[Dixielandjazz] PBS series "The War"

[Larry Walton Entertainment - St. Louis]

George Thurmond.....
> But the series is best for bringing home to us what those guys
> and gals went through and endured, and what our armed forces are now
> experiencing.  The cold and mud of France, and the heat and sand of Iraq
> - it's the same hell!
_________________________________________

I was 6 when the war ended but I was kept in one of those day care places 
that they showed.  The one I stayed in was a lot bigger than the one they 
showed with the loving moms and all.  The thing I remember about it was 
there were almost no toys for about 75 kids and no Moms either.  There was 
some guy that worked as a maintenance man who made toys for us.

My parents worked in an aircraft factory.  They worked 12 hour days with a 
weekend and sometimes 8 hour days without a weekend.  They would take me to 
the "school" before light and pick me up after dark.  Not a lot of family 
time here.  The best times were when I was sick and stayed with the lady 
down the street who would make eggnog with bourbon for me.

The food was awful at the "school" and the same every week.  Thursday was 
boiled onions in powdered milk.  They called it onion soup.  I couldn't get 
the stuff past my teeth but kids had to eat everything.  So on Thursdays I 
would get to sit with that in front of me till my parents picked me up at 
night.  I could do the powdered milk and eggs but needless to say I'm not 
too fond of onion soup to this day.

I was never so happy for VJ day in all my life and I got to go to a real 
school with real stuff like Crayolas.  One thing that hit me right between 
the eyes in that series is the little kid, about 5, in the army uniform and 
cap.  I had one exactly like it and that kid could have been me.

I too remember the scrap drives and flattening out the cans.  That was 
something a little kid could do and I learned to count with ration points at 
the store.  There were guys who came around with horse drawn wagons who 
would give you a quarter for an old tire and a penny a pound for scrap 
metal.   At night I could watch the search lights and sometimes we had 
blackouts.  My grandparents were Diabetic so we got their sugar ration. 
They were training pilots in WWI Jenny's and they flew over my house. 
Sometimes on the weekend we would get on a streetcar and go to a park where 
they had band concerts.  I liked that.  We found a large box of condoms 
under a neighbors porch.  Cool balloons.  For some reason the neighborhood 
moms were upset about it.

There wasn't a whole lot of music in my house but we did have a radio and we 
would listen to programs on Sundays.  My parents liked to dance, they would 
take me and I would hang out with the band.  I would just sit there and 
watch them play which is probably why I know so many of the songs today.

Until I was 15 we had been in a war almost my whole life and that's what was 
normal to me so I joined at 17 before they could draft me.  I was pretty 
sure I didn't want to end up in a hole somewhere or freezing like the guys 
did in Korea.

For those of you who are younger it was a different time and absolutely 
nothing like today in the way we lived, thought and the way we were 
entertained.  There were 14-15 year old kids in some of those bands that I 
listened to.  No one thought anything about it.  The Ken Burns documentary 
only touches on what it was like but I guess you really can't go back.
Larry
StL