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    Bringing Mulligan Home: The Other Side of the Good War
    Bringing Mulligan Home: The Other Side of the Good War
    Bringing Mulligan Home: The Other Side of the Good War
    Audiobook9 hours

    Bringing Mulligan Home: The Other Side of the Good War

    Written by Dale Maharidge

    Narrated by Pete Larkin

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Sgt. Steve Maharidge, like many of his generation, hardly ever talked about the war. The only sign he#8217;d served in it was a single black and white photograph of himself and another soldier tacked to the wall of his basement workshop. After Steve Maharidge#8217;s death, his son Dale, now an adult, began a twelve-year quest to understand his father#8217;s preoccupation with the photo. What had happened during the battle for Okinawa, and why had his father remained silent about his experiences and the man in the picture, Herman Mulligan? In his search for answers, Maharidge sought out the survivors of Love Company, many of whom had never before spoken so openly and emotionally about what they saw and experienced on Okinawa.In Bringing Mulligan Home, Maharidge delivers an affecting narrative of war and its aftermath, of fathers and sons, with lessons for the children whose parents are returning from war today.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHighbridge Company
    Release dateMar 12, 2013
    ISBN9781622311729
    Bringing Mulligan Home: The Other Side of the Good War
    Author

    Dale Maharidge

    For nearly four decades, Dale Maharidge has been one of America's leading chroniclers of poverty. Alongside photographer Michael S. Williamson, his book And Their Children After Them won the Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction in 1990, revisiting the places and people of Depression-era America, depicted in Walker Evans's and James Agee's Let Us Now Praise Famous Men. Also with Williamson, Maharidge produced Journey to Nowhere: The Saga of the New Underclass, which Bruce Springsteen has credited as an influence for songs such as Youngstown"" and ""The New Timer.""""

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    Reviews for Bringing Mulligan Home

