This “Story Under a Stone” will feature a person not buried in the Sheldon cemetery, but since he grew up and went to school in Sheldon and ran a hardware business in town, we’ll include him, A. J. “Manny” Spiekermeier. A brother to Paul and Tom, many of us knew him as the town cop who took his job seriously and made us behave whenever he drove around in his red station wagon.
A letter he wrote to a friend in Sheldon appeared in the Sheldon Progress on December 25, 1942 that told of his activity while in Oregon titled “Life at a Munitions Dump.” On this date the U.S. military had begun stocking war materials in earnest to support our fighting forces. His obituary states he had joined the navy in January that year and been assigned there for a time. He went on to serve on submarines patrolling near the Japanese coast, including the USS Sailfin. This might have been a misprint because the Sailfin had been damaged before the war, but one called the Sailfish was in active combat receiving credit for sinking or damaging thirteen Japanese ships. Perhaps a family member can bring light to this.
American submarines played a pivotal role in the Pacific by targeting Japanese merchant shipping and warships, dramatically crippling Japan's supply lines. American submarine warfare proved decisive in undermining Japanese naval capacity and commerce.
While any service member experiencing combat doesn’t realize it at the time, he or she is living and leaving a story for us to wonder at years later. In later years Manny and his family relocated to Belle Fourche, SD, worked as a maintenance engineer in a hospital, and died in 1996. Burial took place in the Pine Slope Cemetery, Belle Fourche, SD.
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