BEFORE AND AFTER SUNDAY DECEMBER 7, 1941
It was Sunday December 7, 1941, and I had finished caddying 36 holes at Twin Hills Golf and Country Club. It was a pretty good day. Counting Saturday’s 18 holes, I was going home with four dollars and a quarter. The standard fee for 18 holes was a dollar. In those days, if you worked it right, you would get to caddy for the quarter and half dollar tippers and would leave the nickel and dime tippers to some one else. The Four and a quarter dollars would more than meet all of my needs for the coming week. I could take in a couple of movies, play a few games of pool or go down to the Trianon Ballroom and listen to Bob Wills and his band… and still have money left over.
I had caddied at Twin Hills for over three years, working my way up the ladder to the point I was about third or fourth in line for jobs. By this time I knew what each member would tip and what kind of car they drove. You could see the member’s parking lot from the caddy shack and you had to be inside to let the caddy master know you wanted the next job when the assistant Pro called for a caddy to come to the pro shop. The caddies who were in line ahead of me worked for the club during the week and caddied on the weekend. They got the choice jobs– the members that never paid less than two dollars for eighteen holes. As each Sunday ended it was a good practice to drop by the caddie shack and give the Caddy Master a couple of good-as- new golf balls that you usually found on the course. This was a small insurance payment toward getting out early and getting a good job the next weekend. The Caddy Master and Assistant Pro would resell the balls to club members.
As members left the club they would give any caddy standing near the gate a ride into town. As I got into the car that offered me a ride the driver ask if I had heard any news that day. I said “No,” because I had been out on the course all day. He said the Japanese had attached Pearl Harbor and sank several ships. I had trouble relating to this as I didn’t know where Pearl Harbor was.
As tragic as a war can be it took me in a direction I could not have dreamed I would travel if I had not spent several years in the army. The years I spent in the army were to my benefit. I had an opportunity to see first hand the destruction that was caused on December 7, 1941, at Pearl Harbor, and the magnificent recovered that ensued after the attack. I had four years to realize the opportunities were far greater with a degree from a University. The US Government offered to pay each GI, through the “GI Bill,” their tuition, buy all the textbooks and supplies, and give them a monthly stipend. What it amounted for, me was a month at the University for each month of service.
I lost three close friends in the war. My next door neighbor of eight years, Jack Pierce, killed in action. A member of the class of ‘42, Bruce Thompson, killed in action. Since there were only 15 boys in the class we were all real close. Tom Powers, a friend from the summers I spent in Shreveport, killed in action. I spent several summers in Shreveport with my Aunt and Uncle and Tom lived on the same block. Two members of the class of ‘43, Grant Cummings and Edgar Wilson, killed in action. They were not close friends only acquaintances, but we all knew each other and our immediate families.
Jack Pierce and I grew up together though our friends in school were different. He was a year behind me and his friends leaned more toward band activities and my friends leaned more toward football and baseball teams. One evening he asked me to do him a favor. There was a girl in his class he would like to visit and he would like for me to go with him to her house. When he told me it was Ruby Whetzel I immediately knew what his problem was. He really had two problems. First he had to get past Maxine, the biggest meanest-acting German Police dog in that part of Oklahoma. If he was successful in doing this without loosing part of his clothing, he would then have to convince Mr. Whetzel his intentions were honorable. No easy task. After a couple of these visits I had had enough and told him he was on his own.
After two years of war there were many significant changes in my life and the lives of all my friends. Jack Pierce had dropped out of school and joined the Air Force. The Air Force had trained him as a gunner on a B-24 in the State of Washington. While training in Washington he met and married a girl that lived in Washington and they had a boy before he left for overseas. The IT (Short for ITIO, Short for Indian Territory Illuminating Oil Company) moved the Whetzel family to Northern Oklahoma where Ruby graduated from Wynona High School in 1943.
