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But you think the letter might be around someplace.
Sure, I think so.

And a few days later the policeman in our small town of Ardsley knocked on the door. He had a terrible sad face so my mother didn't have to worry when he showed up, because she knew that I had been wounded and not killed.

When did your brother go in the service? Had you been wounded before or after?
I dunno for sure. He went off in China someplace. He fixed teeth in China for the duration.

So you should have been a dentist instead of a barber.
Thank goodness, as I look at my afterlife so to speak, I've had a much more pleasant life than he has.

Well I can't imagine a life spent looking at people's teeth...
But he's a great craftsman, an excellent dentist, and for him there's real joy in that. For me it would not be there.

OK so you were in England and you had some adventures. Have you described as many adventures that you can think of?
No but enough [laughs]! I don't know . It was a good time. I enjoyed the hospital camaraderie . Oh yea, one other thing. The leader of the French underground, I'm trying to remember the name of it, was a patient in the hospital also and I could speak French. I'd recently been studying French like four or five years before and so I was able to read, translate the news to him. "Maquis" which was the underground. So I was his translator and that was fun.

Oh Maquis is the name of the French underground? There's a thing on Star Trek where this underground group on another planet is named Maquis. I thought they made up the name, so that's probably where they got it.
They must have made it up somewheres.

Well maybe it means "French underground" or something.
Could be.

I wanted to ask you about your neck. We are always talking about your hand but.
Oh it was hit the same time as my hand was. But there's no effect from that, there was no cause for concern..Oh it hasn't enhanced my looks any.

tape ends, go to second side

Going back into active duty. You said you were so bored that you would go back to active duty and you were describing going back on the ship.
Right.

Before applying for active duty, I spent some time in the hospital but before that I came back on the ship.

oh
Before I came back they came to me and said "Well you're going back to the states" Won-derful. So the train picked us up and we traveled all night on the train which was exceedingly uncomfortable and the thing I remember was a buddy and I found a spot on the train which was really nice. It was in this room that had mattress sort of things on it. So we went to sleep in the room which was great and so we're sound asleep in the train and in the middle of the night I had to go to the john which is one of the things which has plagued me all my life, and so I got up to go out to go to the john and the door was locked. So there was a little window there And I started pounding on the door and somebody came and looked in the window and I tried to get across that I'd like to go to the john and he looked in and he shook his head which was too bad. And the next guy came along, same sort of a deal! I can't... they're crazy. In the meantime, I don't know whether I wet my pants or what happened. At any rate it was getting pretty bad and getting near daylight and finally some guy came along and let us out. Come to find out we were in a padded cell, the two of us and we had a wonderful sleep. They must have had padded cells for some of our war wounded.

So I looked out the window and we were going through this town and I opened the window and yelled out at a guy I said "What town is this?" and he says [imitating brogue] "a quarta afta eight". So we were in Scotland. [laughs]

And we wound up at the Firth of Something-or-other and got on this beautiful ship, the Rotterdam, which was the third largest ship afloat those days. Beautiful vessel and crossing the Atlantic we hit of course on of the worst storms they'd had in years.

Did you get seasick then?
I came close but I didn't. And it was a great experience. I enjoyed watching the waves come shooting over the bow, it was very exciting. The other thing I learned there was how to do my disappearing card trick. One of the guys there knew how to do it and he taught me how to do it so as I lay in my bunk there all I did was practice the trick and by the time I was back, in the states I could do it pretty well. And so I've had that with me all my life. I did learn something, as you can see from the war.

We wound up back in Staten Island. What a wonderful pleasure it was to see New York City! lit up at that time. All lit up as we approached the harbor and we arrived at a hospital on Staten Island. And the other thing that I'll never forget is the fact that at each person's place at the table was a bottle of milk. Now you don't realize how wonderful milk is until you don't have any for a while. So there it was. Now , not only that, but I was able to get a pass because my Dad's office you could almost see from the hospital, so I got to go see my father and boy was he happy.

I didn't know your father was alive then. When did he die?
He died later. I got to visit him at his office and he was so proud.
and we also went home and I came back. Then from Holleran general hospital I was shipped out to, oh can't think of the town. Where do they have the big race, the biggest horse race of them all

You mean in New York?
No every year, Derby Day... well we were shipped down to this city where the Kentucky Derby's held and there I was and I stayed there and I stayed there and got fat. I ran from a hundred and forty ponds to a hundred and eighty pounds.

Milkshakes! Boy did I have milkshakes. That was a good experience but it got exceedingly boring so I applied for active duty. With that I was assigned as a classification and assignment specialist, in other words I interviewed people and assigned them jobs in the service.

So you were into personnel right off.
And that's where I met your mother. I interviewed her and I could see by the form that she was quite intelligent and I asked what she could do and what she'd like to do and asked her if she'd like to go out with me the next night.

Is she the only person that you did that with?
She was the only one. I was exceedingly successful. It may have been the ribbons I was wearing something of that sort.
Well you are good looking...
Yes

Any rate that's how that happened.

