LOCAL MEN IN ARMED SERVICE.
With a First Tactical Air Force B-26 Marauder Group, Harvey G. Lias, son of Mr. and Mrs. Eugene Lias, of Akron, Iowa, has been promoted to the rank of technical sergeant, it was announced recently from headquarters of Major Gen. John K. Cannon’s First Tactical Air Force. Sergeant Lias is an aerial engineer-gunner with a veteran B-26 Marauder group in the Mediterranean area. He was recently awarded the Air Medal with an Oak Leaf Cluster.
He enlisted in the Army in September 1942, and received his technical training at Gulfport, Miss., the Glenn L. Martin factory in Baltimore, Md., and Fort Meyers, Florida.
Source: Akron Register-Tribune, August 31, 1944
T/Sergt. Harvey G. Lias, who returned to this country December 15 from thirteen months of overseas service in the 12th U. S. Air Force in the Italian theatre of operations, arrived in Akron Tuesday evening to visit his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Eugene H. Lias, and other relatives and friends. T/Sergt. Lias is looking fine after his months of strenuous service in the European war area, with 296 hours of operational combat flying; but he is mighty glad to get back among home folks again. After his leave here, he will probably be transferred to a west coast location.
Source: LeMars Semi-Weekly Sentinel, December 26, 1944
***Further Research:
Harvey George Lias was born Nov. 26, 1923 to Eugene and Florence Bernice Rhodes Lias. He died Sept. 20, 2005 and is buried in Riverside Cemetery, Akron, IA.
Source: ancestry.com
