WWII history project lists entire state National Guard roster
SARATOGA SPRINGS (AP) — Among the thousands of names Jack Kennedy punched into his computer for the New York State Military Museum’s World War II project were scores of men he knew while growing up in an upstate mill town. Many were sent to the Pacific, and more than a few didn’t come back.
“They had a tough go over there,” said Kennedy, 90, himself a veteran of the fighting in Europe.
Kennedy was one of more than a dozen volunteers who spent nearly a year at their computers filling Excel spreadsheets with information on almost 29,000 soldiers in the New York National Guard who were called up for federal service in October 1940. In total, 300,000 National Guard soldiers reported for duty that fall.
Jim Gandy, the project’s coordinator, said the resulting database is unique in the United States because it’s apparently the only one online listing an entire state National Guard organization called up for active duty during World War II.
The museum, located in an old armory in Saratoga Springs, posted the infor- mation online so it can be used by people researching their family genealogy or the history of World War II.
Gandy, the museum’s assistant librarian and archivist, said he got the idea after some local veterans spent a week painstakingly going through paper records to find every National Guardsman from their town who was called up with the 27th Division in 1940.
“Now you can have that information in a minute,” he said.
The online project is a boon to researchers such as Tom Kelly, a retired college history professor who has interviewed many 27th Division veterans, a process that involved mailing out hundreds of questionnaires.
“This obviously would make life much simpler,” he said of the museum’s online tool. “I’m excited to get access to it.”
Bruce Scott got involved after helping out with another museum project. He was also frustrated over trying to trace his genealogy, hitting deadends because some records aren’t posted online.