Doc Erickson remembered as many things to many people

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By Jennifer Rice
Managing Editor
Norris “Doc” Erickson, 68, Commander of the Aurora American Legion Post 84 and owner and operator of Erickson Chiropractic Center in Aurora, died Aug. 20 in his home surrounded by family after a courageous battle with lung cancer.
He was so many things to so many different people. He was a leader for veterans. He worked hard in 1989 to bring a half-size replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall to Aurora and was determined to not let Aurora’s Independence Day parade fall by the wayside when the city put it on the chopping block in early 2011 due to economic restraints. As commander of the American Legion, Doc stepped up and took the reigns, making sure the parade festivities went on as expected.
In the beginning, when I first went for treatment from Doc, I never knew his real name. His wife called him Doc, other patients in his chiropractic office called him Doc, so it’s just what I called him. He called me Kid, a name I despise, but one I allowed because Doc was special.
As my role of patient transitioned into friend, I discovered Doc’s real name was Norris – no wonder people called him Doc. As a habitual talker, my 15 minute appointments could easily extend past an hour. Doc was never short on conversation and I enjoyed that. When Doc attended to another patient, I’d strike up a conversation with his wife Sally.
I’d tell him time and time again that when I came to his office, I’d walk away knowing something new. Doc was so knowledgeable. What separated Doc from other knowledgeable people was he never let me feel belittled or ashamed over an issue I wasn’t educated about. He’d simply go back to his office, bring out a book or a Xeroxed article and explain the whole mystery to me.
I also remember his sense of humor, a mixture of dry and mundane. At times his jokes were so bad I intentionally give him the “pity laugh,” which I explained was simply a courtesy laugh for the effort put forth to repeat the bad joke. We had a few inside jokes that made some situations difficult to maintain a straight face when we were together.
Yes, Doc was many things to many people. For me, he was my teacher, my healer and most importantly, my friend. His character was beyond reproach and his dedication to the practice of chiropractic care flowed deep.
Three weeks ago, I had an incident with my lower back, the pain of which confined me to a wheelchair for a weekend. Though I knew he was not active with his chiropractic office due to chemo treatments, I Facebooked Doc for his suggestions and informed him I was awaiting MRI results. Through his own pain and discomfort, he continued to reassured me things would get better, give it time and use ice until I could see another chiropractor.
The last Facebook message I got from him, he was inquiring about my MRI and what the results showed. He never made any mention of his own pain. Until the end, he was still devoted to his patients. I last spoke to Doc Aug. 17, the day I heard he was placed in Hospice care. He was not expected to make it through the weekend. His wife graciously put me on speaker phone and I spoke with Doc one last time. He said he’d been getting calls from all over the world, checking on how he was doing. His concern for me was obvious, as he wanted to know how my back was doing. He cut the call short, saying he was tired, but not before he said, “It’s been a hell of a ride, kid.”

Jennifer Rice’s e-mail address is Jen@foxvalleylabornews.com.

Bob Mitchler remembered as a war veteran and friend

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Bob Mitchler
Jennifer Rice photo
Sen. Bob Mitchler walks the yard of his rural Oswego home. For years, his front yard has been home to an enormous American flag strung between two trees.