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    • 5/5
      In Bringing Mulligan Home, a Pulitzer-Prize winning author seeks answers to the puzzle of his father’s military service as a U.S. Marine in World War II’s Pacific theater, and its aftereffects. To do this, he interviews dozens of men who served in the same unit at the same battle on Okinawa. All this is ostensibly to find the mysterious “Mulligan” whose photo the author’s father always kept on display near his home workshop. Most of the book consists of narratives taken from interviews of a dozen former Marines, many of whom experienced the same problems of readjustment to civilian life that Steve Maharidge did. Subtitled “The Other Side of the Good War,” the book brings home the toll taken on the “Greatest Generation,” a story that has not been told in quite the same way before. And, whether or not the author got the story about Mulligan or not, he does bring home quite a story.At first, while reading the many pages of veterans’ stories, I was wishing the author would have come up with a cohesive narrative of the battle for Okinawa, interweaving the veterans’ stories together, comparing it to the official story—instead of keeping the stories separate. But the more I read, the less I thought that would have been possible. In the end, it was the totality of the collected memories – from a dozen viewpoints and dimmed by more than sixty years -- that made the story so enlightening. I’ve read many books about World War II, most of them on the air war over Europe, not the battles in the Pacific. So, I can’t compare this book to others I’ve read. Nonetheless, I believe this to be a powerful story, well researched, beautifully written and quite enlightening. I didn’t realize that only 15% of military resources were given over to the Pacific theater during World War II – and that part of the ground war was more like Vietnam than it was like the European theater. But that wasn’t the most important thing I learned. I also learned that many veterans of the Greatest Generation came home to troubled lives, unaware of the long-term physical and psychological damage they had incurred, and soldiered on in spite of it all. The author’s foray into the lives of the Marines he interviewed helped some of them find a peace they long deserved. Dale Maharidge deserves a medal for listening to them with such kindness and making sure were voices are heard. Review based on publisher-provided copy of the book.
    • 4/5
      The book is a journey of a son for his father. A father that avoided a traumatic event as a young man during WWII. A USMC Marine faced with the greatest of trials and tribulations. In the son's search to find a lost Marine (a photo of Mulligan and the father, which was kept by him), the son learns more about the cost of war and the impact it had on young men. What is surprising -- though perhaps not, given all that war entails -- is that thousands and thousands of unknown or never found service personnel from that war remain.
    • 4/5
      Dale Maharidge investigated his father's war experience in Okinawa and the Marine shown in an old photograph with him. With extensive research, including time in Okinawa and countless interviews with veterans of the Battle of Okinawa, Maharidge used his search for what happened to Mulligan as a vehicle for tracing the slice of World War II that took place on Okinawa and its aftermath.
    • 3/5
      Dale Maharidge felt the aftershock of the war in the Pacific for almost all of his whole life; his father Steve exploding with rage when the smallest infraction of non-conformance occur in the house, or when a dream triggered World War II to life again. In his father Steve's basement workshop, was the picture of Herman Mulligan and Steve Maharidge, in a relaxing moment during the war, and quite a mystery to son Dale. While his father was living and dealing with his demons, Dale had only limited information about Mulligan and his father's war. Once his father had passed, Dale Maharidge began an earnest search for who Mulligan was, and who were the men that Dale knew as dad—the calm man, and the enraged veteran.Dale Maharidge has split his book into two parts, beginning with his Midwestern life and the start of the research into the unknown Mulligan. Then, his father dies, and the research stops cold. This is when the book comes into its own. Relentlessly searching phone books and sending requests to the Veterans Administration, Dale contacts surviving members of his father's fighting group, asking who was Herman Mulligan. Along the way, he gathered snippets about the death of Mulligan, and how his father's buddies and leaders fought and survived the war. This insight is compelling, a great companion to "Band of Brothers" and 'Letters from Iwo Jima'. The true prize to the book is Dale's research and visit to Okinawa. He chronicles his time tracing the footsteps of the men that fought on the beach and in the valleys and on the hills. In doing so, he ventured deeper into the lives of Okinawa's resident survivors of the war—their war, the Battle of Okinawa. Civilian casualties were equal or greater to the Japanese losses, either through their pressed services, or from Allied bombings, or from the Japanese themselves, whose dislike of Okinawans becomes apparent to Dale after his talks with the locals and university acquaintances.It was truly a hard fought battle on both sides, and the stories convey such. Dale Maharidge brings to us more of the first-hand experiences that are not always heard. And delves deeper into the causes of the battle—the who and the why. For that, half of this book is a must read.
    • 4/5
      Growing up American in the shadow of World War II, I like many others saw the war in terms of black and white, good and evil. “Bringing Mulligan Home: The Other Side of the Good War”, by Dale Maharidge, shows that viewpoint is too simplistic. The reality of war is so much more complicated. What began as a journey to understand his father led Maharidge to learn more of the Marines with whom his father served. Maharidge, in seeking to understand his father, helps us to see the war through the eyes of the survivors – the Marines, their families, and Okinawans. Nations wage war, but for the combatants and civilians caught in the middle, it is always personal and comes at a price. Maharidge’s book honors the sacrifice of the Marines who served and civilians caught in the middle. “Bringing Mulligan Home” is an interesting book I recommend to anyone interested in personal accounts of the war and its aftermath.
    • 4/5
