Bantjes, John, “Bantjes, John (Interview outline and video), 2008,” Digital Collections, accessed December 5, 2025, https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/document/27099.
John Bantjes was born in Illinois in 1929 to Dutch immigrants who decided to move back to the Netherlands during the Depression. John lived through the entirety of World War II in the Netherlands. When the war was over he moved back to the US and was later drafted during the Korean War. John spent his time in the service training for a Russian attack in Alaska.