US Naval Academy '40
ELDO WILLIAM BERGMAN
EIdo, (classmates called him"Bergie", "Swede", or"El",) reported aboard LEXINGTON at Pearl, July of 1940. Two major decisions were made during the summer of '41: He was baptized a Catholic at Sacred Heart Church, Honolulu, and married his academy sweetheart, Miss Agnes "Tomme" Thompson of New Rochelle and Dering Harbor, New York. This precipitated a minor crisis in his naval career, and for a short while, threatened to terminate it!
On December 7, 1941, LEX was bound for Midway. El's bride of 3 months sat on the sea wall near Diamond Head and watched with horror the smoke billowing upward from the burning ships in Pearl Harbor. Three weeks later, El received orders to report to commission LAFFEY, but was delayed 3 months by a nearly fatal bout with pneumonia, which reduced him from 210 to 180 pounds. In March, El and his bride were evacuated from Hawaii
LAFFEY set a record for rapid departure from the United States. Then followed her brief but distinguished service in rescuing 200 survivors from the torpedoed WASP, fighting valiantly in the night Battle of Cape Esperance and again in the first battle of Guadalcanal on Friday, November 13, 1942. In that vicious battle, LAFFEY was sunk. Thus this brave ship, which had the record for speedy commissioning, now set a record for equally speedy decommissioning -- something less than 8 months. After approximately ten hours in the water, El and other survivors were picked up by Marine-manned LCVP's. Then followed four months of treatment in six hospitals from Guadalcanal to Auckland, New Zealand to Santa Cruz, California.
Bergie next received orders to commission the cruiser BOSTON. During El's 35 months on board, she participated in ten battle campaigns from the Marshalls to Tokyo Bay. Of particular interest in October, 1944, was the 36-hour period in which BOSTON towed the torpedoed HOUSTON to safety from a point 90 miles off Formosa. After 6 months of post-war duty in Japan, BOSTON returned to San Francisco, and El reported to the staff of ComBatCruPac in Long Beach.
Bergie resigned his commission in November, 1947, and returned to Genoa to manage the family Road Construction business, now in its 76th year. Eldo became the 1st president of Lourdes Parish Credit Union, served on the Ottawa County Board of Health, Advisory Board of St. Charles Hospital, Chamber of Commerce Board, founded the Wrestling Wing of Cardinal Stritch High School, was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal from Xavier University, is a 4th degree Knight of Columbus, a member of the Toledo Opera Council and The American Legion. El and Tomme now have fourteen children and twenty-seven grandchildren - perhaps he still qualifies as the man of '40 with the largest family.
