FORWARD

 

World-Herald photographer Earle "Buddy" Bunker captured the family reunion on July 15, 1943, after Lt. Col. Robert Moore stepped off the train in Villisca, greeted by his 6-year-old daughter, Nancy; his wife, Dorothy; and his 2-year-old nephew, Michael Croxdale.

The photograph, one of the most enduring images from World War II, symbolized the hopes of a generation whose men fought that war.

Not a single face shows in the Pulitzer Prize-winning photo, but the joy is overwhelming - a daddy in a round military cap stooping to wrap his arms around a spindly-legged daughter reaching up to his broad shoulders in a welcoming hug. Mom waits her turn, a hand to her face in delight. An excited little boy watches.

At depots across America, the scene was repeated countless times as fathers and sons and husbands returned from battle. Implicit in the joy of each homecoming was the understanding that more than a quarter of a million families grieved for soldiers who would not come home.

Just as Bunker's photo captured a nation's anxiety and relief, the lives that followed for the married couple and the two young children at the depot reflected many of the triumphs and trials of their two generations:

Post-war America loved the automobile; one of the people collected souped-up luxury cars and another died in a car crash. Post-war America viewed cigarettes as glamorous; two of the people died from smoking-related cancer. In post-war America, shops closed in small towns as people left for bigger towns and cities and suburbs; the Moore family drugstore went broke and all four of the people moved away from Villisca. Post-war America liked to unwind with a drink or two or more; alcoholism brought pain to each of the four. The Vietnam War split the nation a generation after World War II; the little boy grew into a flamboyant free spirit of the '60s. He came back from 'Nam with a heroism medal and haunting memories.

Through whatever heartaches the family faced, their lives reflected the pride and perseverance of post-war America. This is their story and in many ways the story of the country they loved and served.

Growing Up in Villisca

This is where a story about a boy who grew up in rural Iowa should tell about happy, wholesome small-town life, about fishing in farm ponds and sipping sodas at the corner drugstore.

The corner drugstore indeed was central to the life of Robert Ross Moore, the second of three sons of Ross and Jessie Moore. Ross owned a drugstore on the town square of Villisca, about 75 miles southeast of Omaha. His sons tended the soda counter.

But Villisca in the early 1900s didn't provide an idyllic rural life, not for the Moore family. During the night on June 10, 1912, when Bob was 7, someone took an ax and killed his uncle, aunt, four cousins and two visiting children.

The Villisca ax murders, still Iowa's biggest unsolved crime, dominated life in the town and especially in the Moore family for years. A suspect was acquitted. A detective hired by Ross Moore accused the local state senator, F.F. Jones, of hiring the killer. Jones sued for slander.

Folks in town picked sides and pointed fingers. Children from one camp were told not to play with those in the other, and adults would not patronize merchants in opposing camps. For years, the Presbyterian (Moores') and Methodist (Joneses') churches, across the street from each other, would not cooperate on anything.

Fear endured in the town and the family. Bob Moore told of a visitor who stayed out late one night. The guest let himself in quietly, hoping not to disturb anyone, and was met by Ross Moore, wielding his shotgun.

Bob Moore was profoundly affected by the murders of his playmates. In his youth, he attended one of the three trials resulting from the murders. Though he talked with his children about them, he was critical of continuing public discussion of the murders.

"He wanted it left alone. He was very adamant," said Jan Castle Renander, editor of the Red Oak Express, who became a close friend after meeting Moore when she wrote a story about a 1986 novel based on the slayings. "He remembered in his childhood how it divided the town."

As much as the ax murders divided Villisca, the Army National Guard united it, and Moore was always glad to talk about the Guard.

He enlisted at the age of 17 and by 1928 was commander of Villisca's Company F, a unit of the 34th Infantry Division. He would work at the drugstore during the week and train on weekends and for two weeks every summer, preparing Villisca's men for battle.

Dennis Neal, a lifelong friend who died last week, recalled recently that in a training exercise Moore expressed the leadership style he followed throughout his four-decade Guard and Army career: "Whenever you give an order, tell the person why you gave it."

Moore married Ruby Taylor, a school teacher, in Omaha on July 1, 1930, wearing his National Guard uniform. Ruby wasn't the wife waiting at the depot 13 years later. She divorced him after three years, on grounds of cruelty. Court records don't elaborate, but in those days before no-fault divorce, cruelty was a common reason to cite.

Little is known about the marriage, which produced no children. Coming from a time when divorce was considered a scandal, Moore never spoke of his first wife. His son, Robert Moore Jr., who was born in 1945, was out of high school before he learned of his father's first marriage.

Ruby, who remarried, lived in Springfield, Neb., as Ruby Vincent and died this June.

On Feb. 10, 1934, six months after his divorce, Moore eloped to Maryville, Mo., with Dorothy Dee Goldsberry, who worked for her widowed mother at Goldie's diner in Villisca.

A year later, Ross Moore died, and his second and third sons, Bob and Bill, took over the drugstore. The oldest son, Wesley "Dinty" Moore, moved away from Villisca as a young adult and later became a vice president of the Great Northern Railroad.

The children in the famed photo were born as Iowa struggled through the Great Depression and German and Japanese aggression pushed the world into war. On Aug. 23, 1936, Dorothy Moore gave birth to a daughter, Nancy Jo. On Dec. 18, 1940, Dorothy's sister, Eva Croxdale, had a son, Michael Bruce.

Story Continued