thedrifter
08-09-07, 06:07 AM
A son of S. Phila. who gave all for Corps
By Gayle Ronan Sims
Inquirer Staff Writer
Christina Formosa was settling down for the night in front of the behemoth television in her snug South Philadelphia rowhouse. That was when all was still right in her world.
At 10:30 p.m. July 27, the phone rang. It was the coroner in San Bernardino County, Calif. He said her husband, Master Gunnery Sgt. Nicholas Formosa, 55, a Marine stationed at the large base at Twentynine Palms, Calif., had been killed. He was riding his motorcycle when an apparently drunk driver hit him head-on. The coroner said he had her husband's body.
"I thought he was talking about a motorcycle accident Nick had a while ago. I told him that was taken care of," Formosa said. "Then he said it again. He had his body. Nick was dead."
It was not supposed to happen this way. Not to a battle-hardened, beloved Marine whose service dated to Vietnam, who fought in the first Gulf War and twice in the Iraq war, and who was one of the oldest and longest-serving members of the branch.
Between active-duty assignments, he spoke regularly to Philadelphia schoolchildren about the dangers of drugs and alcohol.
"Hit by a drunk driver?" Formosa moaned. "This can't be true."
She was not supposed to get the news of her husband's death this way. The Marines were supposed to come to her door and knock. Because he was on active duty, the Marines treat his death as if he were killed in action.
She was confused and in denial, and her life was about to change forever.
"I was surprised we were not told first," said Capt. Neal Fisher, director of public affairs for Twentynine Palms Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center, the largest Marine base in the country and the last stop before many are shipped overseas to fight.
"This was extremely rare, for a widow to get the news this way. We always send two casualty-assistance-calls officers to inform the widow and to help her through the grief. I have never seen this happen."
The next day at 5 a.m., Capt. Shane Grodack and First Sgt. Matthew Corwin from the Marine Corps Training Center in Folsom could not miss the tiny brick rowhouse on the 1200 block of Durfor Street.
Marine and American flags, bigger than all the neighbors', jutted proudly into the narrow street. The window was decorated with a portrait of Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa as a young Marine in 1970, fresh from boot camp at Parris Island - he had already perfected the stare. "Freedom is not free," a window decal stated.
After knocking on the door, the Marines did what they could to help the numb Formosa and her son, Nicholas, 26, both surrounded by members of their enormous Italian family, who all live within blocks. The Marines will assist the family through the funeral, planned for Tuesday, which is expected to be attended by several generals and hundreds of Marines.
Born and raised in South Philadelphia, the couple met when they were 12. They went on their first double date at 16 to see The Sound of Music. Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa graduated in 1969 from Bishop Neumann High School, where he played trumpet. He was listed No. 3 in the draft. With the Vietnam War raging, he joined the Marine Reserve immediately.
"Nick was very private about what he did in the Marines," Formosa said. "He was stationed somewhere in Vietnam that he kept secret. Even when he was in the Gulf War and in Iraq twice, I did not know where he was. I sent packages and mail to an APO address, and he called home whenever he could."
His Marine record book states that he finished training at Parris Island in 1970. There is no record of where he served from 1970 to 1972, but he was activated in the infantry. He was in the inactive reserve from 1973 to 1975.
The couple married in 1979 in a Hollywood-style wedding in South Philadelphia with a reception for 300 at Palumbo's. They bought the home on Durfor Street and never moved.
In down time, he worked as a train master for Conrail for five years and was an electrician at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard until the mid-1980s. He then worked at the Philadelphia Mint, where he cast the first silver dollar commemorating the Marine Corps.
He rejoined the Marine Reserve at Folsom in 1987 and was a mechanic. He was activated in 1991 and shipped to Saudi Arabia. After Desert Storm, Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa was a reservist until reactivated in 2003 and in 2004 for tours in Iraq.
"He was at the highest rank that an enlisted Marine can reach - an E-9 master gunnery sergeant," said Corwin, from the Marine Corps Training Center. "He was an active Marine at the time of his death and was training at Twentynine Palms. He will be given a full-honors funeral."
A uniformed Marine stands guard over the body whenever another person is present. Eight Marine pallbearers will feel its weight as they carry Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa to his grave.
Semper Fidelis: "Always Faithful."
"Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa was very well-liked. He trained hundreds of Marines," said Fisher, the public-affairs director in Twentynine Palms.
