, are honorary members of the Badger State Chapter, 82nd Airborne Association.
"War doesn't end with the end of the battle or the signing of the peace treaty," Peter said. "For those that are left behind, the mothers and the fathers and the children, it never ends. You come to grips with it but it never ends."
Although Ward has been gone for many years, he has earned respect, admiration and love from people who have learned of his heroism.
"Glenn Ward, to me, was the epitome, the best example I could think of to show people what paratroopers in World War II were really like," said Laney. "Kind of a reckless crowd, guys who weren't very good with authority, had close friendships with their brothers. I guess he was kind of a hellraiser. He was a pretty highly-trained guy. He was a pathfinder. Pathfinders are paratroopers who jump ahead of the division and set up landing zones, things like that. Usually the first guys in the combat."
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