      Bringing Mulligan Home:The Other Side of the Good War is Dale Maharidge's personal journey to understand his father and the impact World War II had on him and subsequently his family. It is a well written, thought provoking book, detailing the personal side of war as told by veterans. It was not an easy book to read nor an enjoyable book to read. I had to put it down and walk away from it for days at a time. However, my experience should not discourage others from reading it. I had an uncle who was assigned to the Pacific Theater and he returned an angry, shell shocked man. Maharidge, through his book, helped me understand what had probably happened to my uncle. What also struck me was that many of the people interviewed agreed that war is horrible and really should not occur. This book is a must read for those who struggle and have struggled to understand loved ones who were and are deeply affected by war.I liked the ending and how Maharidge brought some closure to this part of his life.
    • 2/5
      This is the story of one family and how they were impacted by WW2, and the stories of Marine veterans who fought on Guam and Okinawa. If you aren't familiar with the story of the battle for Okinawa, or of the horrible facts of the war in the Pacific in general, this book will be revealing. However, if you are familiar with the history of WW2 and the brutalness of the war, you won't learn much. The individual stories are interesting, though told in a brief, and choppy fashion. I can't tell if the author is just trying ot get out the story of the suffering of the troops in the war, making a general anti-war statement, or trying to rewrite history. At times it seems like he blames the government or generals for what happened to his family, but what you read in this book doesn't back it up. This is essentially a very personal story, one that maybe should have stayed personal. It was inconsistent and inaccurate, so I can't rate it very highly. There are many other better books on the personal history of the war that are much better.
    • 2/5
      This story came up short for me. I think sometimes there are stories so personal it is the most important thing in the world. The hard thing is that other people may not think so. There is a lot of love and honor put into this story for Maharidge's father and the men who fought with him in World War II. However, the story is all over the place never really coming back to his original point in a strong way. A father who didn't talk about the war and his son trying to search for him and make a connection after his death. It has a great premise and good work is done, but the story isn't cohesive and has poor execution.
    • 5/5
      This is a very touching, moving book about how no one escapes from the front lines unchanged. They bring these changes home and they ring down through the generations. Dale tells his father's story in a very honest way, he does not try to make him better or worse than he was. This is the story of what you bring home from war -- no one escapes unchanged, some more than others. Dale's father, Steve, fought in WWII and brought home both internal and external scars. In the interviews it seemed to me that war on the front lines intensified the characteristics of the soldiers; it made the survivors more of what they would have been anyway. It intensified Steve's anger, sharpened it, brought it closer to the surface. But no one came home unchanged and this affected everyone who came in contact with them. The affects of war go into the next generations....
    • 3/5
      The death of Dale Maharidge’s father, Steve Maharidge, had a profound impact, after more than 60 years Dale wanted to know more about his father’s experience in WWII. Who was Herman Walter Mulligan? Why was he so important to his father that he had kept his picture close to him after all these years? Bringing Mulligan Home is not really about Mulligan as it is about the experiences of the men in his father’s company. Dale Maharidge seeks out those still alive in order to find out more about his father and Mulligan; through the interviews he discovers that war is Hell. His research also leads him to Japan, to find out why his father kept a Japanese passport and business card all these years as well. It is broken down into four parts: His father’s life, historical background, interviews with 12 marines, and Dale’s experience in Japan. Honestly, it took me time to get into this book; it jumps ahead a bit without explanation but then settles into personal interviews. Dale’s perspective of the war is unfavorable from the outset. Yes, atrocities were committed on both sides and for most of the book it appeared as he forgot that. He does not appear to paint a flattering picture of his father even before the war, yet he seems to overlook that as well. The part I was most interested in was ‘What happened to Mulligan’ and was not satisfied with an answer; the book is named for him after all. I am glad I read the book but it doesn’t read as a ‘cohesive’ retelling of his father’s or of Mulligan’s war experience.
    • 4/5
      An interesting book. The author interviewed numerous survivors of his father's Marine company in an effort to do two things; find the origin of his father's anger, and to discover what happened to Mulligan, whose body was never recovered. In the course of his interviews, he found that many of the former Marines at Okinawa suffered from PTSD long after the event. The author came to the realization that his father suffered the same malady. The anger of the father also seems to have touched on the son. When the author traveled to Okinawa, he found that Mulligan, who appeared in the only picture the elder Maharidge kept, had blown up a Japanese ammunition dump. This event not only killed him, but led many, including the author's father, to suffer from blast concussions. He also discovered that PTSD reached into the Okinawans as well. His journeys gave him greater awareness of the effects of PTSD on the Marines, the residents of Okinawa, and himself.
    • 5/5
      This is one man's journey to honor his father's memory and that of his father's friend lost on a battlefield in the Pacific. At the same time the author is attempting to find the reasons for his father's periods of rage and his inability to communicate with his family, what he had witnessed on those war ravaged islands. If you know a veteran who has returned from war, any war, and refuses to talk about his experiences, you should read this book. If you have any illusions about war being good, or honorable, or just, you should read this book. If you think of the cost of war only in terms of dollars and cents or material items, you should read this book. If you think war ends when when a piece of paper is signed or the last bullets stop whizzing over the battlefield, you should read this book. The cost of war is not only measured by the casualties lying on the battlefield. It continues to be measured by countless veterans and their families who must deal with the trauma and destruction forced upon their lives by senseless and often unimaginable violence. Be prepared for some raw language and descriptions of war in it's stark and brutal reality. The descriptions of the violence, by men who stood toe to toe with the horror of it, is not a pretty thing. The necessity for these men to relieve themselves of the burdens they have carried from the battlefields is real and needed. This is a deeply moving book that cuts to the bone.
