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Behind Russian Lines. One day in 1942 Captain (ex-R.O.T.C.) Hoegh was leading his company in bayonet drill when the division commander spotted him. whisked him to division headquarters at G-3 (operations) and sent him off—a captain among colonels—to Command and General Staff School. He graduated in the top 10% of his class, soon went to Europe as operations officer for the 104th Infantry ("Timberwolf") Division, wrote the operations orders that carried the 104th through to the Rhine and into Germany. He won his medals—Legion of Honor, Croix de guerre with palm, Bronze Star with cluster. At war's end, when the 104th linked up with the Soviet forces in Germany, Lieut. Colonel Hoegh was in a group that flew behind the Russian lines in a Piper Cub to establish liaison with Marshal Konev's advancing army.
For a country lawyer from Iowa, directing the operations of a 17,000-man infantry division was big and exciting. It gave direct, driving Leo Hoegh a broader horizon, a new sense of confidence in his own administrative ability, an urge to get things done fast. But back in Iowa, these new-found qualities were not necessarily pure assets. Says Virgil Meyer, Hoegh's law partner: "It took Leo about five years to settle down. He was all Army. He wanted to talk right at the point, and you can't always do that in the law. The only thing I could do was let him go over to the courthouse and get beat."
Hoegh plunged back into civic and political activity with the same fast pace, was elected the first World War II com mander of the American Legion post, became chairman of the Chariton Development Co. to woo new industry, president of the Chamber of Commerce and the Rotary Club, a leader in the National Guard. In 1948 he stumped for liberal Harold Stassen, in 1950 ran in the primary against entrenched Republican Congressman Karl LeCompte. "For the Republican Party," said eager Campaigner Hoegh, "do-nothing and me-too are out. The party should draw its inspiration from the people and free itself from the shackles of the Old Guard." Old Guardsman Le Compte beat him 2-1.
A Swing to Ike. By 1951 unorthodox Leo Heogh was pushing for Eisenhower for President in a state where the Republican leaders were strong for Ohio's Senator Robert Taft. He had seen General Eisenhower in Europe during the war. "I was impressed by Ike because he asked questions," says Hoegh. "He wanted to find out what was on people's minds. And he had an open mind of his own." Hoegh was a key tactician in a group of younger Republicans who swung a majority of Iowa's delegates to Eisenhower on the first ballot at the Republican National Convention in 1952.