"My dad did not want me to go into the military," said Nicholas Formosa, a karaoke disc jockey in Philadelphia clubs. "The last conversation I had with him was on the afternoon he died. He had told my mother to loan me as much money as I wanted to play at the casinos in Atlantic City. He wished me luck and said he didn't care if I lost, just not too much."
"My son and I were planning a trip to Twentynine Palms in September," Formosa said. "Nick wanted to buy a house with land so our whole families could move out there. He wanted to go back to Iraq, but I was against it. I know if he was ordered to, he would have gone." A Marine is forced to retire at 60.
At Twentynine Palms, Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa built a simulated humvee that could roll over. He trained Marines how to get out of it, and to get their fellow Marines out. He put them through drills where the humvee was under fire, on fire, in the water, and upside-down after a blast from an improvised explosive device. It was 109 degrees in the desert and even hotter inside the vehicle.
"When this vehicle gets hit by an IED blast, the Marines are more likely to be deaf and also temporarily blind from the smoke," Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa said in a 2006 CNN interview. "Marines inside are disoriented. We train them how to egress this vehicle if one or two or even three of the Marines inside are injured. We train as we fight."
"Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa was a super Marine," said Sgt. Christel Helton, who has been with the Folsom unit for 10 years. "He taught me how to kill the enemy in hand-to-hand combat. It was not pretty."
Each time Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa returned from overseas, his friends and family threw a block party. At the party in 2004, he sang into a microphone while standing before a tattered Marine flag that had been on his humvee in combat in Iraq. Television cameras captured the celebration for the proud Marine as his brother, his sister, and the rest of his family and friends frolicked in the street.
Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa's flag-draped casket is supposed to arrive at Philadelphia International Airport tonight in a commercial plane. It will be greeted by uniformed Marines and escorted by Philadelphia police to the Leonetti Funeral Home, Broad and Wolf Streets in South Philadelphia, where his wife and son will be waiting.
Friends may call from 6 to 9 p.m. tomorrow and after 9 a.m. Tuesday at the funeral home. A Funeral Mass will be said at 11 a.m. Tuesday at Epiphany of Our Lord Church, 11th and Jackson Streets. Burial will be in SS. Peter and Paul Cemetery, Marple Township.
See an interview with Master Gunnery Sgt. Nicholas Formosa and a slide show of his family at go.philly.com/formosa
Ellie
By Gayle Ronan Sims
Inquirer Staff Writer
Christina Formosa was settling down for the night in front of the behemoth television in her snug South Philadelphia rowhouse. That was when all was still right in her world.
At 10:30 p.m. July 27, the phone rang. It was the coroner in San Bernardino County, Calif. He said her husband, Master Gunnery Sgt. Nicholas Formosa, 55, a Marine stationed at the large base at Twentynine Palms, Calif., had been killed. He was riding his motorcycle when an apparently drunk driver hit him head-on. The coroner said he had her husband's body.
"I thought he was talking about a motorcycle accident Nick had a while ago. I told him that was taken care of," Formosa said. "Then he said it again. He had his body. Nick was dead."
It was not supposed to happen this way. Not to a battle-hardened, beloved Marine whose service dated to Vietnam, who fought in the first Gulf War and twice in the Iraq war, and who was one of the oldest and longest-serving members of the branch.
Between active-duty assignments, he spoke regularly to Philadelphia schoolchildren about the dangers of drugs and alcohol.
"Hit by a drunk driver?" Formosa moaned. "This can't be true."
She was not supposed to get the news of her husband's death this way. The Marines were supposed to come to her door and knock. Because he was on active duty, the Marines treat his death as if he were killed in action.
She was confused and in denial, and her life was about to change forever.
"I was surprised we were not told first," said Capt. Neal Fisher, director of public affairs for Twentynine Palms Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center, the largest Marine base in the country and the last stop before many are shipped overseas to fight.
"This was extremely rare, for a widow to get the news this way. We always send two casualty-assistance-calls officers to inform the widow and to help her through the grief. I have never seen this happen."
The next day at 5 a.m., Capt. Shane Grodack and First Sgt. Matthew Corwin from the Marine Corps Training Center in Folsom could not miss the tiny brick rowhouse on the 1200 block of Durfor Street.
Marine and American flags, bigger than all the neighbors', jutted proudly into the narrow street. The window was decorated with a portrait of Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa as a young Marine in 1970, fresh from boot camp at Parris Island - he had already perfected the stare. "Freedom is not free," a window decal stated.
