SHENANDOAH – About two weeks after the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, news reached town that one of our own perished.
Private Walter H. Wardigo, 22, of 151 1/2 West Washington Street, was Shenandoah’s first war casualty as the United States was thrust into the two-year-old World War II.
According to the Shenandoah Evening Herald at the time, Wardigo, son of James and Catherine Wardigo, was stationed at Hickam Field, a U.S. Army airfield adjacent to the Pearl Harbor naval base. He served with the 18th Air Base Squadron and had been in Hawaii for two years.
On Dec. 20, 1941, Wardigo’s photo was on the front page after he had been reported missing and feared dead…