Skeeter Beaters: Memories of the South Pacific, 1941-1945

Throughout the course of the Second World War in the Pacific, one hundred times as many U.S. servicemen were disabled by disease rather than as a result of hostile action with the Japanese. One of the deadliest diseases encountered was malaria--a vector borne disease that even today kills as many as 3 million people worldwide every year. It is the war against malaria, along with the impact it had on military operations and personnel, that provides the backdrop for the story of Bob Michel and his time with the "Skeeter Beaters"--a small unit of U.S. Navy entomologists, doctors, and Pharmacist Mates whose efforts directly impacted the outcome of the war in the Pacific.

This is the war in the South Pacific as it really happened--the day-to-day struggles with disease, twelve-inch poisonous centipedes, poisonous snakes, starvation and the unrelenting Japanese forces.

With a renewed interest in the Second World War and the 60th Anniversary of the Guadalcanal campaign, "Skeeter Beaters" provides a unique look at a small piece of our history heretofore never detailed. After experiencing the Pacific War of Bob Michel and the Skeeter Beaters, one may likely say, "I never knew that before?."