Webster had always been fascinated by sharks. Barbara writes, "The shark, for him, became a symbol of everything that is mysterious and fierce about the sea. He began gathering material for a book of his own. His research went on for years. He studied sharks first-hand, underwater, swimming among them; and caught many, fishing with a handline from his 11-foot sailing dinghy which he had named Tusitala, which means Teller of Tales.' " He wrote the book and submitted it twenty-nine times, but could not convince a publisher that anyone wanted to read about sharks.
On September 9, 1961, Webster set sail from Santa Monica with squid bait, a heavy line, and hook for shark fishing. He never came back. A search the next day discovered the Tusitala awash 5 miles offshore. One oar and the tiller were missing. His body was never found.
Barbara was able to get his book on sharks published (Myth and Maneater, W. W. Norton &. Co., 1963). There was a British edition and a paperback edition in Australia. When Jaws was released in 1975, Dell issued a mass-market paperback.
Three of the sergeants became rich men. John Martin attended Ohio State University on his G.I. Bill money, then returned to his railroad job. He became a supervisor, had a car, secretary, and pension building and was making money on the side by building houses on speculation. In 1961 he gave it all up and, over the intense protest of his wife and children, then in high school, moved to Phoenix, Arizona, and started building homes. He had $8,000 in total capital, and everyone thought he was crazy. At the end of the first year, he paid more in taxes than he had ever made working for the railroad. Soon he was building apartment complexes and nursing homes. He expanded his activities into Texas and Montana. In 1970 he bought a cattle ranch in the mountains of western Montana. Today he is a multimillionaire. He still likes to take risks, although he no longer jumps out of airplanes. He has resisted tempting offers to sell his business; the president of Martin Construction today is John Martin, while his wife Patricia is the vice president and treasurer. They are also the directors and sole stockholders.
Don Moone used his G.I. Bill benefits to attend Grinnell College, then went into advertising. He rose rapidly. In 1973 he became the president of Ketchum, MacLeod & Grove, Inc., a major New York City advertising firm. Four years later, at age fifty-one, he retired, built a home in Florida, and has lived there since in some splendor.
Carwood Lipton majored in engineering at Marshall College (now University), while his wife Jo Anne was bearing three sons. Lipton went to work for Owens-Illinois, Inc. He rose steadily in the firm; in 1971 he moved to London as director of manufacturing for eight glass factories in England and Scotland. In 1974 he went to Geneva, Switzerland, in charge of operations in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. In 1975 Jo Anne died of a heart attack. The next year, Lipton married a widow, Marie Hope Ma-honey, whose husband had been a close friend of Lipton's, just as Marie was a close friend of Jo Anne's. At the request of the CEO of United Glass, Ltd.; he wrote a pamphlet, Leading People. It was a subject he knew well.
Lipton retired in 1983. He writes, "Currently living in comfortable retirement in Southern Pines, North Carolina, where I had decided when we were training in Camp Mackall that I would someday live. My hobbies are much travel throughout the world, golf, model engineering, woodworking, and reading."
Lewis Nixon had always been rich. He took over his father's far-flung industrial and agricultural empire and ran it while traveling around the world. His chief hobby today is reading.
Lt. Buck Compton stayed in public service jobs, so he became more famous than rich. He was a detective in the Los Angeles Police Department from 1947 to 1951, then spent twenty years as a prosecutor for the district attorney's office, eventually becoming chief deputy district attorney. In 1968 he directed the investigation of Sirhan Sirhan, then conducted the prosecution. In 1970 Gov. Ronald Reagan appointed him to the California Court of Appeals as an associate justice. He and his wife Donna have two daughters, one granddaughter. His reputation is that he remains the best athlete in the company; he is said to play a mean game of golf.
Sgt. Mike Ranney took a journalism degree at the University of North Dakota, then had a successful career as a reporter, newspaper editor, and public relations consultant. He and his wife Julia had five daughters, seven grandsons. In 1980 he began publishing what he called "The Spasmodic Newsletter of Easy Company." Some samples:
March 1982: "The Pennsylvania contingent got together at Dick Winters' place for a surprise party for Harry Welsh. Fenstermaker, Strohl, Guarnere, Guth had a great time."
1980. "The reunion this summer in Nashville is shaping up as one of the great turnouts in E Company history. A partial list of the attendees—Dick Winters, Harry Welsh, Moose Heyliger and Buck Compton from the officers; Chuck Grant, Paul Rogers, Walter Scott Gordon; Tipper, Guarnere, Rader, Heffron, Ranney, Johnny Martin, George Luz, Perconte, Jim Alley, and no less a personage than Burr Smith."
1983. "Don Moone retired from the advertising business and now lives it up down in Florida. He and Gordon and Carwood Lipton had a reunion in New Orleans."
With only a couple of exceptions, these men had no business or professional connections. None lived in the same town, few in the same state (except Pennsylvania). Yet they stayed in touch. In January 1981, Moone wrote Winters to thank him for a Christmas present and to fill him in: "It was great news that Talbert was finally located. I called him immediately and after an exchange of insults, we talked. I've always been fond of Tab. He took great care of me in the old days. On New Year's Day at 6:00 A.M. my time, Tab called to wish me a good new year. He was bombed but coherent. He admits that he had a bottle problem, as we suspected, but was 'on the wagon' except for special occasions. Guess New Year's Eve was one of those 'specials.'
"Don Malarkey called me at 3:00 A.M. on New Years Eve morning and he too was well on his way."
Ranney retired to write poetry and his memoirs, but in September 1988 he died before he could get started.
Beyond Heyliger, Martin, Guarnere, and Toye, a number of men went into some form of building, construction, or making things. Capt. Clarence Hester became a roofing contractor in Sacramento, California. Sgt. Robert "Popeye" Wynn became a structural ironworker on buildings and bridges. Pvt. John Plesha worked for the Washington State Highway Department. Sgt. Denver "Bull" Randleman was a superintendent for a heavy construction contractor in Louisiana. Sgt. Walter Hendrix spent forty-five years in the polishing trade, working with granite. Sgt. Burton "Pat" Christenson spent thirty-eight years with the Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company, installing new lines, eventually becoming a supervisor and teacher. Sgt. Jim Alley was a carpenter, then worked on high-dam construction on the Washington State-Canada border. Eventually he had his own construction company in California.
Beyond Leo Boyle, a number of men went into teaching. After a twenty-year hitch in the Army, Sgt. Leo Hashey taught water safety for the Portland, Oregon, Red Cross. He became director of health and safety education. Sgt. Robert Rader taught the handicapped at Paso Robles High School in California for more than thirty years. Capt. Harry Welsh got married immediately upon his return to the States, with his bride Kitty Grogan wearing a dress made from the reserve chute he wore on D-Day and carried with him through the rest of the war. He went to college, taught, earned an M.A., and became a high school counselor, then administrator. Sgt. Forrest Guth taught printing, wood shop, electricity, electronics, and managed the sound and staging of school productions in Norfolk, Virginia, and Wilmington, Delaware, until his retirement. Pvt. Ralph Stafford writes: "Graduated in 1953 and started teaching the 6th grade in Fort Worth. Taught for three years and was elementary principal for 27 years, and dearly loved it. It was truly my calling. I was elected president of District V, Texas State Teachers Association (Dallas-Ft. Worth, 20,000 members).