By Jennifer Rice
Managing Editor
Bob Mitchler was a people person. He loved working with people, veteran organizations and schools. He truly was a Renaissance man.
I first crossed paths with Mitchler in 2010. I was to spend a few hours with the then 89-year-old veteran, summing up his life for a feature story. In the end, I spent two days with him — an excessive amount of time for a story.
On the first day, we talked for so many hours, the sun had disappeared, making the possibility of outdoor pictures impossible. I would have to come back.
“Why don’t you come back tomorrow?” Mitchler asked. “At lunchtime. We’ll have lunch together.” It was more of a statement, than a question.
And that’s what I did. After lunch, we moved outside. A few days prior, a storm had blown through Kendall County, snapping several tree branches and scattering dead twigs and limbs in his yard.
Before I know it, I’m riding shotgun in his John Deere Gator 6×4 vehicle, zipping all over his yard, Mitchler talking my ear off. He suddenly hits the brakes and points to a pile of twigs. “Why don’t you throw them in the back?” I do as he says.
A few feet further, he stops again. “Why don’t you throw them in the back?” Again, I do as he says. Suddenly, I begin to see a pattern. I notice several piles of twigs. I realize I was here to help him pick them up. And I didn’t mind at all.
Listening to Mitchler speak was a reporter’s dream — he never stopped talking. He was so knowledgably, on everything. He had the best stories. He recounted his time running for state senator, how he loved to campaign — “nice, clean campaigning, no mudslinging. We campaigned on issues and platforms,” he remembered. Something they don’t do today, he remarked.
“Never get into a squirting contest with a skunk,” he told me, shaking his finger to the air for emphasis. “If you’re a public figure, you never get into an argument — even if you’re opponent’s wrong. Because the skunk will win, and you’ve got that splattered all over you, and you’ve got to live with it,” he said.
He had a political career he was very proud of. Over the years, he said politics changed. The General Assembly changed. “Today, I couldn’t stand doing what they’re doing down in Springfield.”
He served in both WWII and Korea. He was 21 when he enlisted in the Navy, just before Pearl Harbor. In September 1950, three months after marrying his wife Helen, he was called to active duty when North Korea invaded South Korea.
For Veterans Day, he’d talk to students. He wanted to stress to them to talk to their grandparents; ask them about their role in the war. Just thinking about the question made Mitchler get tears in his eyes. “I’d tell those young students, ‘Around the holidays, take your grandfather aside. Ask him, ‘Will you tell me what you did in the military?’”
He told me several times he’s really had a wonderful life, a good life. That summer and the next, he asked me to canoe alongside him during the Mid-American Canoe Race on the Fox River. That first summer, I tipped my canoe — twice. Before I knew it, Mitchler was long gone.
After the race, he held a 90th birthday party for himself at his house. That’s where I finally met up with him; smelling like river water, dirty with dried mud on my legs and a few bruises to boot.
“Well,” he said. “Maybe when you’re 90, you’ll be able to catch up to me,” which drew laughs from most of the partygoers.
I’m glad I had the honor and experience to know Mitchler. To know him is to love him. I consider him a friend and I’m sad that he’s gone. To the sea his spirit is now.

Jennifer Rice’s e-mail address is Jen@foxvalleylabornews.com.

Death to self-checkouts, back to customer service

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By Jennifer Rice
Managing Editor
As a teenager during the summer, landing a job at McDonald’s was as guaranteed as getting acne. Only now, jobs at McDonald’s are going to become a little scarcer, as it begins to intergrade touch screen kiosks to take your order.
We already see these kiosks at the gas pump and self-checkout lanes at grocery stores and you can have a peek at these guys to know more about setting up the best shop in town. They are touted as ‘convenient,’ and ‘time-saving,’ but what they really do is replace employees — and now they are coming to the Golden Arches as a way to allow you to get food faster. I thought McDonald’s already was ‘fast food.’ I recently walked into a McDonald’s in Bolingbrook and saw these kiosks in action.
I watched as a family of four tried to place their order. The children faired better than their parents. The children maneuvered between the screens in a frenzy, adding extra items to their burgers and deleting shakes they weren’t supposed to order.
On the other hand, the parents gathered around another kiosks looking more like the monkeys in “2001 Space Odyssey” who were seeing the giant, black monolith for the first time. They gingerly touched various screen. When nothing happened, they looked at each other for support, shrugged their shoulders, and then returned to tapping the touch screen.
It was the father that first gave up. He grabbed his wife’s hand and proceeded to the counter to have a real employee take their order.
As I approached the kiosks, their greasy, fingerprinted touch screens were enough to put me off. Ewwww. They don’t accept cash and I only wanted some apple pies. Not wanting to charge $1.10, I also headed to the counter.
From a customer’s standpoint, I guess placing your own McDonald’s order could eventually be faster than waiting in line, but only after you practiced. In the end, these kiosks are job eliminators — they’re anti-labor. With unemployment rates staying steadily high, this is not something we want to embrace.
And when did ‘service’ go away from customer service? Most older people I know stay clear from the self-checkout lanes at supermarkets and would walk out in frustration after trying to use the McDonald’s kiosks. Having someone take your order at a fast food place and scan your food at the grocery store is a service you expect — not be expected to do. You wouldn’t want to be handed a toilet brush as you entered a restaurant bathroom, so don’t expect to checkout your own groceries at the supermarket.
While standing in ‘real’ checkout lines at the grocery store, I see customers using the self-checkouts, and in the end, they inevitably need assistance from a clerk. Management doesn’t understand that using self-checkout lanes to save money and increase profits is coming at the expense of losing the basic service that comes with running a business — customer service.You can navigate to this website for further information.
Last month, Albertsons LLC announced it will eliminate self-checkout lanes by the end of August. It wants to focus more on customer service. They said only a small number of customers were using the self-checkouts. And no matter what type of business you have, it’s important to accept credit card payments from your customers. Stay ahead of the competition with the tailored services offered by Elavon merchant services.
My first job was working for a grocery store, and I was a cashier. I loved that job and I loved my customers. I was so well liked by customers; families specifically came and waited in my line so I could scan their groceries. That time was our time to catch up and talk, to find out what had happened during the week.
In the six years I was a cashier, I watch kids grow up, graduate high school or college. I saw relationships bloom, marriages end and people die. I attended my customer’s graduation parties, funerals and birthday parties and loved the looks I got when I introduced myself as “the girl that checkouts their groceries.”
But that’s what customer service is all about. Making what could be an otherwise mundane, sometimes stressful shopping experience, into a trip customers look forward to.

