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May 2, 2008

Chico Paper March 1949
“Some Gave All”

Military Services For Ray Dunning
The body of Pfc. Ray Dunning will arrive in Chico accompanied by military escort Friday afternoon. Ray was born in Hamilton City on May 30, 1926 and it was here he was raised and received his education. While in high school, he was an outstanding art and dramatics student. After his graduation in 1943, Ray joined the Marine Reserve where he served with Co. A. Amph. Tr. Bt. 5th Marine Division. Dunning met his death on June 11, 1945 while participating in action against the enemy on Okinawa Shima. Besides his parents, Mr. and Mrs. R. Dunning, there are four brothers: Edward, Donald, Garth and Garry and also Mrs. Annie Hall of Shelbyville, Tennessee, his maternal grandmother. Friends are invited to the military services, which will be conducted Saturday at 3 p. m. in the chapel of the Brusie Funeral Home will be under the auspices of the Leo B. McArdie Marine Corps League with Rev. L. G. Moreny, chaplain. Interment will take place in the Chico Cemetery.

Oroville Mercury Register April 15, 1953

NEWS From Buttte County Men In The Service
Scheduled for the 30 days leave from Navy duties aboard the fleet tug USS Arikara based here is Norman G. Keith, seaman, USN of Route 3, Oroville. The Arikara was recently commended for her services in the salvage operations on the civilian freighter D. D. Quartet, which was grounded on a reef, 1,200 miles northwest of Pearl Harbor.

Advanced to present rate while serving on the light cruiser USS Manchester was Bill R. Edwards, machinist’s mate fireman, USN, son of Mr. and Mrs. W. A. Edwards of Fort Wayne Street, Oroville. The Manchester has completed two tours of duty in the Korean Combat Zone and has returned for her third tour of combat duty.

Pvt. Frank J. Horn Jr., whose wife, Pauline, lives on Route 2, Oroville, recently completed a course for medical airmen at the Army’s Eta Jima Specialist School in Japan. He received classroom and field training in the emergency medical treatment of the sick and wounded during the four-week course. Private Horn, whose parents live in Palermo, entered the Army in September, 1952, and has been overseas one month.

Airman Third Class Joseph A. Kram Jr., son of Mr. and Mrs. J. A. Kram of Route 3, has been here visiting his parents while enroute to Camp Stoneman, near Pittsburg, where he will stay while waiting to go overseas. Kram took his basic training at Shephard Air Force Base in Texas, then served almost a year at Norton Air Force Base, San Bernadino doing aircraft repair work. He has two other brothers in the service, Michael, who is in the Air Force and Bernard, who is in the Navy.

Oroville Mercury Register December 24, 1943

Gift For Each Man At Post
Everyman in the army stationed at Oroville Airdrome will receive a gift Christmas day through the Oroville chapter of the American Red Cross with the help of various Oroville organizations. The work of procuring the gifts was under direction of Florence Boyle, local chairman of the camp and hospital committee of the Red Cross. The gifts will be given out on the field by Santa Claus after Christmas dinner, Each man’s name was placed on a package by wives of officers. Mrs. Boyle announced that the following organizations assisted in the gifts-for-service men program: Oroville Business and Professional Women’s’ club, Past presidents, Native Daughters of the Golden West, American Legion auxiliary; the junior group of the American Legion auxiliary. Woodmen Circle; Jobs Daughters, students of Oroville high school, Oroville Girls Organizations, Elks lodge, USO and Red Cross.

Stu’s Notes: Ray Dunning, several years ago, about 5, Jim Lenoff and others told me about a man named Dunning. Well, we did find and write about Joe David Dunham USMC, killed in Korea, in this Column, July 25, 2003. Now, thanks to committee member Joan Lee, we’ve found the above story on Ray Dunning, also a Marine, another piece of the puzzle solved and a relief to me. As I’ve had the Dunning name bouncing around my brain for all these years. A coincidence I suppose , often as I write the stories of a lost Soldier I feel like you would if you cried, which men don’t do, do we, and at that same moment a man on TV eating a hamburger with tears down his face and the TV saying, sometimes it’s ok for a man to cry. Many men were buried over seas some families wanted them to lay on the land they died fighting for, with their fallen buddies. Some were brought home years later. I must contact Betty Davis Boyle about her mother Florence and get the rest of the story. Michael Whitely gave me a copy of “It was told to Me’, a book Florence wrote, and in the book she writes she was returning home very sad on a ship from who knows where.

Oroville Airdrome is what is now our Oroville airport.