Daniel Laurila
Era: World War II
Military Branch: Army
Daniel Laurila served in the Army during World War II.
He served in General Patton's Third Army, in the 776th Tank Destroyer Battalion.
Source: Duluth News Tribune, April 14, 2008 (article below)
----- More Than a Medal
By Janna Goerdt
News Tribune Staff Writer
Veteran Honored: Long after he earned a Purple Heart, a Duluth man properly receives the award in an official ceremony.
Daniel Laurila of Duluth vaguely remembers receiving his first Purple Heart. But it’s not likely he’ll forget receiving his second, nearly 64 years after the first.
Someone casually plunked that first medal on Laurila’s stretcher just hours after he was hit by shrapnel from a German mortar on May 18, 1944, in Italy. Laurila, a technician with the 776th tank destroyer battalion, was standing up as a lookout in his M10 tank when the mortar exploded and tore into his left shoulder.
Laurila certainly remembers how that felt-imagine someone cracking down on your shoulder with a baseball bat, he said-and the emergency treatment he got afterwards. Laurila was evacuated from the site, which was south of Rome, and whisked to an aid station and then a relay station. He got a slug of whiskey, a cigarette and a shot of pain medication-and then official handed over the Purple Heart.
Somehow, Laurila held on to the medal while he was being transferred from station to station and finally back home to Minnesota. Years later, his daughter fit the medal into a shadowbox display.
Yet that Purple Heart was never official in the eyes of the military, because no one had ever filed the paperwork to make it so. When Rich Dumancas, the St. Louis County veteran’s service officer, noticed the omission in Laurila’s discharge papers, he wanted to make it right.
There were at least two good reasons to do so, Dumancas said--and neither centered around having something to pin on a shirt. Purple Heart recipients are eligible for better benefits than nonrecipients, Dumancas said, and the Department of Veterans Affairs requires documented proof to award those benefits. Simply having a medal isn’t enough.
And then there was the way Laurila’s first medal was awarded. It was too casual, many soldiers said, too flip.
So Dumancas arranged for Laurila’s new Purple Heart--this one stamped with his name instead of a random serial number--to be presented to him at the Duluth Armory on Sunday before a room of about 250 local National Guard soldiers.
“It means a lot more to get up in front of other soldiers” to be awarded an honor, said Capt. Justin Rodgers. “You’re being recognized by your peers.” Rodgers oversaw about half of the soldiers that assembled on Sunday. It was their regular weekend for training.
Laurila stood ramrod-straight in front of the soldiers as he accepted the medals, and afterwards shook hands with many of them. Soldiers wanted to thank Laurila, and family members wanted to congratulate him.
“It’s a little overwhelming” Laurila said on Sunday. After all, his military service ended nearly 64 years ago, and he’s lived a quiet but busy life since then.
As he was being officially discharged from military life, Laurila stopped at City Motors in Duluth to buy a car. He walked off the lot with the keys to a ’37 Plymouth Coupe, and the name of the woman who sold it to him. Laurila would be back several times to visit with Dorothy Nelson, so often, in fact, that Nelson was fired for “fraternizing with the customers” Laurila said. The two married soon afterwards, and they celebrate their 63rd anniversary today.
The couple had four children, and Laurila worked as a mechanic for the rest of his life, eventually retiring from the City of Duluth’s parks department. His left shoulder always bothered him. Even after three surgeries to try to alleviate the pain.
Laurila has remained a proud supporter of the United States throughout his life, though he doesn’t talk much about his wartime experiences, said his daughter, Deb Laursen of Blaine, Minnesota.
His sister-in-law, Ellyn Conner of Duluth, agreed. “He still doesn’t like to see war stories on TV, but he’ll talk about it with the other guys,” she said.
Laurila said today’s war is much different than what he experienced during his three years of service.
“You don’t know who your friends are,” he said. “It’s a tougher war than what we had.”
Source: Duluth News Tribune, April 14, 2008