Jennifer Rice’s e-mail address is Jen@foxvalleylabornews.com.

A B-29 plane, 39 missions and one great story

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Paul Linden
Pat Barcas photo
Aurora’s Paul Linden stands in front of his Purple Heart and Distinguished Flying Cross, as well as several keepsake photographs of his time spent in the Pacific Theater.

By Pat Barcas
Staff Writer
Paul Linden of Aurora closes his eyes and cocks his head, remembering back nearly 70 years. You get the feeling his mind is taking a trip back in time, remembering small details and the exact time they happened. Clearly, the time he spent in the 1940s made an impression on him, but this time period doesn’t define him. As a member of the greatest generation, he defines this time period.
He leads an extraordinary existence, but he doesn’t think so. At age 87, he spends his time making furniture and wooden trinkets in his basement woodworking shop for his grandchildren. He repairs and restores antique glass lamps. And he gives tours on Saturdays at the Air Classics Museum of Aviation in Sugar Grove, as well as speaking to local schools and veterans groups.
Linden flew 39 missions during World War II as a radar operator on a B-29 Superfortress heavy bomber. He served in the United States Army Air Force (this was before the Air Force was a standalone group) in the 73rd bomb wing from 1942 to 1945, operating out of the island of Saipan in the Mariana Islands. On his last bombing mission to Japan, his B-29 lost two engines on takeoff and had to make an emergency landing on the island of Iwo Jima, which was under American control at that time.
Here he tells his story.
Linden enlisted in the service at age 19. His strategy was to pick the Army Air Force before he was drafted and the military chose his path for him. He trained in Texas, Chicago, Florida, Kansas, and California as a radar operator and navigator before flying to the South Pacific to fly in the legendary Superfortress.
The B-29 was a brand new plane that was just being developed and delivered to the military from Boeing. Linden remembers first seeing them flying over the airbase in Kansas.
“We didn’t know this plane was being built, so it was a big shocker to see six new ones coming into the airfield. It took your breath away, it was all shiny metal, it looked beautiful. The plane was huge,” he said.
A successor to the B-17 Flying Fortress, the B-29 was state of the art at the time. It had a pressurized cabin, remote controlled gun turrets, and a ceiling of 40,000 feet flying at 350 mph.
“It was comfortable in there, you could wear a T-shirt if you wanted to,” said Linden.
From Kansas he went to Mather Field in Sacramento, where his crew got their own B-29. They named her “Miss Behavin’” and had her nose painted with a pretty lady.
“It cost us $25 and a bottle of booze. The guy did a nice job,” said Linden with a chuckle.
After three days at Mather Field, the crew took off with only a westerly compass heading over the Pacific Ocean. One hour into the flight, they were allowed to open their secret packet that contained exactly where they were going: the island of Saipan in the Mariana Islands.
“My reaction was, ‘where the hell are the Mariana Islands?’ We didn’t know where that was, but we found out,” he said.
They stopped in Hawaii, then made their way to Saipan. They were told they would fly 25 missions.
“Of course that went out the window right away,” said Linden. They eventually flew 39 missions, including strategic bombing missions over the Mitsubishi engine plant in Japan, 11 night firebombing missions over Tokyo, one weather reconnaissance mission, and two 16-hour search and rescue missions over the open ocean.
Before they dropped napalm bombs in the firebombing missions, the crew would throw out leaflets telling people to get out of the cities.
“They didn’t listen. And besides, they had nowhere to go,” he said.
Linden said it was estimated that between 50,000 to 75,000 people were killed after each firebombing mission.
“I saw 17 square miles of Tokyo on fire. It was unbelievable. There was fire as far as you could see,” said Linden.
He said these images weighed on his conscience even after the war, but he was just doing his job.
“Sometimes it’s very difficult for me to say that we killed so many Japanese people in our bombings. If I had a choice, I wouldn’t do it, but I didn’t have a choice. We just did our jobs,” he said. “For a long time, I held back about talking about the war, until I figured out, this is what I should do. People want to hear about it.”
During the last six missions he flew, American P-51 Mustang fighter planes escorted their bomber.
“The enemy fighters didn’t get close to us on those missions,” said Linden.
On previous missions, however, their plane was shot up by enemy fighters and anti-aircraft artillery. Four crewmembers, including Linden, received Purple Hearts for being wounded in the plane by flak.
“They just filled the bullet holes in the plane with an aluminum patch, and then sent us on our next mission,” he said.
Other planes weren’t so lucky, being rammed by kamikaze pilots, they were lost in the ocean forever after attempting to ditch.
The thing that Linden remembers most is landing at Iwo Jima, partly because it was his last mission and they landed safe, and partly because of the legendary status of the island.
“The decision to take Iwo Jima was very controversial, but it worked out. It was used as a refueling stop for the bombers. In July of 1945, 864 B-29s landed at Iwo,” he said.
After his mission was complete, he shipped off to the United States, eventually arriving in Chicago by train. He married his girlfriend, Jane Roe, on September 15, 1945, two weeks after arriving home.
They were set up on a blind date before the war. Linden got to take her out because he had a car, a 1939 Pontiac. Linden and Jane were married 64 years before she passed away two years ago.
“I’m happy I had the chance to do what I did, to participate in what Tom Brokaw calls ‘The Greatest Generation’ and do what was asked of me. When the war was over, I had a chance to sit back and think. It was an experience you’re never going to forget,” said Linden. “It made a lot of veterans have better lives, and for some it made their lives worse. That’s war, you take the consequences. It was a trying time for this country, and I just joined the millions of others in serving.”

