Lloyd Wessel has spent all but two of his 89 years on this earth in Newton. For the two years he was away, Vessel was fighting for his country in World War II.

Wessel’s time serving his country took him all over the South Pacific as a machinist’s mate second class in the Navy.  He faced snipers, posed for pictures next to bombs and befriended natives — and all of this was because of an incident that happened to his friend who joined the Army.

“I had a couple of buddies that signed up for the Army, and I didn’t like crawling around on the ground with them snakes and things,” Wessel joked. “One of the things was, one of our guys, a Newton guy, down in Georgia got bit by one of them cottonmouths. They sent him home on leave for about three or four months to get over that.”