Ernest "Ernie" Andrus was born in 1923 near Severance, Kansas, the younger of two sons in a farming family. During the Great Depression [Annotator's Note: The Great Depression, a global economic depression that lasted from 1929 through 1945], they left farming when his mother became a Harvey Girl [Annotator's Note: a waitress in the first American restaurant chain] and his father took sporadic work in the WPA [Annotator's Note: Works Progress Administration] in Kansas City, Missouri. When Andrus' older brother was diagnosed with incurable cancer, the family moved back to the Kansas side of the Missouri River. There wasn't much to live on. After his brother died, the family moved to Los Angeles, California. They arrived on Andrus' 14th birthday in 1937. Andrus always found work and got work for his younger brother. He sold and delivered newspapers and worked at a bowling alley. In high school, he saved enough money for a car. He was listening to a portable radio with a friend when he heard the news that Pearl Harbor had been bombed [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. Neither of them knew where that was. His buddy said he thought they should go join the Navy. They lived near the sea and were familiar with that branch of the service. They also had a friend that hustled them to join the Navy and see the world. Because of a lazy left eye, the Navy rejected Andrus several times, but he memorized the eye chart, and in June 1942 he was accepted. His mother received his high school diploma in the mail. Just before the war broke out, Andrus won third place in the State of California for an essay he wrote titled, "What America Owes Me and What I Owe America."

Ernest "Ernie" Andrus was excited about going into the Navy. He went to San Diego [Annotator's Note: San Diego, California] for outfitting and boot camp. He requested assignment to the hospital corps because he couldn't kill anybody. He attended the hospital corps school in San Diego, California for five weeks. He got an assignment at Corona Hospital in Corona, California near his home. The facility was a resort hotel before it was turned into a Naval medical facility. Andrus worked nights, and had days off. It was great duty until one day he fell asleep at the wheel and wrecked a car. Andrus was eventually shipped to Oakland, California, then to Treasure Island [Annotator's Note: Naval Station Treasure Island, San Francisco Bay, California] and Goat Island [Annotator's Note: now Yerba Buena Island, San Francisco Bay, California], where he was assigned to USS Rochambeau (AP-63), a converted ocean liner. On New Year's Eve 1942, he shipped out with the Chicago [Annotator's Note: USS Chicago (CL-29)] as an escort. The ship Andrus served on carried troops out to the South Pacific and brought wounded back to San Francisco. He made three such trips. Andrus made stops in the New Hebrides [Annotator's Note: now Vanuatu], and unbeknownst to Andrus at the time, his ship carried Kennedy [Annotator's Note: US Navy Lieutenant (junior grade) John Fitzgerald Kennedy; 35th President of the United States] to Espiritu Santo [Annotator's Note: Espiritu Santo, Vanuatu]. One of their ports of call was Brisbane, Australia, where they picked up an Australian escort, or as the Americans called it, an Australian tin can. The convoy encountered a submarine, and nearly missed being torpedoed. They made another port stop at Melbourne, Australia. Andrus got a kick out of the Australian accent and attitude. They always went into Noumea, New Caledonia, where there were two MOBs [Annotator's Note: Navy mobile hospitals]. They also picked up wounded from a hospital in Wellington, New Zealand, most of them having come from a facility in Auckland [Annotator's Note: Auckland, New Zealand]. Andrus' battle station was on a three inch gun [Annotator's Note: three inch, 50 caliber naval gun] on the fantail [Annotator's Note: overhang of the deck extending aft of the sternpost of a ship] of the ship. They rarely fired it, as they avoided any danger they could. His job was to pass the ammunition. After three trips, he disembarked at San Francisco, went over to Treasure Island, and shipped out again for New Caledonia.

