The Waterbury Democrat., 1944-09-13
Tall Tower
 Topics
pY THE MAN IN TIT TOWER

thought 1t so good, I'm passing 1t along to you,
 At Waterbury Conn, in the Spring of lS4i there there was a l5.year.Old kid playing semprOteSSOnal baSe- ball who was considered real big league prospect
 His name was John Joseph Spillane He was stocky athletic Irish boy righhander and his best position was Shorstop, He had speed and marvellous helding talent And he had throwing arm, He could scoop up a hot grounder and peg the ball. still in roSeh %th Soen @ as magTa yss ooS S
 Some baseball scouts from the Yankee chain and the Cards came around and talked to Johnny and to his father Michael But the scouts heard news that was very sad to them Johnny was quitting his job at linotype manufacturing plant and joining the Marme Corps
 Johnny enlisted in the Corps in August l94l. After that the months tumbed themselves: Boot Camp at PI training mechanic and driver with an Amphl, bious Tractor Training Battalion at Dunedin Fa Pearl Habor and everything the double and then overseas and Johnnys first ID Day" August 7th, 1922 He came in with the first at Gavutu, where the amptraekS performed some famous feats in fetching out the wounded and bringing in ammunition under heaVy
 Meanwhile back in Waterbury, they'd just about forgotten Johnny Spianc the kid with the wonderful throwing arm. One local sports writer did write column of speculation about how the would affect youthful baseball prospects, and Spllane was men, tioned in that single column.
 And then Johnny and his throwing arm got back pack into the news in Waterbury and other places For TOT Michael Spanes boy had the Navy Cross, highest award offered by the U s. naval service, and he had won 1t with his throwing armand his courage Of
 This is how 1t happened:
 After Gavutu and Tanambogo and Guadalcanal, Johnnys outfit rested ana reformed TOT several montnS oaa Spilane's bunch went with the Second Marine Division to the GibertS for the assault on Tarawa where the amp-tracks to prove decisive weapon,
 Corporal Spillane crew chief of Nn od'style Alligator which they usually referred to "The Old Lady" The old Lady could take 1t and she could dish 1t out Splane and boys had put thick cake icing Of plate around her. she was more snug against machine gun and rifle fire than most of the AisatorS The Old Lady went into Tarawa On the first wave with a load of assault troops. She crawed gngerly onto the coral reef like spinster wading into mud puddle And she gathered speed on the cora Sheli aI with machine gun and rifle bullets beating like hail on her sides and with her own 30 and 80 callber machine guns talking back in sharp.tongued fashion
 The tractor got right up on the fiery beach With throat So far that was good going for this operation But now they were close to the sea-Wa and In the lane 3s fire of machine gun the wall and hand grenades which were showering around the Old Lady
 Spillane was cr0uched in a gunnerS slot near the tractors cab Most of the assault troops huddled at the opposite end of the cargo compartment waiting for the word to go the side And then one of the Japanese grenade thrOwers behind the sea-waI found the Old Lady'S range
 A Jap grenade, looking like black nkwell, dropped fzzing and smoking darky on the deck of the tractor near the wounded gunner spiane didn't hesitate He dived for the explosive and still in the crouehed position he used to field grounders, hurled the grenade back toward the sea-wall with hard peg
 Another grenade fell into the tractor and Spllane heaved 1t back. This time there were some the seaWall and the Japanese machine gun went silent Now there was only an occasion rifle bullet striking The Old Ladys sides But another
 
 turned 1t to the Japs Two more smoking grenades lobbed into the compartment and Johnny pitched them the Sea-wall while the assault troops looked on pop-eyed. All this happened in the space of about two minutes. And then a sixth Japanese grenade hit the top of the tractors cab and rolled into the cargo compartment. This grenade was fig. zng angrly when 1t hit. Johnny got 1t away, but 1t exploded just as 1t left his right hand.
 The explosion knocked Spillane to the tractor deck Shrapne showered off the top of his helmet And then he rose to knee and he saw that he no longer had right hand And there shrapne in his neck and right side and right hip But Johnny only crouched there and studied his throwing And he said, be felt as the Yankee and Cardinal talent scouts were looking his shoulder at his bloody throwing and shaking their heads,
 q just stared for a few moments at the place where by hand had been" said Johnny "and wOnd- cred if it had been worth 1t. And then saw the assault troops still safe there against The Old Ladys buk-heads And decided 1t had been worth It."
 Spilane's Navy Cross citation reads: His daunt less courage and quick thinking saved the lives of the troops in his tractor and enabled them to success fully debark and continue the fight against the enemy"
 After Johnny threw back those grenadeS, the machine gun silenced and the boys in the tractor had a comparative Hull in which to scramble for the comparative shelter of the sea-wal.
 Then Spillane took look the sides of the tractor There were four seriously wounded Marines crawling toward The Old Lady The four scrambled aboard, Johnny giving them hand with his good left 
 The NpperS had evidently, brought up some