Pat Barcas’ e-mail address is pat@foxvalleylabornews.com.

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Triathalons = wimpy: Tough Mudders are for beasts

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By Jennifer Rice
Managing Editor
I don’t sport a barbed wire tattoo or eat raw eggs for breakfast, but this weekend, I’ll pretend I do.


I’m competing, along with my fiance, in the Tough Mudder, a 10-mile obstacle course set on a ski hill in Wisconsin, known as the toughest event on the planet. You start at the bottom of the ski hill, work your way up, across, then down. It’s an extreme endurance race that will push every participant to the limit, you’re race number is written on your forehead in black Magic Marker.


There are 20-25 obstacles that are either natural or man-made. There is smoke and flames, open water, high-voltage wires hanging over a puddle of water, constrictor tubes to crawl through, monkey bars and 12-foot high walls to scale. And mud. Lots and lots of mud.


I first heard of the Tough Mudder this spring and though it may sound like a crappy way to spend a Saturday, we can’t wait to compete. To appreciate the full effect of the Tough Mudder, we’re dressing up in costumes — as Native Americans. For those looking to add a bit of flair to their costumes for other events, Sexy Halloween Costumes can also be a fun and bold choice.


There is no major award at the end. Instead, you get free beer and a neon-orange sweatband, straight out of an Olivia Newton-John “Physical” video. It’s mandatory to sport the sweatband at work on Monday. You know, to let every one know what a Tough Mudder you really are.
The event is not timed. Instead, it’s a course all about teamwork, true grit and mental determination. On most obstacles, you need help from fellow mudders.


What I also like about the Tough Mudder is it’s partnered with the Wounded Warrior Project, which helps wounded servicemen and women. To date, Tough Mudder participants have raised more than $1.3 million.
Wounded vets also compete in this race. Pictures on Tough Mudder’s website show vets with missing legs or arms, still competing, still giving it all they have and not giving up. They may be physically challenged but they embody the Tough Mudder spirit, which is: To understand this is not a race but a challenge; to put teamwork and camaraderie before my course time; do not whine – kids whine; help my fellow Mudders complete the course and overcome all fears.


I’ve been glued to the TV set for the Discovery Channel’s “Surviving the Cut,” which takes viewers into the intense world of military elite forces training. This show has become part of my CliffsNotes training for the Tough Mudder. For me, this is how I envision the Tough Mudder will be. Deep down, I know they are nothing alike. Elite military training is far more extreme than a Tough Mudder, but it’s all I’ve got.


Our Tough Mudder training consists of three days a week at boot camp, running and weight training. At a local grade school I found monkey bars to practice on. I got across 12 of them before I felt a blister break on my left palm. I opted for no gloves because the ones I was going to use kept slipping. For the past week I’ve been trying to get my hand to heal.
I’ve competed in other mud runs, some with obstacles, some without. I’ve run through mud at night, completed a marathon, played five games of softball in a row, did some archery sessions with a new arrow quiver, and walked 60 miles in three days. 


But I don’t think anything will prepare me for what awaits me this weekend at the Tough Mudder. But that’s what I’m looking forward to, and I can’t wait.

Jennifer Rice’s e-mail address is Jen@foxvalleylabornews.com.