Ernest "Ernie" Andrus left [Annotator's Note: San Francisco, California] on a Merchant Marine ship. Once they were three miles out of California waters, it turned into a gambling ship. He went broke real fast and went to work for some guys who were bootlegging brandy. At Christmas he was in New Caledonia [Annotator's Note: New Caledonia, Overseas France] and celebrated by going AWOL [Annotator's Note: absent without leave]. After working in a mobile hospital there for a while, he was transferred to LST-124 [Annotator's Note: USS LST-124; a Landing Ship, Tank]. The ship was going back and forth from its base at Guadalcanal [Annotator's Note: Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands] while the Marines were taking islands from the Japanese. When they were on Saipan [Annotator's Note: Saipan, Northern Mariana Islands], and the Allies were getting ready to take the Marianas, Andrus' ship went back to Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor, Hawaii]. There, in a disaster dubbed The Second Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: also known as the West Loch Disaster, 21 May 1944], the Americans lost six LSTs and about 1,000 lives. Andrus was in Honolulu [Annotator's Note: Honolulu, Hawaii] on liberty [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time] and was not involved. The LSTs, loaded with gasoline and explosives, were in West Loch, tied up next to each other. One blew up and the vessels along the way blew up in turn. When Andrus got back on board his ship, which had escaped destruction by sailing out of danger, the sailors were not allowed to talk about what happened. There was fear that the Japanese would learn that something big was being planned. The attack on Guam [Annotator's Note: Second Battle of Guam, 21 July to 10 August 1944, Guam, Mariana Islands] was postponed for a month. Andrus' battle station aboard LST-124 was in the sickbay, so all he could see of the action was what he could glimpse through a porthole. When the stretchers started coming aboard, he was too busy to stick his head out and witness the fireworks. He was just trying to keep those Marines alive. During the whole war, none of the patients Andrus treated died. In one instance, he carried a man aboard that looked to be dead, but when Andrus put the stretcher down, the man moved his head. The doctor said to move along, and in the only instance where Andrus disobeyed his superior's orders, he stayed with the guy through the night. He brought him back by feeding him blood plasma. It is said, a corpsman is a Marine's best friend. He laments the many men who died or came back home with bad wounds. The archives say that Andrus was on Okinawa [Annotator's Note: Okinawa, Japan], and he was awarded a battle star [Annotator's Note: device worn to denote subsequent awards on medals and ribbons; also called campaign stars or battle stars] for it, but he wasn't there.

Ernest "Ernie" Andrus was on USS LST-124 [Annotator's Note: a Landing Ship, Tank] until just before the end of the war. He had more sea duty than most of the sailors on board. When a replacement was named for him, the man never did catch up with the ship. At a point when his doctor, his striker, and his pharmacist's mate had all been rotated back to the United States, he was finally sent to the transfer station and boarded a ship home. He was given a 30 day rehabilitation leave [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time] but had not yet left the ship when he heard the loudspeaker announcement that the war was over. He jumped ship for one night to go into Los Angeles [Annotator's Note: Los Angeles, California] to see the excitement. Next day, he left for Long Beach Hospital [Annotator's Note: Naval Hospital, Long Beach, California] to serve out his remaining six months of duty. He declined the Navy's offer to sign up for another four years. When he was discharged, he used the G.I. Bill to go to UCLA [Annotator's Note: University of California, Los Angeles], but after a year and a half, he had started to raise a family. He dropped out to move to what was called the Thrifty College [Annotator's Note: Thrifty Drugs pharmacy company], which was on the job training for the fastest growing drug chain in the world. Andrus stayed in the drug store business for a while, and later moved to the grocery store business until he retired in 1984. Then he worked registering voters for Ronald Reagan [Annotator's Note: Ronald Wilson Reagan, 40th President of the United States] and took a job for an accounting firm before retiring altogether. He and his wife moved to Prescott, Arizona. Later, while his World War 2 group was still having reunions, Andrus married his third wife with his shipmates in attendance.

Running is in Ernest "Ernie" Andrus' nature. He has been a runner most of his life. He ran his first 200 mile relay when he was 88 years old and got a lot of attention. Andrus began a quest to run coast to coast to raise money for the restoration of USS LST-325 [Annotator's Note: Landing Ship, Tank]. At 90 years old, he started running from San Diego [Annotator's Note: San Diego, California], but when he was in the middle of the desert, his wife passed away and his mission was suspended for three weeks. He resumed the trek, running three days a week. He set out on 7 October 2013, in Mission Beach, San Diego [Annotator's Note: San Diego, California], and ended in Saint Simons Island, Georgia. He hoped to meet the restored LST-325 there, however, the Coast Guard had some unresolved issues with the plan. Andrus runs an average of about 18 miles a week and had been running just over two years at the time of this interview. He thinks the Great Depression [Annotator's Note: The Great Depression, a global economic depression that lasted from 1929 through 1945] shaped the people of the Greatest Generation [Annotator's Note: nickname for World War 2 era Americans]. When he and his fellow soldiers returned from World War 2, nobody talked about the war. Everyone wanted to forget about it and get along with their lives. When they reached retirement age, veterans started thinking that the younger generation should know that freedom is not free. We are depending on them to keep this country free in the future. He feels institutions such as The National WWII Museum [Annotator's Note: in New Orleans, Louisiana] are necessary to educate the citizens of today. There were no spoiled kids during the Great Depression, and it was hoped that kids would not have to go through that again. But the spoiling snowballs with every generation, and kids today think it takes no effort to be a hero. Andrus hopes that anyone looking at his experiences for inspiration would realize that wars are not going to stop, and that today's generation had better be prepared to keep this country free. Their predecessors went through a lot to keep it that way so do not let them down.