    • 4/5
      Raw, honest and gut-wrenching, this book should be required reading for every person considering joining the armed forces. After the passing of his father, a WWII-Pacific theater veteran who rarely spoke of his military service, Maharidge seeks to find out more about a man posing in a photo with his dad (Mulligan) who was KIA. What he discovers in his many conversations with other veterans who served along with his dad and Mulligan in the Pacific is that war has a ripple affect not only on the soldier but on families and generations to come. Maharidge's own father was prone to fits of anger and there is no doubt that these were direct affects of combat. That in turn certainly effected the author and his upbringing. There were exceptions of course, but the majority of the men he interviewed had there life and their families lives altered forever. To say that war is hell may sound cliched but that is exactly what is. Even in so called good wars or necessary wars men in charge make bad decisions and people below them suffer for it. War changes people sometimes irrevocably, and it's not always parades and patriotism. Fear and evil often walk hand in hand and the stories that these men tell will stay with you long after you finish the book.
    • 4/5
      An incredibly moving account of the men of Love Company, Marines that fought in Guam and Okinawa during World War II. My father was a WW II Marine and also saw duty in Okinawa and in Tsingtao China, which is mentioned in the book. Reading the interviews with the surviving men I thought of my father over and over. He never talked about the war, which didn't surprise me. But I didn't realize how really brutal it was until I read the first person accounts these men provided. They could have been my father. The author is from a Slavic steel producing region of Ohio; I am from the same in southwestern Pennsylvania. Our fathers were blue collar working men. Our mothers raised the children. The life he described was different in the sense that my father wasn't the angry troubled man his father was, but there were enough similiarities that I was compelled to read. The cover photograph was the impetus for writing this book and that was a haunting reminder of the young men that lived that war.This book could be read on many levels. If you are interested in the war, the tactics, the battles etc. this book would provide that information. If you are interested in the men and the personal toll taken on their lives and the lives of their families, this book would also provide that information. A very touching, well researched book that will tear at your heart.
    • 5/5
      This book may not make you feel good but it will make you feel. It will make you feel the love felt for a father; love expressed in the unrelenting quest to exorcise the demons that possessed his father’s mind since the day on Okinawa when a friend, Mulligan, died. It will make you feel the fear, the anguish, the despair and helplessness of young marines fighting for their lives and blindly following the orders of leaders not fully qualified to lead. And the guilt or psychotic lack of remorse for deeds committed because there seemed to be no alternatives. You will almost hear the tapping as the enemy soldiers arm their grenades and the twang as an empty clip is ejected from an M-1 Garand. It will make you feel the emotions of old men who were once the young marines stripped of innocence on far off Pacific islands. You will almost feel their memories emerge after being dulled by alcohol, dementia, obsessive emersion in career or, all too seldom, the over-riding love of family. It will make you feel the brutality of war and make you a believer in the adage that the only good war is one that is over.Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Dale Maharidge has written a masterpiece. With his pen, he has pierced a festering wound and released a torrent of puss and blood and maggots. In the first part, he recounts memories of his father, memories of explosive rage mixed with camping trips, the rumble of metal working tools and pleasant times. Always in the background was a picture tacked on the wall of his father’s shop of he and a marine friend taken long ago. With the help of clues hidden away in a box of souvenirs and the angry and uncontrolled outbursts of his father, the author pieced together the identity of the other man, Mulligan, and the origin of his father’s intemperance—a feeling of guilt about Mulligan’s death. After his father died, Maharidge resolved to uncover the facts of Mulligan’s death and bring closure in the form of repentance or atonement—absolution—for his father. He searched for and found almost thirty survivors who had served in his father’s company of marines fighting on Okinawa. (Ironically, it was “L” Company, or in the parlance of the times: “Love” Company.) The stories of twelve are recounted in the second part. The collective image that is evoked is of a band of boys marching into a grove of tangled vines and emerging on the far side as haggard shadows, more zombie-like than flesh and blood warriors. Maharidge pieces together the memories of the twelve of that day when the hand grenade was thrown into a burial tomb believed to shelter Japanese soldiers but held a cache of high explosives instead. (The men were warned beforehand that some tombs were used for that purpose.) The ensuing explosion resulted in the death of Mulligan and caused the Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) that defined his father’s life forever after. No conclusive evidence pointed to the person who threw the grenade but the author, perhaps wishfully, concludes that it was Mulligan himself. The body of Mulligan was not recovered but, if it was, the burial site not recorded. Mulligan dissolves into Everyman and symbolizes all that we wish to forget.In the last part, the author recounts his journey to Okinawa to walk in the steps of his father and the men of Love Company. He finds a measure of peace in the graciousness of the people there and is able to find the place where Mulligan died. He leaves a memorial in the custom of the Okinawans to appease the spirits yet restless there.If you liked the probing of consciousness in Joyce’s “Portrait of an Artist”, Steinbeck’s recounting of family dynamics, the pathos but not the humor of Willie and Joe, the sensitivity and subject matter of Ernie Pyle and Bernard Fall, you will like this book.
    • 4/5
      This was a fascinating memoir about Dale Maharidge's research into his father's WWII service in the South Pacific and how it impacted his father's life and Dale's life after the war. He interviewed many surviving members of Love Company (his dad's) and presented their stories as well. In addition, Dale ventured to Okinawa to see the sites made intimate by his research and met surviving Okinawans. He tells their stories as well. The prose is engaging and the topics raw and truthful.