Herman Amerland Balow joined the Navy in June of 1940 and completed his basic training at the Naval Station Great Lakes in Illinois. He served on the USS Meredith (DD-434), USS Flusser (DD-368), USS Kasaan Bay (CVE-69), and the Naval Frontier Base in San Francisco.

As a metalsmith first class, Balow was a highly skilled metalworker who was responsible for a wide range of tasks related to the maintenance and repair of ships and aircraft to keep them in fighting condition. His duties might have included laying out and fabricating metal construction, fitting and repairing pipes and tubing, maintaining tanks and watertight fixtures, fabricating and repairing aircraft sheet metal, piping, radiators, and instruments, welding, machining, and forging aircraft parts, and maintaining fire fighting equipment and breathing apparatuses.

After his service, Balow and his wife Laurel moved to La Crosse. He owned and operated a wallpapering and painting business. Balow loved to fish on the Mississippi River and was a member of a local Masonic lodge. After retiring from his painting business, he volunteered at Gundersen Lutheran Medical Center.