‘It’s an honor to walk these grounds’

  It took 69 years for retired U.S. Navy second class electrician Jesse Loma to finally step foot on Tinian and Saipan since seeing these islands only from afar aboard a destroyer during World War II, but he said yesterday it was worth the wait.

“I’m glad to be here. I was not expecting it would be like this. .This is the first time I’ve participated in this kind of ceremony,” Loma told Saipan Tribune during a wreath laying at American Memorial Park led by nine visiting veterans-including two from World War II and four from Vietnam War-yesterday afternoon.

Loma said he was only 22 and was aboard a destroyer that was bombarding the islands during the 1943 invasion. He is now 91.

“My daughter asked me, ‘If there’s one World War II place I would like to visit, what would it be?’ I said ‘Tinian.’ I told myself Saipan is only nearby so if I could go to Tinian then I could go to Saipan too,” Loma, of Wisconsin, said.

He chose Tinian because he remembers the island at the time looking like an area in Wisconsin during the planting season. His daughter, Deb Loma Hoffman, is with her in this trip to Guam, Tinian, and Saipan.

Retired U.S. Marine Corps Col. Andrew Taynor Jr., a Vietnam War veteran, said “it’s humbling” to be in a place that almost seven decades ago was a scene of heavy fighting between two determined forces.

“Just to realize what happened here, you have two determined forces, fighting tooth and nail. It’s an honor to walk these grounds,” Taynor said.

This is Taynor’s second visit to Tinian and Saipan.

He was here last year with a friend, retired U.S. Marine Maj. Rick Spooner, who was part of the 2nd U.S. Marine Division that, along with the 4th Marine Division, invaded Japanese-held Saipan on June 15, 1944. Spooner had a recent stroke so he had to stay back, but he plans to visit again in March 2013.

Taynor and Loma are just two of the nine veterans currently on Saipan, after visiting Guam and Tinian, as part of the Military Historical Tours.

Besides Loma, the other World War II veteran is second class carpenters mate Claud Martin Jr., 87. Martin served as a member of the Seabees 56th Battalion.

The three other Vietnam War veterans besides Taynor are retired USMC Col. Richard Blanchfield, retired USMC Lt. Col. Richard Duff Jr., and U.S. Air Force Capt. Ralph Mobley.

Also with them are U.S. Navy veterans Richard Hillary and James Rabon Jr., and U.S. Marines Cpl. Shayne Jarosz.

The veterans are with their relatives-daughters and wives.

CNMI historian Don Farrell and Pacific Development Inc. director Gordon Marciano were among the individuals who gave the group a tour of Tinian and Saipan.

By Haidee V. Eugenio
Reporter