After knocking on the door, the Marines did what they could to help the numb Formosa and her son, Nicholas, 26, both surrounded by members of their enormous Italian family, who all live within blocks. The Marines will assist the family through the funeral, planned for Tuesday, which is expected to be attended by several generals and hundreds of Marines.
Born and raised in South Philadelphia, the couple met when they were 12. They went on their first double date at 16 to see The Sound of Music. Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa graduated in 1969 from Bishop Neumann High School, where he played trumpet. He was listed No. 3 in the draft. With the Vietnam War raging, he joined the Marine Reserve immediately.
"Nick was very private about what he did in the Marines," Formosa said. "He was stationed somewhere in Vietnam that he kept secret. Even when he was in the Gulf War and in Iraq twice, I did not know where he was. I sent packages and mail to an APO address, and he called home whenever he could."
His Marine record book states that he finished training at Parris Island in 1970. There is no record of where he served from 1970 to 1972, but he was activated in the infantry. He was in the inactive reserve from 1973 to 1975.
The couple married in 1979 in a Hollywood-style wedding in South Philadelphia with a reception for 300 at Palumbo's. They bought the home on Durfor Street and never moved.
In down time, he worked as a train master for Conrail for five years and was an electrician at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard until the mid-1980s. He then worked at the Philadelphia Mint, where he cast the first silver dollar commemorating the Marine Corps.
He rejoined the Marine Reserve at Folsom in 1987 and was a mechanic. He was activated in 1991 and shipped to Saudi Arabia. After Desert Storm, Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa was a reservist until reactivated in 2003 and in 2004 for tours in Iraq.
"He was at the highest rank that an enlisted Marine can reach - an E-9 master gunnery sergeant," said Corwin, from the Marine Corps Training Center. "He was an active Marine at the time of his death and was training at Twentynine Palms. He will be given a full-honors funeral."
A uniformed Marine stands guard over the body whenever another person is present. Eight Marine pallbearers will feel its weight as they carry Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa to his grave.
Semper Fidelis: "Always Faithful."
"Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa was very well-liked. He trained hundreds of Marines," said Fisher, the public-affairs director in Twentynine Palms.
"My dad did not want me to go into the military," said Nicholas Formosa, a karaoke disc jockey in Philadelphia clubs. "The last conversation I had with him was on the afternoon he died. He had told my mother to loan me as much money as I wanted to play at the casinos in Atlantic City. He wished me luck and said he didn't care if I lost, just not too much."
"My son and I were planning a trip to Twentynine Palms in September," Formosa said. "Nick wanted to buy a house with land so our whole families could move out there. He wanted to go back to Iraq, but I was against it. I know if he was ordered to, he would have gone." A Marine is forced to retire at 60.
At Twentynine Palms, Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa built a simulated humvee that could roll over. He trained Marines how to get out of it, and to get their fellow Marines out. He put them through drills where the humvee was under fire, on fire, in the water, and upside-down after a blast from an improvised explosive device. It was 109 degrees in the desert and even hotter inside the vehicle.
"When this vehicle gets hit by an IED blast, the Marines are more likely to be deaf and also temporarily blind from the smoke," Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa said in a 2006 CNN interview. "Marines inside are disoriented. We train them how to egress this vehicle if one or two or even three of the Marines inside are injured. We train as we fight."
"Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa was a super Marine," said Sgt. Christel Helton, who has been with the Folsom unit for 10 years. "He taught me how to kill the enemy in hand-to-hand combat. It was not pretty."
Each time Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa returned from overseas, his friends and family threw a block party. At the party in 2004, he sang into a microphone while standing before a tattered Marine flag that had been on his humvee in combat in Iraq. Television cameras captured the celebration for the proud Marine as his brother, his sister, and the rest of his family and friends frolicked in the street.
Master Gunnery Sgt. Formosa's flag-draped casket is supposed to arrive at Philadelphia International Airport tonight in a commercial plane. It will be greeted by uniformed Marines and escorted by Philadelphia police to the Leonetti Funeral Home, Broad and Wolf Streets in South Philadelphia, where his wife and son will be waiting.
Friends may call from 6 to 9 p.m. tomorrow and after 9 a.m. Tuesday at the funeral home. A Funeral Mass will be said at 11 a.m. Tuesday at Epiphany of Our Lord Church, 11th and Jackson Streets. Burial will be in SS. Peter and Paul Cemetery, Marple Township.
See an interview with Master Gunnery Sgt. Nicholas Formosa and a slide show of his family at go.philly.com/formosa
Ellie