The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
HALLOWED GROUND
City breaks ground on Greater Middletown Military Museum — a dream 15 years in making
MIDDLETOWN » Ron Organek is an optimistic man.
But even he admits that he struggled with maintaining hope that a military museum — to house memorabilia, letters, uniforms and other relics of Middletown-area soldiers who served in war — would, over the course of 15 years, be realized.
“It’s actually wonderful,” said Organek, 75, president of the board of directors and founder of the museum, on Tuesday afternoon. “There were times when I was wondering if we would get this off the ground or not. But then always somebody said, ‘Look: Let’s do this’ or ‘Let’s do that,’” he said. “And people were always there.”
The city broke ground Tuesday for the Greater Middletown Military Museum during ceremony at its future location in Veterans Park next to the Connecticut Trees of Honor Memorial on Walnut Grove Road. The 5,000-square-foot structure was designed by Steve Nelson of Wethersfield-based Moser Pilon Nelson Architects and will be built by J.A. Rosa Construction of Wolcott.
“I started talking to (the late local veterans) William Pomfret, Norm Way and Bobby Mantel,” Organek said, explaining the genesis of the museum. “People find this stuff in their attics and it’s being thrown in the dump.
“There was a WWII flag flown over City Hall when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor,” he said. A Vietnam vet and charter member of the museum found it — torn and riddled with holes — “in a dumpster on South Green in the ’60s, where we had a bomb shelter that was used as a storage area,” Organek said. “There was also a blue flag with gold numbers on it that represented the amount of people from Middletown serving in the military during the war.
“Every month, it was taken down and the numbers were changed. We don’t know where that flag is,” Organek said.
The man saw the flag and said, “‘We can’t have an American flag treated this way’ so he jumped in and took it out,” said Organek, who believes the museum will one day have it among its collection.
Another resident, Organek said, “has foot locker full of original Nazi memorabilia that he has told us we will get. His father was in WWII and he went into Germany and took all this stuff and brought it home: SS items, swastikas and a full-size German flag that Hitler would stand in front of with the red background.”
Organek pointed to the gold ceremonial shovels that were created free of charge for the event, which are actually entrenching tools given by board member Michael Rogalsky. Donations such as these made the ceremony — and museum — possible, he said.
Former Connecticut State Troubadour and Middletown native Tom Callinan, son of a World War II soldier, led off the ceremonies with the national anthem on guitar.
State Sen. Len Suzio, who recalled Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address and its reference to “hallowed ground,” praised the local veterans’ “tenacity and persistence” in continuing the project over a decade and a half despite many challenges.
“You risked it all. You put your lives on the line just so we could enjoy our American way of life,” he said of their service.
Veteran Ken McClellan, a member of the museum board, has been on the building committee since its formation. Early on, many started collecting books, records, diaries, uniforms and other items to one day preserve in a museum, he said.
“We have more than enough to fill 5,000 square feet: 100 uniforms, several thousand books, letters, actual v-mail letters from WWII.
“Before there was email, there was v-mail,” McLellan explained. “Letters going over an airplane took up a lot of space and a lot of weight so what the government did is it would open the letters, photograph them, send it over to Germany as film spools, print them out and send it in a postcard-sized letter.”
Although the museum’s relics will be preserved behind glass and by other means, “we may open some of the collection for people to handle — but more for research rather than for experience,” McLellan said. “We may have some less valuable items; get some recent uniforms and helmets to put on kids.”
Eventually the group will open up its records library to the public and have materials digitized online.
“We estimate we’ll need $15,000 to $25,000 a year for just operation, maintaining our collection because we don’t want to put things on a display rack and have them fall apart,” McLellan said. “We want to digitize books and records, the diaries that guys have.”
Organek said the first incarnation of the museum, which began as an idea in 2002, was first housed at the Middletown Press’ morgue (or archive of old issues) when the newspaper was located at 2 Main St., but when the Press moved to Main Street Market, the items were packed up.
Over the years, these wartime artifacts and collectibles found several homes, although none was permanent, Organek said.
In March 2011, the museum board signed a lease with the city to use two modular buildings at the former St. Sebastian School, or Eckersley Hall, now the home of the Middletown Senior Center at 61 Durant Terrace.
The board was asked to vacate the two trailers after a few years because they were needed for the geothermal heating system, McLellan said, so the items were moved into storage.
“The critical things that could be damaged are in a moving and storage place under a controlled temperature,” Organek said.
In November 2015, the city and museum board executed a lease for a location in Veterans Park near the Old Mill Road entrance. However, in 2016, plans were for the building to be located next to the Connecticut Trees of Honor as complements to one another, according to Organek.
At one time, the board was in talks with the Middlesex County Historical Society for a location there, but there wasn’t adequate space. The same reason scuttled plans to have it at the Godfrey Library on Newfield Street, said Organek, who even has some items at his home. “It’s kind of scattered all over.”
Vietnam veteran Lucien Mailhot of New Britain, who served in the Navy from 1970 to 1972, a member of the Grunts MC motorcycle group, showed off his collection of dog tags following the groundbreaking.
“I feel like I’m giving the (vets) honor to have them with me, look at their names and respect what they did,” he said of the metal identification necklaces he carries around in a pouch, stamped with the names of soldiers who served in World War II and the Korean, Gulf and Vietnam wars.
“This is great for all the other generations to come, like my grandchildren. They’ll be able to see it and the history of the veterans,” said Mailhot, who finds his collectibles at flea markets and tag sales.
State Rep. Joseph Serra, whose 11 uncles served in WWII, said the future site has little-known historical significance. When work first began on Veterans Memorial Pool, excavators found axe heads and arrowheads from the Mattabesett Indians who used to live on what is now Indian Hill Cemetery.
Lt. Gov. Nancy Wyman explained what she believes are true heroes to those gathered.
“Too often here, we look up to athletes, actors and actresses,” she said. “Here in our community are these men and women — veterans who never, never asked unless it was for someone else and always gave. You gave in your service to our country and give every day in the Middletown community.
“I’m proud to call you my friends,” she said.
The group has created a Gofundme page, Middletown, CT Museum, with a $200,000 goal to help cover ongoing costs.
Monetary donations may be sent to the museum in care of the Community Foundation of Middlesex County at 49 Main St., Middletown, CT 06457. For information, visit the Gofundme site or gmv mm. com and click “make a donation.”