{"id":61316,"date":"2025-05-13T13:13:44","date_gmt":"2025-05-13T17:13:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/?p=61316"},"modified":"2025-05-13T13:19:05","modified_gmt":"2025-05-13T17:19:05","slug":"bringing-boston-universitys-world-war-ii-heroes-back-into-memory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/2025\/05\/13\/bringing-boston-universitys-world-war-ii-heroes-back-into-memory\/","title":{"rendered":"Bringing Boston University\u2019s World War II Heroes Back into Memory\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

When World War II unfolded, thousands from Boston University including students, alumni, and faculty enlisted to protect the nation’s honor. Many of those patriots died fighting for the country, leaving behind an enduring legacy of courage and duty. The ultimate sacrifice of these 223 fallen officers was acknowledged by the university\u2019s president Daniel L. Marsh in 1945 during the Thanksgiving address, where he promised to commemorate their lives with a memorial. Unfortunately, this vision fell into obscurity, never coming to fruition. Eighty years later, a collaborative effort by Pardee Professor John D. Woodward, Jr.<\/a> and graduate student Michael Tozeski (Pardee\u201925) has revived this dream of honoring Terriers lost to WWII.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Professor John Woodward<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Prof. Woodward, a US Army veteran, former CIA officer, and the director of BU\u2019s Division of Military Education was perturbed by the absence of a memorial on campus. To put together a list of students and alumni, the professor roped in Tozeski, a graduate student of international affairs at Pardee and an administrative coordinator at the BU Dean of Students Office.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to remember those people. It borders on negligence if we don\u2019t. I\u2019m 65, and I remember every holiday we\u2019d gather as a family. My dad and my uncles were all combat veterans of World War II. I saw how important the wars and their time serving were to them. They were young men when they served, and it had a huge impact on them. They always honored the comrades they lost in the war.<\/span><\/i>\u201d \u2014 <\/span><\/i>\u00a0Professor John Woodward, Jr. in an interview with Bostania.<\/span><\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

For four months, Tozeski spent all his time outside of class and work on finding these 223 names at Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center, meticulously scanning BU yearbooks and <\/span>Bostonia<\/span><\/i> issues \u2014 collating names, branches of service, ranks, hometowns, and graduation year in a spreadsheet. His investigation frequently encountered erroneous information, but Tozeski still persevered and remained committed to crosschecking every finding with available state, federal and local records. The result? So far, he has discovered and verified 221 of the 223 names and has even been able to dig up some heroic accounts.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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Michael Tozeski (Pardee’25) | Photo Credits: Cydney Scott<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While the hunt for last two names has been paused, Woodward and Tozeski are hopeful that this exploration will expedite the approval for a memorial on campus \u2014 serving as an enduring symbol of the sacrifices made by the students and alumni for generations to come. For now, Prof. Woodward has listed the names on the ROTC website, providing an official documentation that may encourage families of the fallen to come forward with additional details or uncover the identities of those not included. The web interface for the Honor Wall page is developed by <\/span>BU ROTC Cadet Kyron Kern and BU Midshipman Peter Barto (Pardee’25).<\/p>\n

Visit the <\/span>ROTC website<\/span><\/a> to peruse the names on the honor wall curated by Michael Tozeski.<\/span><\/p>\n

To know more about Prof. Woodward<\/a> and Michael Tozeski\u2019s efforts, read this story by <\/span>Bostonia<\/span><\/i><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Prof. Woodward and Michael Tozeski (Pardee\u201925) bring Boston University\u2019s World War II heroes back into memory. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24850,"featured_media":61317,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8811,11797,8432,8416],"tags":[8469,10055,12821,9408,12820,12822,8794,11228],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61316"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24850"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=61316"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61316\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":61329,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61316\/revisions\/61329"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/61317"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61316"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=61316"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/pardeeschool\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=61316"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}