Man’s shovel part of history
By WAYNE TOWNER, wtowner@newsandsentinel.comArticle Photos
LITTLE HOCKING - An injury during his childhood kept Dale Nutter out of the military in World War II, but the Little Hocking man nonetheless helped make a significant contribution to the war effort.
Nutter, who turns 92 this summer, is donating a folding shovel/pick, commonly called an entrenching tool in the military, that he helped design at O Ames to the National World War II Museum in New Orleans where it will become part of the museum's permanent collection.
During World War II, Nutter had been called up in the draft three times, but was rejected due to a childhood injury that crushed one of his feet. He had not received proper care for the injury, which occurred when he was 5 years old, and it had not healed correctly.
Nutter was born and raised on a farm in Wirt County and went to work for O Ames in Parkersburg, which was responsible for making the shovels carried and used by soldiers in the military at that time. He was 25 years old in 1942 when he went to work for the company.
Nutter said the U.S. military already had a small hand shovel for soldiers that had a folding shovel head. O Ames was approached to develop something for use in the coral-based islands of the Pacific Theater.
The engineers with the company began working on their ideas, Nutter said. At the same time, he began talking about it with a friend, Jim Robison, who later became his brother-in-law, and decided to try some ideas of his.
Having been born and raised on a farm with a blacksmith shop, Nutter was used to making things from scratch.
"Back at that time you didn't run down to the hardware store and buy what you wanted; you went out to the shop and hammered it out," he said.
Using his hands-on experience, he built a prototype that added a narrow pick-like blade to the folding shovel, which could also be folded down flush with the handle when not in use. Nutter took his prototype to the company's chief engineer, who wasn't impressed, but the company owner liked it and said he should finish and paint it for submittal to the military with the other prototypes.
"Believe it or not, they sent back everything the engineers had made and said they wanted this shovel," he said of his prototype. "At the time they wanted 70,000 dozen of these things."
Years later, Nutter said he talked to a veteran who remembered using his shovel while stationed in the Pacific Theater and thought it might have helped save a lot of people.
Nutter said the shovel he is donating to the museum is the third one made by the company, although he had originally asked for the first one made. As the production line started, the first was taken and placed in a company safe and the second was taken for company display purposes. He was given the third one from that line and has kept it for decades.
He let his children use it at different times, so it's not in pristine condition but remains in good shape and working order. The stamp "O Ames 1945" can still be seen on the shovel head.
Linda Stone, Nutter's daughter, said the Ames-built shovel was used in the latter part of World War II and through the Korean War. It might also have seen use in Vietnam, but she is not certain of that. A more modern shovel has been in use by the military since the 1970s.
"It's something my family thought was something that should be passed along," Nutter said of his decision to donate the tool to the museum at the urging of his children.
"I was kind of elated. I thought it deserved to be put someplace where someone could see it if they wanted to," he said.
In the decades since WW II, Nutter said he worked for O Ames on and off for years while also operating his own cement block business. He retired from Union Carbide in 1980. Another daughter, Nancy McVicar Drake of Florida, came up with the idea of donating the shovel to the National World War II Museum.
"We are thrilled that Mr. Nutter chose to donate his shovel to the museum," said Kacey M. Hill, public relations officer with the museum in New Orleans, adding the shovel will not go on immediate display. "Like all museums, only a small portion of our collection is on display at any time. Mr. Nutter's artifact and many other important items related to the war are reserved for use in future exhibits as well as scholarship related to the war," she said.
The National World War II Museum features 16,000 square feet of gallery space with state-of-the-art, interactive exhibits that feature oral histories from veterans, artifacts, documents and photographs and rare film footage. Artifacts include Sherman tanks, jeeps, halftracks, a barrel that carried heavy water that was part of Adolf Hitler's atomic weapons program and a restored C-47 that dropped paratroopers over the fields of Normandy and saw action in the Battle of the Bulge.
In November, the next phase of a $300 million capital expansion will begin to quadruple the size of the original museum site. The museum was dedicated in 2000 as the National D-Day Museum and was later designated by Congress as America's National World War II Museum.
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Observer
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06-07-09 6:29 PM
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Thank you Mr. Nutter, you are one of the greatest West Virgnians. I feel you should have received a medal, and should have been compensated for your inventive efforts. I'm sure there are many soldiers that would agree.
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halfhill
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06-07-09 11:36 AM
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Mr. Nutter's Ames shovel is an improvement over the previous non-folding Ames shovel that manufactured over 1 million for the Army. Surplus stores say the one he donated is the most popular--if they can find ones to sell. I worked two summers while in PHS "44-'45 at Ames. I still have both kinds.
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