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About The Blue Mountain eagle. (John Day, Or.) 1972-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 8, 2017)
STATE VOLLEYBALL CHAMPS The PAGE B1 Blue Mountain EAGLE Contributed photo/Tanni Wenger Photography Studio Grant County’s newspaper since 1868 W EDNESDAY , N OVEMBER 8, 2017 Forest reform bill passes House • N O . 45 The Grant Union Prospectors celebrate during their rise to the top at the OSAA Volleyball State Championships. • 20 P AGES • $1.00 www.MyEagleNews.com Celebrating Veterans Rep. Walden applauds effort in conference call By George Plaven SOPHIA NICODEMUS EO Media Group For the fi fth time in as many years, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill Wednesday that would ex- pedite certain forest thinning projects to lower the risk of destructive wildfi res across U.S. Rep. the country. Rep. Greg Greg Walden (R-Or- egon) hailed it as a big day for the Northwest during a confer- ence call with reporters, say- ing the bill not only solves the issue of “fi re borrowing” but gives agencies more leeway to thin overcrowded and diseased forests. Fire borrowing refers to the longstanding practice of taking money away from for- est management programs to pay for fi re suppression, making it even more diffi cult for the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management to get ahead of the problem. Instead, the Resilient Feder- al Forests Act of 2017 would create a new account under the Disaster Relief Fund — See FOREST, Page A9 joined Air Force for career, service Vet recognized for top secret work By Richard Hanners Contributed photo Navy Radioman Third Class Bob Kimberling, left, stands with some war buddies during their service in World War II. BOB KIMBERLING recalls WWII service Navy vet a 70-year member of American Legion in the harbor and have a small ship go in and tell them where to fi re.” He added, “You’d be avy World War II copying all the messages veteran Bob Kim- from the planes and boats in berling of Prairie the invasion, and we were City was 16 when he heard supposed to copy that on a about the Dec. 7, 1941, attack typewriter and turn it over to on Pearl Harbor. the superiors.” In 1944, at age 18, he When asked if his ship signed up for the selective ever came under fi re, he said, service. He and his friend Ver- “We may have dodged a tor- non Reynolds drove together pedo or two.” to Pendleton then rode a train Toward the end of the war, to Portland where Kimberling he was aboard a ship headed to Bob Kimberling signed up for the Navy and the invasion of Japan, he said. Reynolds for the Army. “When the Japanese sur- Entering the service in September of 1944, rendered, the ship turned around back to Kimberling went from working on his dad’s Maui,” he said. ranch, to boot camp in Farragut, Idaho, to the He said, after his ship came back to base Pacifi c Fleet Radio Strikers School at Pearl camp, “It was kind of like a vacation — it Harbor. was Maui.” He was in radio school for 22 weeks, he Kimberling was honorably discharged June said, learning to send and receive Morse code. 4, 1946, a radioman third class. Kimberling was a part of the Air Support His friend Reynolds returned earlier from Control Unit Amphibious Forces Pacifi c Fleet. the war after being shot in the thigh in Okinawa, “We were in a unit invasion of an island,” he See WWII, Page A8 said. “We might be in the communications ship By Angel Carpenter Blue Mountain Eagle N DEAN NODINE recalls Navy time during Korean War Page 8 Blue Mountain Eagle F or Sophia Nicodemus, joining the Air Force was a career and service decision. “It was a career option with college bene- fi ts,” she said. “I also want- ed to serve my country.” Nicodemus graduated from high school in Mesa, Arizona, in 1999 and was working at a car parts store when someone suggested she join the Air Force. She had been a good student in high school and was con- sidering going to college, but she had scored well on the military’s ASVAB gen- eral competency test. The Air Force recruiter she saw signed her up for a linguist Contributed photo job in intelligence work. Air Force Staff Sgt. “At fi rst, I wanted to see some action and get de- Sophia Gutierrez, now Sophia ployed,” she said. Nicodemus. Intel training Nicodemus was sent to Phoenix, where she under- went the Defense Language Abilities Battery tests. “I was already bilingual and had taken four years of French, but these tests used made-up languages with nonsense sounds,” she said. Next was six months of boot camp at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas. “I wasn’t an athlete in school – I always worked,” she said. “But Air Force boot camp is not as hard as Army and Marine boot camp.” Nicodemus was sent to the Defense Language In- stitute in Monterey, California, for technical training in Spanish and different dialects. She learned native speakers couldn’t be complacent and had to study hard. “It was full-time on top of my military responsibili- ties, such as exercise,” she said. “It made for long days.” She was next sent to Goodfellow Air Force Base in San Angelo, Texas, to learn how to perform her job for the Air Force. “Altogether, I spent about a year training for my job,” she said. Nicodemus was at Medina Annex at Lackland awaiting top secret clearance for her job at the Medina See SERVICE, Page A8