Post by Moses on Dec 27, 2004 23:56:31 GMT -5
Original URL: www.jsonline.com/news/state/dec04/287776.asp
Christmas call was last for soldier
Friends, family in Loyal mourn loss of caring man
By MEG JONES
mjones@journalsentinel.com
Last Updated: Dec. 27, 2004
Before Staff Sgt. Todd Olson left his Loyal home in June, a friend gave him a commemorative coin to keep in his pocket for good luck.
On one side were footprints. On the other was this: "Follow the footprints of the Lord. They will lead you through troubled times and brighten your life."
Last month, as his unit prepared to go to war, Olson said he planned to give it back to his friend when he returned home from Iraq.
Olson, 36, was killed just a couple of weeks after his Wisconsin National Guard unit arrived in Iraq and one day after he called his family on Christmas to tell them how much he loved and missed them. He is the 33rd military member from Wisconsin to die in Iraq.
He died when his patrol was hit by a bomb in Samarra, about 60 miles north of Baghdad....
Wore many hats
Olson was a husband; a father of three teenage boys and a 5-year-old girl; a member of the Loyal School Board; a loan officer at the M&I Bank in Loyal and Neillsville where he specialized in loans to farmers; a member of the Lions; a youth group leader at Trinity Lutheran Church in Loyal; and a youth football coach.
Olson joined the National Guard for the college benefits shortly after he graduated from Loyal High School in 1986. After he graduated and started a family, he stayed in the Guard for the extra cash and camaraderie.
In an interview in June, a few days before his Neillsville unit - Detachment 1, Charley Company of the Wisconsin National Guard 1st Battalion, 128th Infantry Brigade - shipped out for training in Mississippi, Olson talked about how difficult it would be to detach himself from all of the things in which he was involved.
His eyes reddened and his voice got strained as he mentioned how much he would miss in his children's lives - sports events, birthdays and holidays - during the several months of training and the expected yearlong tour in Iraq. Plus, he worried about the effect his absence would have on the farmers whose businesses he helped to improve.
"I've got a close relationship with my customers, and they've had it tough in the last few years with milk prices. So it's hard to leave them,"[/b] Olson said.
Olson's unit was folded into the 278th Regimental Combat Team, a combination of soldiers from the Tennessee Army National Guard and Guard members from several other states. The 278th made the news a few weeks ago when a soldier in the unit asked Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld why some American military members were forced to forage for armor for their Humvees.
Nancy Olson talked to her husband on Christmas Day. He told her he was standing on a tin roof to make the phone call.
"He was actually in really good spirits, and I was very surprised because he told me he only had a couple of hours of sleep in the last couple of days and they were supposed to get one hot meal a day but that wasn't happening. But on Christmas Day, they had gotten their hot meal and things seemed to be going well," she said in an interview with WCCN-AM (1370) radio in Neillsville.
The call from the military Sunday morning was that Olson had been injured and was being treated by doctors. But around noon, the family learned the terrible news.
"His legs and his arms were hurt, and they airlifted him from there to a hospital. They had told us that he was injured and later they came back and told us they he didn't make it," Nancy Olson said.
Community mourns
Flags were flown at half-staff in the tiny Clark County community of Loyal, where Olson lived his whole life, and in Neillsville, where he reported for duty at the National Guard armory for years, and at M&I banks in both communities.
Red, white and blue flowers were planted at the Neillsville in the spring in honor of Olson. After he was deployed June 23, Olson asked bank employees to keep him in the loop with his customers.
"That tells you the depth of his commitment, they were always on his mind," said Al Nystrom, president of the Marshfield group of M&I Bank who worked with Olson for seven years. "He had a high sense of loyalty to his clients. He grew up in an agriculture environment and he understands the challenges farmers face. He tried to help them improve their dairy operations."
Gluch spent a couple of days with Olson before his unit shipped out to Kuwait in November. Olson knew the danger he would likely confront, said Gluch, but his worries were more for the young guys in his unit.
"He said, 'You know, Dan, I've lived a good life. I'm a lucky man. One time I sat back and said, "Why me?" I have four kids at home, a wife I love, and a job I love and a community I'm part of, but then it hit me that those kids (in his unit) haven't lived.
"'They don't know what it's like to live a life and find a woman they love and buy a house and raise a family. I have.' That just set me back," Gluch said. "There he was worrying about them. He was the old man in the unit. He was talking about the 22-year-olds and 23-year-olds."
Olson said in an interview at Camp Shelby, Miss., on Veterans Day in November that the four-plus months of training were arduous in the Mississippi heat, but one of the benefits was losing a few pounds. Like many of the soldiers in his unit, Olson had a few days of leave in late October and early November and said when he returned home he gained back some of the weight he lost.
Noting it was Veterans Day, Olson said he was humbled to attend parades for veterans who had gone to war in distant lands in the past. He talked about how in just a few days he would be a veteran of a foreign war.
"You hope you can live up to some of the things that they did and at the same time make them proud," Olson said.
DONATIONS
A memorial fund has been established for Todd Olson's family. Donations can be made at any M&I Bank in Wisconsin: Todd Olson Family Memorial, Account No. 34465288; or donations may be mailed to the M&I Bank where Olson worked, 204 S. Main St., Loyal, WI 54446.
Appeared in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on Dec. 28, 2004.
