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Walt, also known as Iz to his classmates, was born an Army brat on 2 November 1914 at Fort DeRussy, Hawaii. He was the second of five children born to George, Lieutenant Colonel, United States Army, and Dora, whom he dubbed “Duchess,” both now deceased. George was a sergeant at the time, so Walt’s first quarters literally was a pyramidal tent on Waikiki Beach. Small wonder, throughout his life, he could swim like a fish.</div>
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He completed high school near Scott Field in Belleville, Illinois, spent one year at the University of Illinois and two at the University of Michigan, matriculating in the field of Journalism. He was a voracious reader and a gifted writer, and assuredly would have cut his mark in the literary field. But, encouraged by a high school friend who was a United States Military Academy cadet, he tried for and won a Congressional appointment, entering the Academy just under the age limit. By then he had already shown his indomitable spirit and resiliency twice in the face of death, once versus a severe bout of scarlet fever and once in an auto crash; the Army surgeon at Selfridge Field who pieced his skull back together said he had pulled through on sheer guts.</div>
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Walt took to cadet life like a duck to water. He praised the Academy to all who would listen and was the personification of “duty, honor, country.” The 1940 <em>HOWITZER </em>provides a nice capsule of Cadet Wald: “A regimental buck without a buck’s personal indifference—God bless him. His philosophy of live and let live prevented his boning tactical files with the rest of the boys. His tactical indifference was more than balanced by his academic assiduity. Behind those eyebrows lurked a walking dictionary and encyclopedia—most of which was in Spanish. With his broad knowledge, infallible logic, and convincing obstinance that defeated even his little redhead, he mowed down the best of them in arguments.” Upon graduation he married the little redhead, nee Betty Hunter.</div>
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A standard tour followed at the Field Artillery School, Fort Sill. Then, like many of his classmates in those troubled days, he volunteered for overseas duty and was sent to the Philippine Islands. He was a captain with the 61st Field Artillery on Pearl Harbor day and was captured on Cebu after having won the Silver Star for gallantry in action, as well as a Purple Heart.</div>
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Betty and all the Wald family, like many others in the same predicament, sweated out news of his survival and when no word came for many months, feared he had been killed. There was great joy when the Red Cross finally got through a card advising that he was alive and a prisoner of war on Mindanao, which was his unfortunate lot for quite some time. In December 1944, half a world away in France by my own artillery battery, on a cold, sparkling clear night, I thought deeply of him and, unaccountably so to this day, cried like a child. The next day a letter from George advised of Walt’s death. On 7 September 1944 the <em>Shino Maru</em>, an unmarked Japanese transport in process of moving prisoners out of the Philippines, was torpedoed by American forces off Mindanao. Aboard were 750 of whom 82 survived, reached shore and were rescued by guerrillas. Eye witnesses later told me Walt was killed instantly, just two months shy of his 30th birthday. Surviving at his death, besides his parents and his wife Betty, now Mrs. W.H. Tucker, were his brother Sam, his sister Tootsie Coleman, wife of Pete, United States Military Academy, Class of 1938, his sister Bess Tittle, widow of Norm, United States Military Academy, Class of 1938 and the writer, United States Military Academy, Class of 1944.</div>
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Walt was one of those rare, selfless persons, the consideration of others always coming first; a gentle person; a true gentleman; an outstanding soldier, and integrity was his middle name. Many times I heard his favorite quotation;</div>
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<em>“This above all: to thine own self be true.</em></div>
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<em>And it must follow, as the night the day,</em></div>
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<em>Thou canst not then be false to any man.”</em></div>
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In his all too short lifetime, he lived by that credo to the hilt. He stands tall in the Long Gray Line. My oldest son proudly hears his name.</div>
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<em>—His brother Al</em></div>