Theodore Skare was born in April 1924 in Two Harbors, Minnesota. His family moved to Chicago, Illinois when he was baby. They lived there until his father died in 1931 when he was seven years old. His father was a superintendent of an apartment building. He was an only child. His mother sent him to live with his grandparents in Wisconsin for a year. His mother got married to a friend who had become a widower and they all moved to Cloquet, Minnesota. There was a lot of industry and work there during the Depression. His stepfather was a machinist and welder and worked in the shipyards in Duluth, Minnesota building Liberty ships [Annotator's Note: a class of rapidly produced cargo ship]. They lived in a lower-middle-class neighborhood. Everyone was poor but they had a good life. They ate well and got by. Skare graduated from high school in 1941. The developing wars were only talked about at home. Once the attack on Pearl Harbor happened they knew war would be coming. Skare was 17 and he heard the news on the radio. He knew the service was in his future. He was upset as was everyone but he just went on with his life and waited. He went to Duluth Business University for a year and then went to work in May 1942. In May 1943 he was drafted.

Theodore Skare was drafted in May 1943. He had previously tried to enlist in the Army Air Corps but they turned him down due to high blood pressure. The Army had no problem with it. His parents did not like him going in the service, but they did not say much. Leaving for the service was a commonplace occurrence then. He went to Fort Snelling, Minnesota to be inducted. He then went to Camp Barkeley, Texas by train. He was sent there to be trained as a medic. He did not like basic training in the middle of Texas in the middle of the summer. The infiltration course was particularly unpleasant. He felt lucky that he was a medic and got to go to school instead of doing infantry training. Skare went to school to be a medical clerk-typist. He received a lot of medical training in basic first aid. He remained there until September 1943. They had a short break for ASTP [Annotator's Note: Army Specialized Training Program] training at Camp Maxey, Texas but the program there was closed, and he was sent back to Camp Barkeley. He then went to Camp Ellis [Annotator's Note: near Macomb, Illinois] to a newly forming malaria survey unit. They were there through the winter and then went to Camp Plauche [Annotator's Note: also known as Camp Harahan, Harahan, Louisiana]. They were looking for mosquitos. Each unit had 11 men and included two officers, an entomologist, parasitologist, lab techs, sanitary techs, drivers, and Skare. It was a self-sufficient unit. They would identify the type of mosquito and the presence of malaria. Skare feels his training there was mostly a waste of time. It was not hard to find mosquitos, but he does not recall ever finding malaria-bearing ones. They would also do ten mile marches and the usual Army baloney. They were looking for the mosquito larva in stagnant water. They had all of the necessary lab equipment to test them. He did not care much for the job and spent most of his time in the office. He would go in the field to have something to do besides typing reports. They knew they were headed to the Pacific. They embarked from Camp Stoneman, California. They received shots and boarded the SS Lurline, which was a nice ride. American military members who had gotten into trouble with the law performed the KP [Annotator's Note: kitchen police or kitchen patrol] duties on the ship. Skare and his men just laid in the sun the whole trip. There were WACS [Annotator's Note: members of the Women's Army Corps, the women's branch of the US Army, 1942 to 1978] aboard too, but they were isolated from the others. [Annotator's Note: There is an odd tape break at the end.]

[Annotator's Note: There was an odd tape break and the conversation starts mid-sentence]. Theodore Skare was aboard the SS Lurline crossing the Pacific. There were six men in each stateroom containing two three-level bunk beds. It was not classy but not uncomfortable. They were a fast ship and were unescorted. They docked first at Brisbane, Australia and unloaded some sailors but no one else was allowed off the ship. They then landed in Oro Bay, New Guinea, near Buna and Gona. Skare unloaded the ship before being taken off the ship. He found the ice cream locker on the ship and borrowed ice cream from the Navy. They were assigned to a casual camp in tents and they made a shower for themselves. They had a mess hall and a movie theater. Life was boring for six months with no duties. They only had their personal items with them. They were keeping up with the events of the war's progress. Skare's unit [Annotator's Note: 209th Malaria Survey Unit] was to be assigned to 13th Air Force Bomber Command, but they were elsewhere. They were scheduled to go to Morotai in the Dutch East Indies and they had to wait for them. They all came together and flew to Biak, Papua on C-47s [Annotator's Note: Douglas C-47 Skytrain cargo aircraft]. Skare was ill and put in the hospital. All of his personal goods went to Morotai without him. After he recovered, he went to the Red Cross to get a toothbrush and razor and they would not give him one. They said they would give him a stamp so he could write home for what he needed. He has not had a good relationship with the Red Cross since. He donates to other charities. He arrived in Morotai near Bomber Command Headquarters who provided their basic needs, including his toothbrush. [Annotator's Note: Skare laughs.]

