At WWII Museum Eisenhower Portrayer Shows General as a ‘Soldier’s Solider’

By SANDRA RHODES
Allegheny National Forest Visitors Bureau

When Gen. Dwight Eisenhower retired after more than 30 years of military service, he was asked what his most vivid memory was. His answer was simple – the American solider.

Gen. Dwight Eisenhower – through portrayer Bruce Hoff of San Antonio, Texas – was at the Eldred World War II Museum over the holiday weekend. He gave three talks – one each on Saturday, Sunday and Monday. An ode to the American solider was saved for Memorial Day.

“The young men, most were citizen soldiers, who two months earlier were students, dropped everything to pursue freedom for the oppressed people of Europe,” he said.

When Eisenhower was in command, he enjoyed taking time to meet those who served under him. He wanted to get to know them and perhaps, even meet someone from his home state of Kansas.

One such moment captured by the media is not at all what it seems.

Eisenhower was talking with a group of American paratroopers in England in 1944 before the D-Day Invasion. Captions tell of Eisenhower giving orders to the troops, getting them prepared for the next day’s mission. In truth, he was talking about fly fishing to one of the soldiers from Michigan.

“They knew their mission. This relieved tension,” he said of his visit there. It appears, not everything is as is seems. This was also true when Eisenhower visited the death camps in Germany.

“No one could be prepared for what we found,” he said. “My words cannot describe what we found.”

He felt the need to go to these camps to “give evidence to their existence if ever someone denied the evil our soldiers were fighting to defeat.”

The same soldiers were separated from their families and were now “resting in peace in the fields of France, Belgium and England.”

The focus of Monday’s talk was around the day Eisenhower stepped down as supreme commander of the Allied Forces. In his last memo, he addressed the American soldier stating his “proudest to boast that I was your fellow solider.”

A member of the audience, Roger Alexis, who is also a member of the board of directors for the museum, echoed those comments. Alexis noted that although there are a plethora of medals and ribbons he could put on his uniform, there were only a couple there.

“That to me is a soldier’s solider,” Alexis said.

“Eisenhower” explained that he never liked to wear too many ribbons at one time, instead preferring to wear those he was most proud of and those given to him by entities he would be meeting that day.

Another audience member asked about the infamous Werewolves that were hardcore believes in Nazism. They specialized in ambushes, sniping and propaganda.

“They are criminal groups, really.”

Eisenhower, who would later become president of the United States, was also a proponent of desegregation in the military.

“A solider is a solider,” he said. “I only judge a soldier on whether they do their duty or not do their duty.”

It’s also important for the United States to, at the end of the war, to downsize its military, but to also keep a presence in the world.

“We must hold tight to freedom.”

On Saturday, Hoff, as Eisenhower, talked about when Eisenhower first assumed command on Sept. 1, 1944. Sunday’s talk centered on Eisenhower’s famous “Guildhall Speech.”

The Eldred WWII Museum, which has been named one of the most underrated museums in the U.S., includes three levels packed with World War II memorabilia.

For more information about the museum, call 814-225-2220 or log onto eldredwwiimuseum.org; for visitor information, contact the Allegheny National Forest Visitors Bureau by logging onto www.visitANF.com or calling 800-473-9370 to request a visitor guide with map.