By Kurt MooreThe Marion Star

MARION — War storiesweren’t something Mark Hartmanheard much from his dad foryears.

It wasn’t until maybe the last10 years that Harold Hartmantalked about his time in World WarII, during which he served as aninterpreter with General GeorgeS. Patton’s Third Army. Then hestarted talking about steppingover dead bodies and helping to in-terrogate Germans on their searchfor Nazi soldiers.

It was enough for Mark tosense his dad’s pride and seekHarold and his wife Ruth’s burialin Arlington National Cemetery.

Harold died Feb. 2. Mark saidthe Hartmans and other relativessaw his wish come true whenHarold and his wife’s cremated re-mains were placed in the ceme-tery’s columbarium on June 25.Their niche in the columbarium isalong Patton Drive.

“It’s a feeling of honor,” Marksaid. “That was where they weremeant to be.”

Harold, a Michigan native whohad lived in Marion when he wasdrafted, entered the service as autility repairman in 1943. Heserved in the Central Europe cam-paign in HQ Battery 550th AABN3rd Army.

He told his grandson, LukeHartman, in an interview for schoolhow he met up with the ForwardReconnaissance 550 Anti-AircraftUnit after the military learned thathe could speak German.

“Do you speak German?” a sol-dier had asked him.

“I said, ‘Yeah.’ He said, ‘Oh,you’re going to be our interpreter,we just lost our interpreter in ourJeep.’”

Harold’s job was to encourageGermans to surrender and to finda village’s burgermeister, or itsmayor, to ask if any Nazis were in

the village. They made otherpreparations as the rest of the unitadvanced.

He spoke about the Battle ofthe Bulge and liberating theBergen-Belsen ConcentrationCamp in northwest Germany. Hetalked to his grandson about thebattles and the killing done by bothsides.

“That’s what you had to do tosurvive, see,” he said in the inter-view. “And, just think we was abunch a’ kids like you. That’s whatwe were over there. What we hadto do with a bunch a’ kids like us.That’s when (Tom) Brokaw wrotethat book he said that greatest gen-eration, that’s what he meant, hesaid us kids done one hell of a job.”

His pride showed as he talkedto his grandson about not forget-ting the World War II vets.

“If it wouldn’t be for us guys,World War II, you wouldn’t be liv-ing like you do now,” he said. “Be-cause the way of life you have now

Submitted by OSUM

MARION — George Ghearingstood on the shore of Tokyo Baythe morning of Sept. 2, 1945, andwatched Gen. Douglas McArthurtake a launch out to the battleshipMissouri to sign the documentsthat ended World War II. His Ma-rine unit had the distinction of cap-turing the last Japanese battleshipof the war.

Service has been part of 88-year-old Ghearing’s life from anearly age.

The same holds for his wife,Evelyn, who is a charter memberof the Buckeye Backers volunteerorganization at The Ohio State Uni-versity at Marion. She sewed thevests worn by the volunteers and,together with her husband, donat-ed $150,000 to endow the Evelynand George Ghearing Scholarshipthat benefits Ohio State Marionstudents majoring in education,engineering or business.

The Ghearings were recentlynamed the 2012 recipients of OhioState Marion’s Ralph Howard Ser-vice Award. Given by Ohio StateMarion’s Board of Trustees in thename of the late local attorney, theaward honors individuals or or-ganizations significantly impact-

ing the quality of education at OhioState Marion.

In addition to their scholarshipsupport, the Ghearings have con-tributed to construction of May-

nard Hall and to a new studentlounge in Morrill Hall. Anotherprogram benefiting from theirsupport is Kids College. Their dol-lars provide scholarship assis-

tance for children taking the uni-versity’s summer enrichmentcourses.

Even before arriving in Mari-on, education was important to the

Ghearings. Along with four othercommunity leaders in 1960,George helped establish what hasbecome a 900-student branch ofWright State University in Celina.

The couple met as children andhave been together ever since. Asa star baseball and football playerin high school, George planned ona career in coaching.

However, shortly after theirwedding in July 1943, the buddingsports star left for World War II’sPacific Theater as a member ofthe U.S. Marines. While in theservice, he focused on communi-cations and telephone operations,beginning what was to become ahighly successful career intelecommunications.

After moving to Marion in 1963for George’s career with GTE,Evelyn taught in the Marion CitySchool system. After “retirement,”they founded GRG Telecommuni-cations Inc.