Ruby E. Whetzel
LD Todd
L-5
I finished High School at Foster and five months later volunteered for the Army Air Force. I wasn’t sure what I had signed up for but it sounded interesting. I was to be trained as a Liaison pilot. The first three months of my training was to be as a civilian enrolled at Oklahoma Baptist University (OBUI) near Shawnee Oklahoma. It was to be a combination of learning to fly an air plane and ground school (navigation, meteorology and aerodynamics of Flight). After completing my training at OBU I was inducted into the Army at Fort Sill Oklahoma and transferred to Waco Army Air Force Base for further training as a Liaison pilot.
At Waco it was a combination of marching, hiking and PT (physical training) and a little flying plus ground school. After finishing Waco I was transferred to Lamesa Air Force Base, Lamesa, Texas for the completion of my Liaison pilot training.
While stationed at Lemsa I first realize the devastation war can have on an individual. This was about July 1943. I was exchanging letters with Tom Powers and we were telling each what our careers in the Army were all about. He was stationed in England and trained as a gunner on a B-17 and flying mission over Europe. I had written to him and explained what the duties of a Liaison pilot were and that I would graduate in a little over a month.
I had finished my finals and was assured I had passed all of the ground school courses and the only thing left for me to graduate was to take and pass a check ride the next day. On my way back to the barracks I stopped by the mail room. The mail clerk handed me a letter. I recognized it as the last one I had mailed to Tom Powers. Stamped across the front of the envelope was “RETURN TO SENDER, MIA.” Until now the war had been kind of remote, but now it was real personal to have one of your personal friends missing in action.
During the check ride the next day I knew things were going from bad to worse. About, thirty minutes into the ride the instructor said, “I don’t know what your problem is but your mind is not on flying this airplane. Take me back to the flight line and we will give it another try tomorrow before giving you a grade.” By the time I had returned to the barracks I new, the last nine months would be down the drain if I failed my check ride the next day. In my mind I knew I could fly an L-5 as good as anyone. Flying the L-5 was the coordination of hands, feet and eyes and a little common sense. I knew I had all of these in abundance. If I could to get my nerves under control I would be OK
As the next morning arrived I was on the flight line by 7:00 AM and confident I would pass the check ride. As we left the field I could see it was not going to be just another check ride. The instructor outlined what he wanted me to do with the emphasis on spot landings and forced landings. He controlled the throttle on all forced landings and I had to tell him where I would set the plane down when he pulled the throttle back. Even though we wore parachutes there was never any thought given to use them. You were expected to be capable of landing the plane safely any place any time you were forced down. After about two hours into the ride he gave me a thumbs up and said let go back to the flight line. With my check ride behind me I was assured of graduating.
I had two choices: a replacement pool of Liaison pilots in North Carolina or a Squadron stationed at Pollick Louisiana. I chose the Pollick assignment.
This offered me an opportunity to visit with Tom Powers parents, in Shreveport, to see if they knew what happened to him. They never found out what happened.
In January, 1944, I was home on furlough and Dad said he knew Ruby Whetzel was back in town visiting old friends. He said if I wanted to visit with her he would drop me off and pick me up later. By the time he came back for me Ruby and I were well along to renewing an old friendship. This time I had three things going for me. Maxine wasn’t around, I didn’t have to make small talk with Bill Whetzel and I didn’t have to leave until Ruby asked me to leave.
I was stationed in Paris, Texas, and made the trip to Oklahoma City each month until we got married in June, 1944. After our marriage we lived in Deport, Texas, until being transferred to Brownwood, Texas, and I joined the 163rd Liaison Squadron.
I was assigned to the 163rd Liaison squadron and we were on our way to the war in the Pacific. The squadron had a layover in Hawaii. Thinking back when I first heard of the attack, by the Japanese, I didn’t know where Pearl Harbor was. Now, three years later I was flying an Army Air Force plane and looking down on the Battleship Arizona sitting on the bottom of Pearl Harbor. Of the 1177 sailors still entombed in the ship one was a graduate of Foster High School Class of 1939, Billie Hamilton.
The layover in Hawaii was the prelude to participating in the invasion of Okinawa.
