Superior native receives national recognition for WWII service – Superior Telegram

SUPERIOR – Among the veterans honored at the 35th National Memorial Day Concert, broadcast on PBS May 26, was a Superior native.

Jack Moran, 98, was honored for his service in the Battle of the Bulge – the last major German offensive on the Western Front in World War II.

“I wanted people to know that the man receiving the award is one of their Superiorites,” Moran said. He said it was an honor to be recognized in this way.

Moran now lives in the Los Angeles area, but before he found himself in the European theater at age 18 in a battle bloodier and deadlier than the D-Day invasion, Moran remembers an idyllic childhood of winter sports and summers at the lake in northwest Wisconsin.

“I was born and raised in Superior,” Moran said. “I graduated from Superior Cathedral in 1942. One of my careers was working for the Great Northern (railroad). I went to Wisconsin State for two semesters. Then I left town … but Superior is still a wonderful thought in my memories.”

His service in General George Patton’s Third Army during World War II was the subject of national honors on the eve of Memorial Day.

Moran said he joined the Army because they offered a program that was attractive to him and would allow him to attend college.

“The whole plan backfired,” Moran said. “A whole group of us were in the ASTP (Army Specialized Training Program), a graduate program. I was sent to the University of Wisconsin at Madison.”

Article by Susan Moran

But his studies were interrupted because war continued to rage in Europe.

At Kasserine Pass in Italy, America was hit so hard that generals in Washington said they needed more soldiers. As a result, the ASTP program was canceled across the country and the men were sent to the infantry, Moran said.

“I went in with my hands and feet, but having survived, I’m glad I did it,” Moran said. “We lost a lot of fine young men all over Europe.”

Moran served in the 87th Division, 347th Infantry Regiment.

When he arrived in France, Moran said people in small towns clapped as they walked through the streets and thousands of photographs were taken.

Moran’s daughter, Susan Moran, said they recently returned from Normandy, France, for the 80th anniversary of D-Day.

“The French love our vets,” she said. “We like our vets; they love our vets.”

Moran was first deployed in the Saar Valley outside Metz in France.

“I saw seven men go down in 15 seconds,” said actor Bryan Cranston, retelling Moran’s story. “My best friend from basic training, Hugh Gorman, got shot in the face by a German machine gun. When you get hit by a machine gun, it’s not just one bullet. You can’t go down fast enough to avoid number 2, number 3, number 4… In that month of fighting, I saw enough death and destruction to last a lifetime.”

Cranston recounted how Moran’s 87th Division spent 40 hours in freezers until they arrived in Bastogne, Belgium, in the middle of the night. Surrounded by the Germans, the shelling became so heavy that Moran knelt in his foxhole and begged God to stop the shelling, the actor said.

“That was the first time I cried in the war, and the last time,” Cranston said, echoing Moran’s words.

Article by Susan Moran

“Bryan Cranston did a great job,” Moran said. “I actually wrote his speech for him. It was a wonderful evening on the West Lawn next to the Capitol. There were almost 100,000 people there.”

Moran said he was moved after Cranston finished telling his story and went over to give him a hug.

When the war in Europe ended on May 9, 1945, Moran said his unit was rushed to the west coast of France, where it was loaded onto a ship and sent home. On December 23, 1945, it was sent to the Pacific to form the first wave of reinforcements for the invasion of Japan.

The Japanese signed the surrender agreement on September 2, 1945, after the United States dropped atomic bombs on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Japanese government agreed to the terms of surrender on August 10, 1945, one day after the second bombing of Nagasaki.

“It’s a good thing the war ended,” Moran said.

Shelley Nelson has been a reporter with the Duluth Media Group since 1997 and has covered Superior and Douglas County communities and government for the Duluth News Tribune from 1999 to 2006 and for the Superior Telegram since 2006. Reach her at 715-395-5022 or [email protected].