José Mendoza López was born Santiago Ihuitlán Plumas, Oaxaca, Mexico back in 1910. As a young boy he and his mother moved to Orizaba where he helped his mother sell clothes that she had made. When he was eight his mother died so he moved to Brownsville, Texas to live with his uncle’s family.
While in Brownsville, he began working various jobs and never returned to school. He later traveled the country with a boxing promoter with 55 fights under his belt in the lightweight division using the nickname of Kid Mendoza. In 1934, during a boxing match in Melbourne, Australia he met a group of Merchant Marines and signed a contract with them. He was accepted in the union spending the next five years traveling the world. He was en-route to California from Hawaii when he learned about the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. He enlisted in the Army in 1942, he saw action in the Battle of the Bulge. He died in 2005, he was 94.
What you may not know about José is that he was awarded the Medal of Honor. He single-handed held off a German attack hilling at least 100 of the enemy allowing Company K to successfully withdraw.
NW Arkansas, come for a visit, stay for a lifetime.
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