“I’m going for 100 or I’ll die trying,” Bornhorst told the Dayton Daily News.
In 1944, he was drafted into the Navy in the midst of World War II. He turned 23 years old aboard the USS Idaho — nicknamed “The Big Spud” — a day before American forces invaded Iwo Jima on Feb. 19, 1945.
The Battle of Iwo Jima lasted for five weeks. It’s believed that all but 200 or so of the 21,000 Japanese forces on the island were killed, as were almost 7,000 Marines with another 19,000 wounded.
Bornhorst said the Idaho and a group of ships arrived a few days prior to the invasion, firing on Japanese military targets all day long. At night, the battleship would retreat back out to sea and cruise around the waters.
From the lookout point, Bornhorst watched as a group of Americans raised the flag in the soil of Mt. Suribachi. That moment was photographed by Joe Rosenthal, becoming one of the most iconic images of World War II.
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“I didn’t think too much of it at the time,” Bornhorst said. “It was just all in a day’s work.”
After securing Iwo Jima and docking for repairs in Guam, battleship Idaho sailed to the Japanese island Okinawa for a “repeat performance,” Bornhorst said. The Americans invaded the island on Easter Sunday, and the battle went on for months.
Bornhorst witnessed the triumphs and terrors of war — Kamikaze suicide planes whizzing overhead; the boisterous celebration of U.S. ships shooting rockets through the air when Japan finally surrendered in August 1945; and securing Tokyo Bay during the signing of the Peace Treaty.
About a year later, the Navy discharged Bornhorst and he hitchhiked his way back to Ohio from Norfolk, Va. He married his hometown sweetheart Rita Bensman and raised eight children.
For more than three decades he managed Swanders Farmers Elevator Co., while also working as a tree trimmer and a pig-raising crop farmer.
In the early 1990s, he started dressing up as Uncle Sam for parades and military homecomings across Shelby County — becoming a local celebrity.
Though his love of country is unwavering, he doesn’t idolize war.
“Nobody wins in a war,” he said. “The human race hasn’t learned yet.”
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