Riverside resident continues family legacy of military service
Riverside resident Kevin Kuzel comes from a long line of family serving in the military. Everyone in his family from his generation back to his grandparents on his mother’s side served, including his uncles who served during World War II on both his parents’ sides.
“My grandmother actually signed up with my mother to serve,” Kuzel said. She served as a recruiting officer in Jacksonville, even though she lived in Dallas, Texas, until the end of the war in 1945.
“My brother served in the Army during the Vietnam War. Military training was part of my upbringing,” said Kuzel.
His father, Frantisek, “Frank,” was Czechoslovakian and a member of Sokol in Dallas, Texas, a very disciplined gymnastic group of Czech origin. They drilled in military style prior to gymnastic work every week on Friday.
Frank Kuzel was in the 101st Airborne Division in WWII. He participated in D-Day (Operation Overlord) and then went back to England to retrain and participate in Operation Market Garden. He was captured in September 1944 by the German SS, sent to a dispersion and then to Stalag 2A where he was imprisoned for about nine months until the locked gates were abandoned as Germans fled to surrender.
Kuzel’s mother, Barbara O’Brien, was born in Dallas. She was sent to Germany with the 9th U.S. Army Air Force, where she painted nose art on the bombers. She met Frank at the San Miguel Allende art school in Mexico after both had been repatriated.
Frank and Barbara both become professional artists and moved to Washington, D.C., where Frank applied to the Department of Defense as an illustrator.
“He was temporarily blacklisted during the McCarthy era because they thought everyone in the art colony was a Communist,” Kuzel said. “He was eventually cleared and became a commercial illustrator, then an art director, and eventually he sold printing.”
“I never considered not serving,” said Kuzel. “I always wanted to fly.”
He worked and paid his own way through Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas, in the electrical engineering program and as part of the Air Force ROTC. Following college, he paid for civilian training to earn his pilot’s license. After the Vietnam War ended, however, the Air Force was only accepting Air Force Academy graduates into its program, so Kuzel had to find other options.
“I joined the Navy’s pilot training program via the Marine Corps Aviation Officer Candidate School in Pensacola,” Kuzel said. He received his wings in December 1979 after flight training at NAS Kingsville, Texas. The training airwing commander, M.G. Basford, recommended him to fly A7 Corsair attack jets at Cecil Field.
In 1982, he served at Air Operations in Cecil Field where he flew the C-1A, which was similar to a WWII medium bomber. Commanding Officer Captain Jack Austin asked him to be the air station’s public affairs officer in 1983. Two years later he became the liaison to the Clay County Chamber of Commerce and the Westside Businessmen’s Club, now the Westside Business Leader’s Club. He also lobbied the Jacksonville City Council for legislation.
Kuzel left active duty in 1985 and joined the Reserves, serving at Patrol Air Wing 1174 at NAS Jacksonville. He retired as a commander in 1995.
Kuzel continued to work after leaving military service in a variety of jobs, including owning an international military electronics business, working as a private investigator, and supplying props and consulting in the movie industry.
From 2007 through 2011 he worked with the Riverside Avondale Preservation society and headed up its luminary project.
In 1988, he met and married his wife, Cindy, and acquired a daughter in the process.
“Our daughter was settled in school here, and all of Cindy’s family lives here, so we decided to stay in Jacksonville,” he said. They chose Riverside for their home.
“I’ve lived in Riverside since about 2000,” Kuzel said. “I grew up in a historic neighborhood in Dallas, and Riverside just feels like home.”
He lives in an historic, 106-year-old home. “It’s been a slow renovation process.”
About 2010, he became involved with a fellow naval aviator, Jim Love, and helped him with his successful campaign for City Council. He became Jim’s executive assistant.
“Jim was called the CO, and I was called the XO,” he recalled.
Kuzel says he values the lessons he learned in the military. “I learned to listen to and rely on the knowledge of those in charge, to plan ahead and not rely solely on technology, and to be reliable, on time, loyal and always show respect.”
“People come up to me all the time and say thank you for your service,” said Kuzel. “I always look back at them and tell them that if it wasn’t for their tax dollars then I would not have been able to do my job. We’re one big team, this nation as a whole.”
By Karen Rieley
Resident Community News
(No Ratings Yet)
Loading... 
