John Pertzborn is no stranger to good stories. The legendary St. Louis broadcaster—best known for his long-running “Pertzborn’s People” segment on KSDK-TV in the 1980s and ’90s and as co-anchor of Fox 2’s morning news since 1998—has spent decades telling the tales of everyday people doing extraordinary things.
But this time, the story found him.
While poking around a cluttered estate-sale shop in Dogtown, Pertzborn spotted something tucked between dusty albums and forgotten antiques: a 78-rpm phonograph record in a simple cardboard mailer. Stamped on the label: April 1943. Sent from Pittsburg, Calif. Addressed to a home on Vernon Street in St. Louis.
The sender? Wally Rosen, a young Jewish marine.
“I put it on my 1904 Victor 6 phonograph and there he was,” said Pertzborn, a longtime phonograph collector. “Wally starts talking to his family—telling them he misses them, congratulating relatives on an engagement, even speaking directly to his fiancée, June, about getting married when he gets back.”
It was more than a message. It was a time capsule—and a rare glimpse into the emotional lifelines Jewish soldiers used to stay connected during wartime.
A Mother’s Day gift
Wally had recorded the message at a USO Center in Pittsburg, at Camp Stoneman, a major Army staging base during World War II that processed hundreds of thousands of troops heading to the Pacific Theater. Many of those troops, like Wally, were offered the chance to record what were known as “Voice Letters”—brief, one-minute messages cut onto phonograph records and mailed home.
“This recording is quite a novel idea,” Wally says on the disc. “I’m making it as a gift for Mother’s Day. I hope you’ll all enjoy it.”
He speaks with warmth, pride and longing—not just for home, but for the future. “This thing can’t last forever,” he tells a woman named June. “I’ll be back soon. And when I do—we’ll get married.”
A message nearly lost
Wally mailed the record to a home on Vernon Street, likely in north St. Louis. That address is now a vacant lot. How the disc ended up at a Dogtown shop decades later remains a mystery, though Pertzborn suspects it resurfaced through an estate sale.
The shop owner gave the disc to him without hesitation.
“She didn’t even charge me,” he said. “She didn’t know what it was—but I did. I just knew someone in that family would want this.”
Wally Rosen passed away in 2000, as noted in the St. Louis Jewish Light. And he did indeed marry June, the woman he lovingly addresses on the record, and later to Patricia Brangle Rosen, who is listed in his obituary.
“I don’t want to profit off it,” Pertzborn said. “I just want to return it to Wally’s descendants. If that was my dad or grandpa, I’d want this in my hands.”
Yiddish gold and forgotten culture
As if one discovery weren’t enough, John also found a binder full of 78-rpm records—all in Yiddish.
“These are the kinds of things most people overlook,” he said. “But they’re cultural treasures—songs, comedy, maybe theater. And they’re just sitting there.”
The records are still at the store—for now. But their survival, like Wally’s voice, is a reminder that history often lives in the most unexpected places.
Can you help us return Wally’s voice to his family?
I have tried unsuccessfully to reach members of Wally Rosen’s extended family. If anyone reading this knows any family members, I’d love to help return this priceless part of your history.
Drop me a note at [email protected]—I’d be honored to pass it along.
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