By John Bishop
Contributing Writer
HUDSON — Sitting in his home office, complete with an antique roll top desk and decorations representing his many career accomplishments and experiences, Command Sergeant Major (ret.) Anthony “Tony” Kurgan Jr., 79, reflected on his life.
Law enforcement and military experience
His decades of experience with the Massachusetts State Police and the Army National Guard were life-changing in several off-duty moments. They were instances when his training helped save a family friend, a neighbor, his father, and his beloved wife.
“I liked serving my country and being a patriot, being part of the defense of our nation – part of the best army in the world,” he said, searching for words. “And following in my father’s footsteps.”
Trying to give a quick synopsis of his long career was hard for Kurgan. However, it was in describing moments when his friends and family really needed him that he easily found an overriding philosophy for his life’s work: helping people.
Saving lives
“She had a stroke one morning,” he said, gesturing down the main hall of his home to where his wife, Josephine, sat watching television. “As a result of my state police training, I was able to identify the oncoming signs of a stroke.
“So I popped her a couple of baby aspirin…called 911, and we went to the hospital right away.
“The doctors and the nurses said, ‘If you didn’t do what you did, [Josie] wouldn’t be here with you now.’
“My father [the late Anthony Kurgan Sr.] went down once at his home,” Kurgan continued. “We were having dinner there one night, and he choked on a piece of meat. So I got it up quickly, acted and cleared the airway.
“My neighbor over here had a heart attack,” added Kurgan, gesturing again, this time into the heart of his quiet neighborhood. “I was able to give him CPR and revive him.
“And then my best friend’s uncle went down at his wedding, I did CPR on him… the CPR worked,” he said.
Kurgan thought for a moment, trying his best to sum up the narrative.
“I mean, it was good, good training,” said the over-37-year veteran of the National Guard. “I’m glad I had it, and I’m glad I was able to help somebody out.”
The Guard
“Help somebody out.”
Kurgan, a Boy Scout with Troop 1 in Hudson as a youth, said those words without any measure of bravado or self-aggrandizement. Rather, the recollections served only as a coda to a nearly two-hour conversation about his time with the Massachusetts National Guard and Mass. State Police.
Most of those stories were about others, fellow soldiers and troopers, and his father.
Indeed, it seemed like the often-poignant tales, especially a note about organizing charity boxing matches at the Hudson Armory (to raise funds for the Children’s Cancer Blood Program), were meant as a sort of “thank you.” A sense of gratitude for the circumstances that allowed Kurgan to be sitting in his den, talking about his life. He said he is appreciative that he was literally and figuratively a member of “The Guard,” embodying training that was able to help many people close to him.
However, Kurgan – like many other Cold War warriors (and members of the Greatest Generation, such as his father, a fellow U.S. Army veteran) – helped so many people live comfortably in Hudson, in Massachusetts, and, indeed, all around the free world.
His dad, Tony Sr. (1919-1988), also of Hudson, was drafted shortly after Pearl Harbor. For much of the next couple of years, he traveled the East Coast, to and from Tampa, Florida, transporting prisoners to the military stockade in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
From there, and once the Allies made their push into Nazi Germany, like many soldiers in non-combat positions, Tony Sr. made his way overseas and saw intense combat with the 14th Armored Division.
After the war, the elder Kurgan joined the 26th Yankee Division via the Massachusetts National Guard at the Hudson Armory, where he served as the military custodian for over 23 years before retiring as a Chief Warrant Officer in 1970.
Big boots to fill
Kurgan Jr. picked up where his father left off, helping his dad at the Armory as a boy, and learning the tricks and trade of the Army.
After graduating from Hudson High in 1964, Tony Jr. joined the National Guard and received Basic Combat Training in August of 1966 at Fort Dix, New Jersey. From there, and over the next three decades (much of which was with the Yankee Division), Kurgan traveled the United States and Europe with his final duty posting with the 181st Engineer Battalion in Whitinsville.
Meanwhile, after graduation from the State Police Academy, his civilian job saw Kurgan in the blues of the Massachusetts State Police as a uniformed officer for 17 years, followed by 15 more years as a plainclothes officer (Court Prosecutor/Liaison Officer).
Along the way, Kurgan, the father of three, earned degrees from Quinsigamond Community College, UMass Boston, and Anna Maria College. But speaking to Kurgan, it sounded like the Army, and his work in and around the Hudson Armory, maintained top billing in his memories.
“I had an interest in firearms, and I wanted to become an armorer,” explained Kurgan. “As a little kid, I would go to the Armory when my dad was working, and he’d let me go up to the gun room. I’d clean up the stuff there for them, keep things organized and keep things squared away.
“The guys are coming from the field, and they, they would draw the individual weapons that were assigned to them, and use them in the field and carry them, and train with them.
“And when they come in, they have to clean them. They put me in charge of accepting or denying them,” explained Kurgan with a big smile. “You know, and it was kind of funny some little civilian kid, checking the weapon out, saying, ‘Hey, look at all the carbon here, and the barrel, that’s got to be recleaned, too [chuckles].’”
Veterans work
It was a big responsibility for a youngster, but Tony Jr. always seemed destined for the U.S. Army.
Suffice it to say – Kurgan, who will soon be the only enlisted man to have a display in the National Guard Museum in Concord (“Very humbling,” said Kurgan) — did his family and his Hudson community proud.
“I tried to be in the same unit with my father,” he said, matter-of-factly. “I like tanks, I like weaponry and dealing with that.”
Even today, he is still dealing with “that,” as the Senior Vice Commander of the Yankee Division Veterans Association (YDVA). It is a group that continues the camaraderie and relationships forged while in service and meticulously maintains the memory of those men who fought wearing the “YD” in WWI, WWII, and beyond.
The YDVA has, in recent years, helped complete roof renovations of a Belleau, France church damaged during a Great War battle in which the 26th Yankee Division (and many local) doughboys participated. The project, which included a $9,400 donation, began during the 100th anniversary of the liberation of France (during the First World War), and allowed Kurgan a bit of pride.
The familiar “YD” symbol, which has started to fade from local memory, remains important to the people of France and the repaired church is known as the “YD” church.
“With the YD, and the recognition factor there, it really made me feel good,” Kurgan, the commander of the Worcester chapter of the YDVA, said of the grateful nature of the French people he met and worked with when he visited.
“A lot of times, the hair on the back of your neck stands up, you know?”
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