It’s been a long time since I’ve heard that old patriotic song, but it was a popular tune after December 7, 1941. Another thing forgotten is what was in the old building right in the center of Allen’s main business district. It sits empty but it was recently repaired. No hint it once housed the busiest drug store in town. It was a center of gathering, a place to enjoy a Coke or a banana split. The women of the Allen area bought their cosmetics there while waiting to have their prescriptions filled. Yes, the brightly lit place was a prosperous centerpiece landmark run by a popular pharmacist named Otho Butler.

Pharmacist Butler was a patriotic citizen soldier too. He was the Commanding Officer of Company G, of the 180th infantry Regiment, 45th Division (Thunderbird) U.S. Army. Captain Butler probably didn’t plan on going off to war nor did the other men of Allen’s Company G. But they did. Called up to duty before the Japs attacked Pearl Harbor the company was sent to Texas for advanced combat training. Time passed after Pearl Harbor and the company wound up on a place no one had ever heard of — Sicily — the toe of Italy. A famous general named George Patton was there and was in charge of the invasion to clear the island of Germans. And he did.

On July 25, 1943, on a hillside near Palermo, the great general’s advance was halted by German machinegun nests. Patton ordered the guns to be taken out and the order went down the line and landed in the lap of our pharmacist Captain Otho Butler and his Company G — a unit made up mostly of our Allen boys. They were pinned down by these particular machine guns. No one was willing to give up their foxhole and charge into the path of the deadly machine guns, but it had to be done.

Captain Butler was a leader with courage. That’s why he had been made an officer. He made his plans, picked his men and they went over and cleared the nests, silencing the machine guns and killing the Germans. It wasn’t easy and it came at a high price. Our Captain Otho Butler, Allen’s pharmacist, part time soldier and now a hero lay dead on a now forgotten hillside in Sicily. For his exceptional heroism Butler was awarded a Silver Star.

Captain Butler’s wife, Lola Dell, continued with her life as best she could. After the war, she and her daughter, Bonita, continued to attend the First Baptist Church of Allen where Lola Dell was the pianist. She sold the Central Drug Store to Bill and Liberty Orick who changed the name to “The Central Store.” They operated the business for many years maintaining the fountain and other services of the popular store. I don’t know what happened to daughter Bonita Butler, but Lola Dell got a job at Farmer’s State Bank and worked there until she retired and years later passed away.

Numerous signs between Ada and McAlester now identify this long stretch of SH-1 as the “Captain Otho Butler Memorial Highway.” I’m glad his name is there because it reminds me every time I go to Ada about this Army officer who loved his country so much he laid down his life for it. It makes me think of the many other young men of our Allen area who without blinking, marched off to defend this country and their loved ones from the enslavement and tyranny Adolph Hitler had planned for us.

They may not play that song “Let’s Remember Pearl Harbor” on the radio anymore, but I sure do remember that awful day and those awful times and Pharmacist-Captain Otho Butler. A hero from Allen.

Remember Pearl Harbor and how it affects our lives to this very day. Don’t forget to go to church this Sunday.

Wayne Bullard, DPh cwaynebullard@gmail.com