3/28/2008 9:51:00 PM
One of the last of the Navajo Code Talkers receives medal
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Courtesy/Walter Cody
Larry Kimmel, a member of the Arizona Territorial Gourd Society, give the Warrior Medal of Valor to Willard Oliver, left, on Tuesday. Oliver is one of the last surviving Navajo Code Talkers, who delivered secret military messages during World War II. |
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Nerve damage and a trachea tube prevent Willard Oliver from speaking, but once that voice proudly carried messages that helped win World War II.
During the war Allied forces used American Indian languages as a code in order to confound the efforts of the Axis military to intercept and decode their communication. The American Indian soldiers who used their native tongues to protect military information are the Code Talkers.
"When he was in school, they told him not to speak Navajo - said they'd wash his mouth out with soap," said Nellie Oliver, Willard's wife. "In the war, they were pretty happy that he could speak Navajo. Then, they told him to forget about all that he did during the war. Now, a lot has been forgotten."
Oliver, 86, is one of the last living Navajo Code Talkers. He currently resides at the Extended Care and Rehabilitation Center at Prescott's Bob Stump VA Medical Center, where he received the Warrior Medal of Valor, Tuesday, from members of the Arizona Territorial Gourd Society.
Oliver's daughter, Olivia Oliver Whitethorne, said that her father was living in Lukachukai, Ariz., when an automobile struck him while he was walking to the market. Since then, Oliver has been at the VA hospital in Prescott, where his family visits him each week.
"He joined the army when he was really young, only 18," Olivia said. "He was wounded there, and he's still got shrapnel in him and a bullet in his shoulder. They never took it out because it didn't bother him, and he worried the operation might make him lose the use of his arm."
During his time serving in the Army, Oliver participated in some of the fiercest battles of World War II, earning him five campaign medals. The army selected him to be one of the Navajo Code Talkers, putting him in charge of secret military messages and the equipment to send them.
"They'd go, 'You there, you're doing it,' - that's how they'd draft code talkers," said Hank Whitethorne, Oliver's son-in-law. "Navajo was never a written language, until recently. They had to come up with a lot of words for military things that weren't in the Navajo language. So, 'whale' would be 'battleship,' 'potato' was 'grenade.' The code used 'bird' for 'airplane.' Even if the enemy somehow learned the language, there was more to the code."
As part of their duties, Oliver and his fellow Code Talkers would have to lay down communication wire between locations in order to establish radio communication. On one occasion, when he was making sure the wire was intact, he became separated from his fellow soldiers for quite some time, forcing him to subsist on his own in the jungle.
"He'd tell me about that time he was out there, on his own and didn't have food," Nellie said. "He had to shoot a wild pig. Had to eat that. He has so many stories from the war."
Larry Kimmel, a member of the gourd society who awarded Oliver the Warrior Medal of Valor, said this is the first time the group has presented the award to a Code Talker.
"It's a true honor for us just to meet someone like him," Kimmel said. "There are maybe a dozen of them left alive, and more of them pass away each month. All Americans should honor what they did for us. That's what we Native Americans do; we honor our warriors."
Olivia said that tradition has always been important to Oliver, and his family. During the war he carried an arrowhead that carried the blessing of the "four sacred mountains," and after the war he wore a ceremonial uniform for Code Talkers that carried special significance.
"Everything about it has meaning; beige pants for mother earth, a red jacket for the blood they shed," Olivia said. "The shirt is yellow, the color of corn pollen. It reminds us of the tradition of the 'corn pollen road.' Walk the corn pollen road - which is life - straight ahead, always. As you walk that road, you gain the wisdom of life. My father has walked a good road."
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Posted: Thursday, October 15, 2009
Article comment by:
DEVIL DOGS
~semper fi~
Posted: Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Article comment by:
shan
We all love you chei.We miss you so much . we can't believe yur gone now, but your warmth and all the great memories will be still with us in our hearts..we love you so much.i still think your in lukachukai at the old house walking around; picking up trash/cans,bringing in woods,building a fire,taking walks to the trading post.we miss you so much.=(..r.i.p chei...from your grand daughter.<3
Posted: Thursday, September 17, 2009
Article comment by:
No name provided
where can I find a code talker to interview? any in calif?
Posted: Monday, April 20, 2009
Article comment by:
NI NI Reese
Wow that really inspired me to get my own group together to teach little children the principles of the Navajo Codetalkers. thanx a million your number 1 fan ni-ni reese
Posted: Sunday, April 12, 2009
Article comment by:
Tom Kistner
I have much respect for Mr. Oliver and his fellow code talkers. I am also sorry for the way these true American heros have been treated. Peace to all that are still of this earth!!
Posted: Monday, March 31, 2008
Article comment by:
june newborn
i am so glad that this man is being honored. my father was in ww11, the same time. he was a marine.when he died in 1975 he still carried scrap to.he was cherokee/dutch.
Posted: Sunday, March 30, 2008
Article comment by:
finvom
Thank you for providing an excellent coverage on the recognition of my dad, Willard Oliver. However, I must correct one statement to the effect that he "joined the Army." Actually and factually, he was enlisted into the U.S. Marine Corps. I am his son, currently serving in the U.S. Army. Respectfully, Sergeant Major V. Oliver
Posted: Saturday, March 29, 2008
Article comment by:
rjacques1
my2nu3
Thank you for the wonderful article on Mr. Willard Oliver.
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