So you never asked any other WACs.
No, no.

Was that early on?
I dunno...

So you met Mom and you dated her, how long?
It didn't take very long and we arranged for a marriage at the post.

So your father died somewhere along in there.
My father died when I was down in Kentucky and I was flown back. Red Cross was most helpful. That was my third ride on an airplane. I got back quicker than my brother who was in Philadelphia got back. I got back in a rush.

He died of a stroke?
Yup

So he wasn't in a hospital or anything.
No he left for work that morning and he was a commuter, left for work, and while he was working he had this tremendous headache and he said "I'd better go to the hospital and see a doctor or something" and he died on the street in New York someplace.
 

So when you came home you were taking care of the funeral and your Mom.
Both. My twin brother got home and... One of the interesting things about the funeral was this was during rationing and my mother always said that's the biggest line of cars they've had here since they started rationing; so he was a very popular guy.

So then you went back to Kentucky and then Fort Dix.
No when I applied for active duty I wound up at ... where did "I shall never see a place as lovely as a tree?.. What was the name of the author of that?

Dickinson?
No Kilmer

Oh, Joyce Kilmer. Camp Kilmer.
That's where you met Mom.
That's where I interviewed her.

Where was that?
New Jersey, near New Brunswick New Jersey
We were married and we lived near a place called Hyde Park just outside of New Brunswick for a bit. And then it was time to get discharged and we both got discharged and started our life.

The war was over then.
Yea

Was the war over before you got married?
I dunno, think so, probably.
See we had to finish the war in Europe and that we had to get done with the war in Japan so I don't know if they were both completed by the time we headed for home.

Well I think that covers the war. Is there anything else you think I should have asked?
No if I'd been prepared ahead of time, I might have been able to draw up a set of questions let alone answers [smile]
I felt the complete experience was a very good one for me - certainly made me order the rest of my life and I feel I've done fairly well.

So do you feel that the war changed you in any way?
Absolutely instead of being a.. I thought I was a real big shot... instead of being really impressed with myself, I was able to realize that there were other people in this world so I devoted the rest ... devoted sounds very something-or-other... but I spent the rest of my life any way in a very enjoyable time serving others and that's the way I see it winding up.

How about house keeping and stuff. Did being in the service get you organized? Or did the boys choir do that?
That's right, as a child I became very organized in housekeeping shall we say and perhaps one of the reasons for my divorce was the fact that I felt I was pretty I was pretty neat - in the literal sense of the term- a neat guy and my wife who was a - less neat. I guess is the best I can say.
Much less neat.

So you came out of the war a different person.
I think so.

So it was pretty much your outlook on other people and your place in society that changed.
That's right. The realization that I really wasn't such a big shot and its only until very recently that I've been able to feel that I am a big shot [laughs] that's because of age and experience. But I've had some very successful things and as a result I feel very good, but not superior, I'm able to enjoy and experience people from all walks of life.

So how did you think you were a big shot before you went into the war.
Because I had a college diploma!
Boy I was right up there.

But your friends had college diplomas didn't they?
Some of em.

The people you went to college with had college diplomas.
That's right, that's right But I always felt I was an underachiever, that I was far superior whatever it was I was doing.

Oh if you really went to town you could show people what you could do.
Were you told you were an underachiever?
Many times
My mother impressed that on herself a lot.

What'd your father think of you?
Well there were times I think he was quite proud of me. He was very proud of me after I was wounded and I came home with a bandage on. Very proud. Embarrassingly proud. We had to up some stairs and we had to go from one train to another in our suburb we had to transfer trains from one to another, to go up and over and I can remember the line of people their and he was saying really loud "Are you all right, Bob?"
[Cathy laughing] I said "Why don't you shut up"... No I didn't.

I'm sure that was going on in your mind.
But he certainly over the years wasn't able to be proud of me because of my scholastic achievements, but he was quite proud of my war service.

He wasn't so impressed with your college degree then.
[laughs] No, neither was I , not really. No I was. The fact I had it was something. I don't say they just handed it to me, but I did have to do a little work. When I went back to school twenty years later, it was a different thing. I enjoyed it immensely and was quite productive.

Well I can really relate to that. You were probably at Hobart you were practicing your social skills.
Well social and business. I wound up at Hobart College with a profit of $400.

Most folks go to college and they wind up in debt, but I did very well in various activities from short order cook to cleaning establishment salesperson.

I didn't know about this! My dad the money maker... This is what the war did to you.
Yep. I was the student manager of the student union.

Yes I met someone who .. I told them that my dad may have been the cause of SAGA (a college food service, somewhat like Marriott) Can you elaborate of that?
Well they had a student union at Hobart College and one of the guys that followed me in that position was also student manager of the student union and he has since operates a chain of Student unions where people eat, including the one at Springfield college at that time.

I want to thank you for this interview.
 

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