Pennsylvania HB 740: An Act designating the entire portion of Pennsylvania Route 232 within the Borough of Rockledge, Montgomery County, as the PFC Helmut Boehm Memorial Road.

Bill Text

PRINTER'S NO. 764
THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF PENNSYLVANIA
HOUSE BILL
No. 740
Session of
2025
INTRODUCED BY SANCHEZ, McANDREW, GIRAL, GUENST, PIELLI, KHAN,
WARREN, FREEMAN, HILL-EVANS, GREEN AND GILLEN,
FEBRUARY 26, 2025
REFERRED TO COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION, FEBRUARY 26, 2025
AN ACT
Designating the entire portion of Pennsylvania Route 232 within
the Borough of Rockledge, Montgomery County, as the PFC
Helmut Boehm Memorial Road.
The General Assembly of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania
hereby enacts as follows:
Section 1. PFC Helmut Boehm Memorial Road.
(a) Findings.--The General Assembly finds and declares as
follows:
(1) Private First Class Helmut Boehm was born April 6,
1925, in the Village of Herold in the Erzgebirge region of
Saxony, Germany, to Oskar and Anna Boehm.
(2) At the age of three, PFC Boehm came to the United
States with his parents and siblings and settled in the
working class neighborhood of Olney in the City of
Philadelphia.
(3) After graduating from Olney High School in 1943, PFC
Boehm was drafted into the United States Army and served as
an Ambulance Orderly (Private First Class) in the 479th Motor
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Ambulance Company during World War II.
(4) Deployed less than one month after D-Day in 1944,
PFC Boehm commenced his service during the heavy Operation
Overlord combat through the Hedgerows of Normandy, France.
(5) Driving an ambulance into combat areas, PFC Boehm
continually transported the wounded from the battlefield to
evacuation airstrips and field hospitals while providing
emergency treatments, administering necessary injections,
blood plasma and medications and applying bandages until the
wounded were successfully evacuated to safety.
(6) PFC Boehm continued these mission-critical duties
until liberating the Buchenwald Concentration Camp near the
end of World War II.
(7) PFC Boehm saw action in Northern France, Belgium and
the Ardennes (Battle of the Bulge), the Rhineland (Remagen
Bridge) and Germany.
(8) PFC Boehm was awarded the Bronze Star for his
voluntary participation in a night mission to evacuate the
wounded trapped behind enemy lines during the Battle of the
Hürtgen Forest in November 1944.
(9) After the cessation of hostilities, PFC Boehm was
tasked with the evacuation of many refugees fleeing the
Soviet Army in Eastern Europe.
(10) After returning from Europe and the war, PFC Boehm
worked as an industrial painter and undertook an
apprenticeship along with vocational electrician training.
(11) PFC Boehm was married to his wife, Elfriede Edith
Schwarzkopf, for 66 years and had one son, Gerald, one
daughter, Cheryl, six grandchildren and one great-grandson.
(12) Private First Class Helmut Boehm passed away June
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10, 2024, at 99 years of age.
(b) Designation.--The entire portion of Pennsylvania Route
232 within the Borough of Rockledge, Montgomery County, is
designated as the PFC Helmut Boehm Memorial Road.
(c) Signs.--The Department of Transportation shall erect and
maintain appropriate signs displaying the name of the road to
traffic in both directions on the road.
Section 2. Effective date.
This act shall take effect in 60 days.
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