Theodore Skare was on Morotai which the Japanese had invaded originally. The Americans took it back, occupying about a third of it with Japanese troops on the remainder. There was a nice breeze, so it was not extremely hot. His unit [Annotator's Note: 209th Malaria Survey Unit] began their malaria survey work there. He both went into the field and took care of the report writing. The Japanese occupied the nearby Halmahara Islands and they had some aircraft there. They would bomb at night for a while. He got excited the first time it happened. There was a pillbox they made for shelter. They really only came close once and did not do much damage. The Japanese on the island were far away enough that they were not a worry. They would occasionally sneak through to try and steal food but not often. The 13th Air Force was flying missions out of there. Skare spent most of his day doing typing for the unit. When he went into the field, he would take dippers to find mosquitos in any stagnant water. They would bring them back and test them. If they were Anopheles [Annotator's Note: genus of mosquito that transmits human malaria], they would alert the malaria control unit. They would then spray the area with oil and DDT [Annotator's Note: Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane; chemical compound developed as an insecticide]. He thinks they likely killed a lot of birds and animals doing so. Everyone took Atabrine [Annotator's Note: an anti-malarial medication] to delay malaria's attacks on the body. It turned everyone sort of yellow. One of the lab techs got malaria on the ship to go home. The Atabrine had hidden the symptoms. The 32nd Infantry Division had a huge problem with malaria. They would return to the same pools each time within a certain distance of the troops. They did not go into the Japanese held area. The commanding officer thought they should go to the front lines and catch mosquitos with their bare arms. The First Sergeant refused the order and was court-martialed and demoted. That CO [Annotator's Note: commanding officer] was transferred out after that. He had been made a captain in the Army because he was an entomologist. They never saw any natives there but they did see them in New Guinea.

After leaving Morotai, Theodore Skare and his unit [Annotator's Note: 209th Malaria Survey Unit] went to Clark Field, Philippines and were stationed at Fort Stotsenburg. They had a house there since it was a permanent Army base. The war was ending so they were not doing much. The did not do any mosquito surveys there. Before Harry [Annotator's Note: President Harry S. Truman] dropped the bomb [Annotator's Note: the atomic bomb], they were to go to Okinawa to become infantry troops for the planned invasion [Annotator's Note: the planned invasion of the Japanese Home Islands]. He thanks God Harry dropped the bomb. Some of the malaria survey units were made labs to do medical exams on the women serving the troops physically. He was glad he did not get that detail. He was ordered to a casual camp for some time waiting for a ship. He left on 25 December 1945 aboard the SS Sloterdijk, a Dutch ship. They ran into a storm. One guy could never make it to the mess hall because he was so sick. Skare was okay. They docked on 16 January 1946 in San Francisco. He then boarded a troop train to Camp McCoy, Wisconsin and was discharged 24 January. He was not interested in staying in the service nor going into the Reserves. He had a wife and a child waiting for him. He was anxious to get back to civilian life. He did not even join the 52-20 Club [Annotator's Note: provision of the 1944 G.I. Bill that enabled all former servicemen to receive 20 dollars of unemployment benefits per week for 52 weeks while looking for work]; he just went back to work in Cloquet, Minnesota until 1951. He was transferred to St. Paul, Minnesota, eventually working up to systems manager.

Theodore Skare was on duty in the Pacific with a wife back home. He missed her terribly and was lonesome. He did not know he had a child until two months after he was born. She sent a telegram but he did not get it. They had four kids and were married for 56 years. [Annotator's Note: Skare gets emotional.] One child is a dentist, one is a retired teacher, one is a lawyer and one is a flight attendant who calls him daily. He wrote a lot of letters. The mail was slow but he was getting the story of his child being reared. His wife lived with her parents, which helped her a lot. Most of the men he served with were single. Skare did not decide to serve. He tried to volunteer out of obligation, but they did not take him and was later drafted. He did not like the Japanese, but he feels we really mistreated the Japanese-Americans in the United States. We thought they were all bad, but they were not. Their military was particularly sadistic, and he is glad he was not in the Marines and had to battle them. He would get news of that while in the Philippines. He did not know there were American internment camps here. He felt bad about that. Reunions at Pearl Harbor include the Japanese participants who have been forgiven. It was tough to do, but done. Going home was Skare's most memorable moment of World War 2. He got home after a lot of the other people did. Being on the tail end came with no celebrations. Being gone from a new wife and child was the worst thing about the war. [Annotator's Note: Skare pauses with emotion.] His service means very little of anything to him today and he wonders if he really contributed anything. He is sure his work prevented some malaria, but who knows. He thinks the war is lost in history to American kids. It is in his mind but to them it is in a book. It was serious. We were close to losing that war. If Hitler [Annotator's Note: German dictator Adolf Hitler] had moved on England instead of Russia, we would have been in dire straits. The National WWII Museum is important to keep this fresh in people's minds. People need to remember the USS Arizona (BB-39) and Pearl Harbor. Future generations need to learn so we do not do it again. The politicians make it hard to prevent another war like this.