Obituary Record

Wayne R Winslow
Died on 4/3/2016

None

Posted on line 4 April 2016; Published in The Pilot Tribune, Tuesday 5 April 2016

Mr. Wayne R. Winslow, age 93 of Blair, died April 3, 2016 at Memorial Community Hosptial in Blair. Services are currently pending. Arrangements by Campbell Aman Funeral Home in Blair.

Published in The Enterprise Friday, 8 April 2016

Wayne R. Winslow, age 93 of Blair, died on April 3, 2016 at Memorial Community Hospital in Blair. A memorial service will be held at First United Methodist Church in Blair on Saturday, April 9, with visitation starting at 1:00 PM and service at 2:00 PM. Burial will be on a later date beside his infant son Robert in the family plot in the Ida Grove, Iowa, cemetery.

Wayne R. Winslow was born in Hebron, Nebraska on September 16, 1922. He was the oldest son of the six children of Roy and Viva Winslow. His father was a pharmacist and owned a Rexall drug store, and Wayne spend his growing-up years becoming a master soda jerk, helping customers, and maintaining the pharmacy inventory.

After the sudden death of his father during Wayne’s junior year in high school, and because of the serious illness of his youngest brother, Wayne and his mother elected to move the family to Iowa City for the accessibility of the University of Iowa Hospital. He was graduated from City High School in Iowa City, became a piper in the all-male University of Iowa Highlanders and began studies at the University of Iowa, majoring in engineering.

His education was interrupted by World War II. He enlisted in the air force and was selected for a special unit which ultimately was sent to a newly liberated base on the island of Guam. He mastered a top secret code, arrived on Guam shortly after the Allies had secured the island, and ultimately transmitted the order for the dropping of the first atomic bomb. His observations were reported to the officers and official observers outside the room. In the years after the war, he learned through government officials who periodically visited his home without advanced notice that his actions in civilian life were regularly monitored by the Department of Defense or Secret Service. Thanks to the GI Bill and extensive summer work with John Deere, Wayne earned his degree in Mechanical Engineering from the State University of Iowa, as chief engineer of the Godbersen Company in Ida Grove, and finally joined the industrial sales engineering staff of Standard Oil of Indiana. In 1954, he married Clarann Bekman, and the couple lived in Newton, Ida Grove, Cedar Rapids, Waterloo, Overland Park, Omaha, and after retiring, in Blair.

As a student at the University of Iowa, he was encouraged to try out for the Iowa Highlanders, an all-male group of bagpipers. He loved the bagpipes, and the Highlanders were regular entertainment at the football games, in parades, and in competitions. In his later years, he challenged his lungs by again taking up the pipes and teaching fellow Shriners bagpiping.

Surviving family members include his wife of 61 years, Clarann, son and daughter-in-law, Richard and Cassandra Winslow of Soldotna, Alaska, daughter and son-in-law, Dr. Jean and Dr. John Simonson of Blair, Nebraska, and grandchildren, Thomas Simonson, Matthew Simonson, Danika Winslow, and Isaak Winslow.

Published in The Enterprise, Friday, 15 April 2016; Article written by Leeanna Ellis

(Photo) (Photo of Wayne playing bagpipes in Gateway to the West Days parade in Blair.

Blair man gave code to drop atomic bomb

Wayne Winslow died April 3

Wayne Winslow will be remembered as a man who loved his family, the bagpipes and his country. But the Blair man also played a pivotal role in history: He transmitted the order for the dropping of the first atomic bomb.

Winslow, 93, died April 3 at Memorial Community Hospital & Health System after a brief illness.

He was a student at the University of Iowa when he enlisted in the U.S. Air Force during World War II, when he learned top-secret code. He was a private with the 339th Signal Company Wing and served in Guam.

A secret mission

Winslow learned about the bomb during the last week of July 1945. He was in charge of the code room, which would give the signal to the Enola Gay B-29 bomber to drop the atomic bomb over Hiroshima.

Winslow was tasked with writing a code the Enola Gay and reconnaissance planes could use to report what they saw following the bombing.

On Aug. 6, 1945, Winslow reported for duty, unaware that would be the infamous day. He arrived to find many people waiting outside the code room.

“Harry Truman wasn’t there, but there were a whole bunch of government dignitaries, and here comes this enlisted guy,” Winslow’s wife, Clarann, said.

“They can’t go in, but he can.”

In an interview for NET’s “The War: Nebraska Stories” – one of the few times Wayne spoke publicly of his involvement in the war – he described decoding messages from reconnaissance planes over Hiroshima, Japan after the bomb was dropped.

At 11:15 a.m., the target was not visible. Smoke and debris filled the air. The cloud was boiling.

At 2:15 p.m., the message was the same. The cloud was now at 35,000 feet.

The message center was full of generals and Col. Paul Tibbets, the pilot of the Enola Gay.

“Col. Tibbets kept asking the same question: What do they see? What do they see?” Wayne said.

Nine hours after the bomb was dropped, another message came in and Wayne decoded it.

“Cloud is still over target. Cloud is still boiling. Estimate the cloud to be at 70,000 feet.

