A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
An Army photographer took the photo at right of Jerry Manthey in a Black Hawk helicopter when he was in the Army National Guard Viking Division, which eventually became part of the larger Red Bull InfantryDivision.
Manthey shared a photo of himself rappeling out of a helicopter.
Four days after graduating from high school in 1970, Gerald "Jerry" Manthey went on active duty in the Air Force.
A crew chief/flight engineer, Manthey trained with B-52 bombers. His first assignment was at the K.I. Sawyer Air Force Base, a strategic air command. Once there, Manthey started working on KC-135 planes, which were in-flight refueling tankers.
He learned quickly how lucky he was to be working on the KCs.
"Four engines instead of eight on a KC, eight on a B-52. Half the problems," he said. "Plus I got to fly with the plane. I loved airplanes. I was walking on air."
Manthey served at K.I. for two years, then was transferred to the Upper Heyford Air Force Base in Oxfordshire, England.
"They had F-111 swing wing bombers, fighter bombers. The wings would go back in flight to reach Mach 2 and then come forward to land."
He finished his service in England and got out of the Air Force in 1974.
But that wasn't the end. He came back to Minnesota and started Jerio's Pizza in Cloquet and eventually Backstreet Pizza in Anoka, but he missed being in the military.
"I felt this patriotic calling, so I went in the Army National Guard in 1985 at age 35," he said. "At 38, I graduated Air Assault School and got my air assault wings. We had 100 people in the class the first day, and graduated 34 about 30 days later."
He was in an infantry unit, and older than most of his classmates. "They called me the old man, but I made it," he said.
They trained on Hueys and Black Hawk helicopters.
"You have to rappel out of the helicopters," he said, describing how the training progressed from 12-foot towers, to 35-feet to 65-feet and then to actual helicopters.
"You're a combat infantry and they insert you into the combat," he said. "They don't get the time to land. You might be 100 feet in the air and rappel down in full combat gear."
He stayed in the Army National Guard for four years, from 1985 to 1990. At age 40, he transferred to the Air National Guard in Duluth, the 148th Fighter Wing. In 1996, Manthey volunteered to go to Bosnia, as part of peacekeeping operations there. He retired from the 148th in 2004.
"Most people who serve in the military have one honorable discharge, I have three of them," he said.
