Saturday, January 1, 2011
What I did in World War 2
My grandson, Taylor was told by his teacher to interview his grandparents about the War. This is what I wrote for him, I graduated from high school in 1941, I attended Washburn College in the fall. My family owned a family car and a pickup truck. I got to drive that the most as my sister had a boyfriebd without a car so she took that. On December was Pearl Harbor. I had known about the European war because our neighbors to the north had to move from the Nazis. He was a psychrist at Mennigers while he got a US license. His stepdaughter was half Jewish. The male students started leaving the school. My husband to be was in the ROTC. My mother became a driver for the Red Cross and wore a neat uniform. Every holiday we had soldiers as guests. We had gas rationing and gas and meat stamps. I worked for my father and he had a filling station so I took care of gas stamps. Everyone rode the buses or if it was nice I rode my bike. My dad put it in the pickup and I drove home with him. A lot of his customers used the barter system for that was a time when you had your groceries delivered and we shopped at whatever grocery had a bill. College classes went on as usual except men students kept leaving for the armed forces. I do not think any of my classes were with air force but were with the navy. They took over the dorm and the sororitys. We had to move off campus. We went back to playing KU and KState. On December 1942 they tried a blackout in Topeka. It was not successful but the Japanese never attacked. My sister's boy friend went off to war as did my best friends and they decided we should do more then be hostesses at the USO so we decided to be Red Cross nurses aides. We went to class and Martha gave up but Helen and I stuck it out and got neat uniforms. We worked every Monday night and every other Sunday morning. Helen alwas worked maternity but they moved me around. There was a registered nurse on every floor. Monday nights I put people to bed. I gave them the bedpan and put all their flowers in the hall so the flowers would not take their oxygen while they slept. If I spilled the bed pan which I did once. It was my job to mop it up. There were no emergency rooms then at least not in Topeka so sometimes we were there. My mother had always told me to wear nice underwear when I went out in case I had a wreck but I found my job was to cut off whatever they were wearing and I never noticed if their underwear was great. We did great as USO hostesses as we had grown up with a pool table so played good pool and knew when it was polite to lose. As hostesses once a month they had a dance in the city hall which was fun but you were not allowed to turn anyone downwhen they asked you. By the time the war ended we had an airfield in Topeka and they were just back from the war. They did not want to talk they just sat and looked at you. Also you had to ride in a canvas topped truck and it was cold. At college we had a war bond rally and I was chosen to represent my soroity, I got third. I wore my $65.00 fur coat and was gracious in losing.Ray who I was dating at this time and he was editor of the school paper wrote an editorial about the football team wasn't very good but we should attend the school dance anyway. The team shaved off his hair. It had grown back when he was called into service and they cut his hair again but better. I finally graduated in 1944 and went to San Diego to visit my older sister Ethel. My mother stayed on and I had to get back to teach school. They had blood drives and I always gave blood until they told me I needed my blood more than they did but I did get my gallon pin. (More another day).
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