the road to becoming
a grand marshal
Resident reflects on
the road to becoming
a grand marshal
BY JENNIFER KOHLHEPP
Staff Writer
JENNIFER KOHLHEPP George Soriano, 82, will be grand marshal at North Brunswick’s Memorial Day parade Monday.
NORTH BRUNSWICK — He followed his heart through a lifetime of serving others and will now finally take his place at the head of the parade.
The township selected George Soriano to be the grand marshal of North Brunswick’s Memorial Day parade last week.
The 82-year-old resident never imagined that moving across the United States to Idaho in an effort to help others and his family through the Great Depression would be the first in a lifetime of civil services that would allow him the honor of sitting in the lead car of the parade.
"During the Depression days, no one could find a job," said Soriano, a Somerville High School graduate. "You couldn’t buy a job. You had to have more than a little nepotism just to work."
JENNIFER KOHLHEPP Above is a photograph of George Soriano, North Brunswick, dressed in his military uniform during his service as a pilot and aerial engineer in World War II.
Soriano joined President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Civilian Conservation Commission and in June 1940 moved to a valley called Hanson in Idaho. While there, he worked with the government "to assist the poor class of people who couldn’t afford to do their own road and forestry work."
In Idaho, Soriano learned to maintain and operate a dump truck earning $30 a month.
"I would live off of $5 a month and send $25 home to my family," Soriano said.
For a short time after returning home from Idaho, Soriano worked for a trucking company in order to continue to provide for his family in hard times until he was drafted in 1943.
After placing high for mechanics on a standard test, the military sent Soriano to Washington State College where he received Army Air Force training in Pullman, Wash.
During World War II, Soriano served as an aerial engineer and piloted flights, while stationed in Alaska, to provide troops with supplies in Anchorage and Fairbanks. Troops there were working to ward off Japanese troops stationed on the Aleutian Islands.
"Men were losing their appendages in the cold and rough terrain," Soriano said. "We would transport galoshes, snow packs, and other equipment to our infantrymen."
Prior to the war’s end, Soriano also served in Montana and Florida.
In 1943, a magazine called "The Ring" featured Soriano as a "fighter who helped his fellow troops through the rough times of war by wrestling at the USO."
By 1947, Soriano said he was "riding motorcycles with the state police."
Badge No. 865, Soriano worked as a state trooper for nine years in Central Jersey in towns such as Hightstown, Princeton, Morristown and New Brunswick.
"Committed to protecting the safety of citizens and the law in the state of New Jersey," he said he took the position of detective for the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office and held it for 23 years.
He graduated Seton Hall University’s Narcotic Enforcement Officers Training program in 1956 and soon volunteered for the Rutgers University Extension Division through Middlesex County.
"In 1956, I volunteered to be the sole guinea pig for county research on how much alcohol in the blood provided certain Breathalyzer readings," he said. "I drank a Coca-Cola mixed with 190 proof alcohol over about 20 minutes."
The research from the experiment set the guidelines for determining how much alcohol in the blood makes a person legally drunk, Soriano said.
From 1966-1972 he served as the director of police training in Middlesex County and specialized in accident investigation until retiring in 1978 as lieutenant of county detectives.
Soriano survived a quadruple bypass in 1984 and lost his wife seven years ago, but before then, he had the opportunity to take her on travels all over the world.
Numerous framed certificates on the walls in the breezeway of his home proclaim the couple as "adventurers." Documents from Panama, Alaska, Norway, and some of the most remote locations on the face of the globe bare testament to their explorations.
The father of two daughters, Patti and Donna, and the grandfather of four grandchildren, Soriano credits the love of his life, Audrey, with giving him the support to accomplish his greatest fetes.
The spry Soriano still remains active in the community as a lifelong member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 3117 in Edison, life member of the New Jersey State Police and life member of the Association of Former State Troopers.
Soriano is known as being a lifelong proponent of world peace.
Of the current war, Soriano said, "I want the government to bring our troops home from Iraq. But, I doubt we will ever have peace as long as big business runs America and as long as governments do not accept divisions in religious beliefs."
A United States government service medal hanging in his home summarizes the veteran’s contribution to his country and reads, "For devoted and selfless consecration in service of his country and the citizens of the United States."
However, Soriano provides a summary of a personal and universal history with a story about a time shortly before the end of World War II, when he was stationed off the coast of Florida.
"I had the opportunity to appear as an extra in a film about the war," Soriano said. "They cast me as an army man and I got to see John Wayne messing around with some of the army fellows, but my scene didn’t make the final cut of the film."
The grand marshal did not appear in "They Were Expendable."