The Fox Valley Veterans Breakfast Club Herschel Luckinbill Veteran of the Month February 2022 is Steve Westerlund.
He was born February 6, 1949 in Moline, Ill. and lived in Rock Island. At age 10, his father left the family and Steve was raised by his stepfather, a hired hand, who would move to wherever there was work. Consequently, from age 10 to 16, the family lived on 11 farms, all in northern Illinois. Steve left home at age 16 and moved in with one of his friends who lived on a farm, outside of La Moille. He was graduated from La Moille High School in 1967 and moved to Chicago to attend Devry Institute for an education in electronics.
By June 1968, he was out of money. He planned to return to Devry in six weeks after working full time to earn the money, however, because he stopped attending Devry, he became eligible for the draft and was contacted within one week! He joined the Air Force and enlisted July 5,1968. Following basic training at Lackland AFB, San Antonio, Texas, he was assigned to Lowry AFB, Denver, Colo. Long Range Detection of nuclear explosions anywhere in the world was among the first missions of the newly-created U.S. Air Force in 1947. Consequently, the Air Force Technical Applications Center (AFTAC) was born. AFTAC’s nuclear event detection mission is directly linked to its nuclear treaty monitoring mission.
Training for the scientific applications specialist career field was formalized in June 1954 with the creation of the special instruments training branch (SPINSTRA) under the Department of Special Weapons. SPINSTRA starts with airmen and NCOs who achieve the highest scores on the Air Force vocational aptitude test. Steve began training at Lowry AFB in September 1968. After completing his training September 1969, he was assigned to HQ Command 1157, as a tech ops squadron sergeant in Teheran, Iran. His job was related to the mission of ARMISH-MAAG Detachment 333. ARMISH (Iranian Army) MAAG (military assistance advisory group) essentially was the military equipment sales arm to Iran.
Because of the classified nature of his mission, Steve’s description of his mission was deliberately vague. He held a SAVAC (Iranian CIA) card which gave him diplomatic immunity. When he was in Iran and Spain, because of the nature of his assignment, he never had to wear a uniform. In January 1971, while still in Iran, Steve re-enlisted for four years.
In May 1971, Steve was reassigned to HQ Command 1155th Technical Operations Squadron, McClellan AFB, Sacramento, Calif.. Its mission was to provide worldwide support and deployment of specialized equipment. While stationed in California, Steve was married to Cherie November 11,1971. In January 1973, he was reassigned to HQ Command 1157 in Seneca, Spain. Cherie moved with him. January 18, 1975, Staff Sgt Steve Westerlund received an honorable discharge. For his service, he received: AF Outstanding Unit Award with oak leaf cluster; AF Longevity Award; National Defense Service medal; AF Service medal; AF Good Conduct medal; and Small Arms Expert ribbon. He and Cherie returned to California. They had two children and were divorced in 1988. He remarried in 1990, but there was divorce in 1995.
While in California, Steve learned computer programming and began 40 years of computer programming; during which he worked as an employee and/or an independent contractor with 36 companies. He ended his career working for one company for 24 years. In 1995, he moved to Aurora and lived with Margaret, a friend of his sister, to whom he had been introduced. They moved to Oswego in 2000. Together they have five children, 15 grandchildren, and three great grandchildren.
Steve retired in 2018. Much of his time is spent on creating books of his family history.