George traveled the world onbehalf of their new venture whileEvelyn managed the company inthe United States. The enterprisegrew to employ nearly 100 peoplebefore the Ghearings finally re-tired in 2002.

MarionStar.com Sunday, July 8, 2012

» OBITUARIES 2B » PLANAHEAD 3B » VITAL STATISTICS 4B1B LOCAL

By John JarvisThe Marion Star

MARION — Cardboard boxes sit empty onthe floor of the Rev. Michael Nimocks’kitchen, a sign of the times for the retiringpastor of St. Mary Church.

After serving the Catholic parish for nineyears, Nimocks will say his last masses todaybefore his successor, the Rev.Dwayne McNew, becomes pas-tor on Tuesday.

“I think change is good foreverybody,” Nimocks said, seat-ed in a pew at the front of thegothic sanctuary. “When you’vespent a long period of time as apriest and a pastor, yourthoughts and how you look at the Gospelyou’ve said it in as many times and as manyways ..., so folks need maybe to have it ex-pressed a different way. So, I think we’ll allbenefit from me stepping back and FatherDwayne stepping in and doing it his way.”

Nimocks leaves behind a legacy of gen-erosity of spirit, said Phyllis Butterworth,chairwoman for the church’s pastoral council,an advisory body for the parish.

“He’s certainly going to enjoy a well-de-served retirement,” Butterworth said. “He didso much for our parish, not just spiritually butthe physical parish.”

She said the Columbus native played a piv-otal role in establishing a permanent site forthe St. Vincent de Paul Society food pantryand clothing center, upgrading the churchroof and steps and St. Mary Grade School.

“He actually started an endowment fundfor our parish at the Catholic Foundation,” shesaid. “It’s to help ensure the financial healthfor our church and our congregation. It kindof speaks to the kind of man that he is.”

Nimocks was ordained as a priest in 1996after having spent 19 years serving as a per-manent deacon at Our Lady of Mount CarmelChurch in Buckeye Lake. In 1997, he was as-signed to Holy Trinity Church in Bolivarwhere he served as pastor until 2003 when

Bishop James Griffin asked him to serve aspastor at St. Mary.

“I was concerned because I’d never been ina parish with a school as a pastor,” he said.“But St. Mary is a great parish, and I waspleased to come. The people were warm andaccepting, and they responded to the needs.”

Important to the new pastor, he said, willbe that the church will have a carryover ofabout $250,000 when he arrives. The churchalso has about eight endowment funds.

Nimocks said his concerns about filling therole, in effect, of superintendent for St. MaryGrade School were allayed by the school prin-cipal, Bob Rush.

“We really didn’t have any problems withthe school, and that was all because of BobRush,” he said.

Bill Dichtl, former chairman for the pas-toral council, wished Nimocks well.

“I wish Father Nimocks a lot of luck andmany blessings,” Dichtl said. “Our hope is ournew pastor comes in and is able to breathenew life into the parish, energize the people.”

Nimocks is in the third year of his secondsix-year term as assigned by the bishop.

“I was 70,” he said. “I just felt it was timefor me to move on. They’re getting a youngerpastor moving up from Portsmouth. ... Ithought after nine years it’ll be good for theparish to get somebody with new ideas. He’syounger. The kids will like him. I think he’sgoing to fit well with Marion Catholic (Ju-nior/Senior High School).”

Receiving a new pastor is part of life for aCatholic congregation, Butterworth said.

“We expect this as Catholics,” she said. “Weknow this is going to happen. It’s probablymuch like it is in business. All of us have hadnew bosses. The new boss always brings innew talents, new ways of doing things. We’reexcited about what kind of opportunities Fa-ther McNew will see for our parish. An out-side perspective is always healthy. It’s kind oflike a renewal of spirit, too.”

Reporter John Jarvis: 740-375-5154, jjarvis@marionstar.com or Twitter @jmwjarvis

Ruth and Harold Hartman. SUBMITTED PHOTOS

St. Mary Church’s pastor, the Rev. Michael Nimocks, is retiring Tuesday after nine years of serviceto the Marion Catholic community. JAMES MILLER/THE MARION STAR

Harold A. Hartman

Evelyn and George Ghearing, at left, are shown here with Gregory S. Rose, dean of The Ohio State Universi-ty at Marion. SUBMITTED PHOTO

Fr. Nimocks retires

McNew

Portsmouth priest to take over leading St. Mary parish

Marion man’s finalrest is at ArlingtonNational Cemetery

See REST, page 2B

OSUM awards Ghearings for impact on education

See GHEARINGS, page 2B

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