Wayne reported the message to the waiting dignitaries. They asked him to repeat it. He did.

“They said, ‘What have we started?” Wayne said. “Do we have a continuous reaction going? What have we started?”

Returning to civilian life

After the war, Wayne returned to his studies at the University of Iowa. It was there that he met his wife, Clarann. Wayne was a senior and an engineering major.

“I was a lowly freshman,” Clarann said.

“I hated those darn things,” she said.

But on one occasion, she didn’t have anything planned and reluctantly attended the exchange.

“When (the fraternity) walked in, the president led the way and the president was Wayne,” Clarann said.

Wayne gravitated toward Clarann’s group of friends.

“He told us about some of his experiences – not much,” Clarann said. “He was very quiet. But he told me enough that I thought he was kind of interesting. He’s a guy I’d like to visit with more.”

A week or so later, an ice storm hit Iowa City. Clarann, while walking to class, fell on the ice. She made her way back to her dorm, where others helped treat her.

“I was lying there and really hurting when the phone rang,” she said.

It was Wayne. He called to see if she would be interested in getting together for coffee.

Without thinking, Clarann agreed.

Wayne arrived the next day and saw Clarann’s injuries. He encouraged her to go to the student health center to be treated.

“I’ll take you,” he said.

Wayne waited while Clarann was examined by a doctor and then took her back to her dorm.

Not long after, they went out for coffee.

“I was really interested when I met you,” Wayne told her. “I’d like to continue our conversation.”

A little more than a year later, the couple was engaged. They married in 1954.

Wayne graduated with an engineering degree and took a job with Maytag in Newton, Iowa. But Clarann still needed to finish college.

“I had promised my parents,” she said.

Clarann lived with Wayne’s mother and stepfather during the week while she attended classes. On Fridays, she would take the train from Iowa City to Newton and spend the weekends with Wayne.

“We had a commuter marriage for a year,” she said.

Following Clarann’s graduation, Wayne worked for a construction company in western Iowa before joining Standard oil of Indiana. Wayne’s job took them to Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Waterloo, Iowa; Kansas City, Kan.; and finally, Omaha.

Wayne and Clarann later retired to Blair.

‘I was following orders’

The couple was married several years before Wayne told his wife in great detail about what he had done during the war.

“It was a night I don’t want to forget, but I don’t want to remember either,” Clarann said. “It was a tough night.”

He cried, she said.

Wayne had to believe that his actions saved countless lives had there been an invasion of Japan, Clarann said.

“I was following orders,” he told her. “The philosophy was that this would save American lives and I had to remember that.” Clarann asked him once how he felt about his actions.

“I’ve never been able to put it into words,” he told her. “I kept thinking about all of those people. But I also knew that something had to be done to bring this to a close.”

Under the watchful eye of the government

Nearly 20 years after the war, Clarann was home by herself when two men appeared on her front porch. They were from the department of Defense. They showed Clarann their identification and then began peppering her with questions.

“Do you know Wayne Winslow?”

“Yes”, she answered.

“Are you his wife?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Are you aware that he served in World War II?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Do you know where he served?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know what he did?”

Clarann explained she and Wayne had talked about his military service. The men wanted to know if Wayne had spoken publicly about his involvement in the war.

They also wanted to know how she felt about what he did.

“In all honesty, I wish he hadn’t been the one who did it but that was his order and he did it,” she said. “That’s what war is.”

“How does he feel about it?” they asked.

“He wishes he hadn’t been the one to do it,” Clarann told them. “But he did it. He did what he was ordered to do and we’ll live with that.”

With that, the men left.

But it wasn’t the last time the couple saw the men. They saw them again in Kansas City.

“Sometimes, we didn’t know,” Clarann said. “They went to the neighbors.”

A love of family

Wayne was the oldest son of the six children of Roy and Viva Winslow. His father was a pharmacist and owned a drug store where Wayne worked as a soda jerk.

After his father’s death, Wayne, his mother and siblings moved from Hebron to Iowa City, where he graduated from City High School.

While he was a student in college, Wayne became a bagpiper in the University of Iowa Highlanders.

“The pipes helped him get through grieving for his father and his brother,” Clarann said.

Following the war, he helped the Highlanders, which had become an all women’s group.

Wayne enjoyed playing the bagpipes, Clarann said. He would play at funerals and march in parades with the Shriners.

Wayne put his bagpipes away only six months ago, she said.

His family, Clarann said, was important to him. S much so that he turned down a job offer in Chicago so that he could see them more often.

He also loved visiting with his grandchildren.

“We enjoy them,” Clarann said. “Wayne really enjoyed them.”

Wayne is survived by his wife of 61 years; daughter and son-in-law, Dr. Jean and Dr. John Simonson of Blair; son and daughter-in-law, Richard and Cassandra Winslow of Soldotna, Alaska; and grandchildren: Thomas Simonson, Matthew Simonson, Danika Winslow and Isaak Winslow.

~~~ Obituary courtesy of the Washington County Genealogical Society. Newspaper clippings on file in the Blair Public Library at Blair, Nebraska.~~~

Printed in the Washington County Pilot-Tribune on 4/5/2016


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