About Bob

About ten years ago I started to gain interest in collecting US WWII artifacts. Not soon after I realized specialization is key. Especially since I cannot  collect it all. This website was created to share my collection with you fellow collecters out there to use it as a online reference setting. I’ll try to add as much photos and information about an item as I can. I emphasis my collection mainly on items related to the US 4th “Ivy” Infantry Division and the Graves Registration Companies in the European Theater of Operations (ETO).  Also, I show interest in personal itemry with the US Government ‘Free-of-Tax’ stamp, and last but not least ‘Lend-Lease’ items made in the United Kingdom. Most of these items cannot be found in regular reference books or websites and therefor I had to do my own research. I think I did a pretty good job gathering some nice items over the years.

My name is Bob and at the moment I’m thirty years old. Born and raised in The Netherlands and from early on in my life my grandfather told me several stories he encountered while grewing up during the war. Mostly about his time doing forced labour in a German Schmeisser factory.

Becides collecting artifacts from WWII, I’am also the adopter of two US WWII graves on the Military Cemetery in Magraten, Holland. For me it’s very honorable to take care of those two graves. My country was partially liberated by the Americans in 1944 and, for me, this is the least I can do in return.

Since the year, 2016, I became a volunteer for the ‘Stichting Verenigde Adoptanten Amerikaanse Oorlogsgraven’ or SVAAO for short. A Dutch Foundation for United Adopters American War Graves founded in 2011. The foundation is a collective of Belgian and Dutch adopters of American WWII soldiers’ graves at American War Cemeteries in Belgium and the Netherlands, whose primarily aim it is to give a face to each of these soldiers.  Hoping to keep the memory alive to these men and women in honor of the sacrifices for our freedom. My job as a volunteer is help build the database grow bigger and bigger each month. For example, the Margraten Cemetery holds 8301 graves plus 1722 names on the Wall of Missing. The foundation hopes to complete the database one day, holding information and a photograph of each individual soldier. I hope I can make a major contribution to this enormous but noble goal.

All obtained information of my own two adoped graves, SGT. Kenneth A. LITTLE and PFC. Frank FERRARO will be added to this website, and will be updated regularly. Over the years I gained (some) knowledge on how to find information about a soldier, and due to this internet era we’re living in, new information can be found if you know where to look.. This is the third part of my interest in the history of 1940-1945: research.

Bob Moolenbeek; collecter, adopter, researcher
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