Interview

Vern Kube, Interviewed by Sierra Bryant, 2015

Name of person(s) interviewed; Vern Kube

 Other people present: Sierra Bryant and Makenzie Mize

Researcher: Sierra Bryant

Date of interview: May-30-2015

 Location of interview: Veteran’s home

Special conditions (noise, interruptions, etc.): video had to be restarted towards the end because because veteran started sharing another good story after video was ended. Transition added to avoid confusion

 General description of contents:  interview with Vern Kube and his experience in WWII

Length of interview: 33:42

TOPIC SUMMARY

Time      Contents

Start                  Background on childhood and entering the service.


3:35                  Brief touch on how the food was


4:00                  How he got through his time in the service and pranks that were                                   pulled on fellow service men


5:46                 Travel and first experiences after deployment


7:04                 How free time was spent and experiences during free time


9:14                 His thoughts about fellow service men and the close friends he made


11:24              When he left the Navy, started a family, and entered his career.


15:07             Certificate from Admiral Ramsey in 1946, including his story on                                     atomic bomb testing


20:53            Story about a young artist who wanted to draw him the day he left at                            the age of 18


21:47            More on the Atomic bomb


22:00            More general information and memories of his time in the service


23:41            More on his later life and his wife

24:00 to end       Participation and experience of WWII Honor Flight

Mr. Vern Kube
Interviewed by Sierra Bryant, 2015

Vern Kube didn't have it easy when it came to his childhood and growing up. When he was only 8 years old, his father passed away and his mother remarried to a man who did not always treat Vern the way a stepfather should. 

In his early teenage years, Vern left home and began to live with his sister, and at the young age of 18 was drafted by the U.S. Army in 1946. The next day, Mr. Kube decided to join the navy instead, because he had no desire to be in the army and thought the navy would be a better choice.

Unfortunately, before and while in the service, Mr. Kube struggled with a drinking problem. Vern spent two years of his life in the navy until he was discharged at the age of 20.  While serving in the navy, Mr. Kube witnessed the test detonations of two atomic bombs, one of them in the Bikini Atoll.  

Upon his return home, Kube debated going back to finish high school, but he realized that suddenly the ones he recalled as freshman were now seniors, so he chose to find work rather that finish high school. 

In Vern's late 20's, he married his wife Edith, and later decided he wanted his family to experience the world as he had, so they packed up and moved to Guam where they spent two years before moving back due to a back operation Vern was scheduled to have.

 Vern and his wife currently reside in Pendleton, Oregon where he is the pastor of a church on the Umatilla Indian Reservation. In May of 2015, Vern was honored with the opportunity to go on the WWII Honor Flight, along with 50 other WWII veterans from eastern Oregon. During this time, he spent four days in Washington, D.C., where he and the other veterans with him received letters and visited memorials, with the highlight being the WWII Memorial. 

Mr. Vern Kube  is only one of so many men that served, and every single one of them deserve all the recognition and respect we as Americans can offer.

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Vern Kube East Oregonian Article
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