The Tragedy of War

by Bob Laudie

War creates many strange and odd situations as I found out on my arrival in England in May, 1943. I was a Bombardier-Navigator on the six man crew of a Martin B-26 bomber named, "Little Lulu." We were "Marauder" men, as the bomber was called. It had other names: "The Widow Maker," "The Flying Coffin," and "The Flying Prostitute" (because it had no visible means of support due to it's small wing surface).

Twenty-nine crews of us left Barksdale Field, in Shreveport, Louisiana, the late afternoon of Sunday, May 2, 1943, for the long hot train trip to Savanna, Georgia. The train was old, humid, crowded and dirty, and the soot filled smoke from the engine fogged into the open windows. We finally arrived at our destination at noon, Tuesday the 4th, tired, sweaty, dirty and excited. We were off to new adventures and uncharted, unknown places. I had conned the engineer of the train to let me ride in the engine with him one day on the long trip which was fun, however.

We dubbed our assigned, brand spanking new Marauder, Little Lulu. Friday, May7th, we headed north to Presque Isle, Maine, and WAR. Little Lulu's crew did manage to stay in Time's Square, New York, for four days on the way because the crew made certain, or thought they saw saw a "cloud" over the hotel, and so better to wait a few days. We finally left New York and spent two days in Presque Isle while we waited for the weather to clear for the next leg of our long trek to England.

Sunday, May 16, we flew the few hour trip from Presque Isle to cold, snow covered Goose Bay, Labrador. After much scrutiny of films, maps and briefings, we departed for BWI, located on the glacier ice cap at the end of a long narrow Fjord in southern Greenland. Finally, the weather was right and we were cleared to fly over the ice cap and on to Meets Field Iceland. The last stop on our way to Harham, England was Prestwic, Scotland. Little Lulu's crew was sent on to Rovington, north of London for a week to become familiar with British communication systems and it was here I experienced by Tragedy of War.

One evening while exploring the local area, I happened on a festival of some kind with dancing and a small bar with chairs or stools next to the bar. Wanting to learn more about the activities in progress, I sat down next to a man in a British uniform and struck up a conversation with him. We exchanged the usual small talk that people engage in first meeting such as exchange of names and where you are from. I had expected a location in England from him so I was very surprised when he said he was from Poland. As we sat drinking our warm English mild and bitter beer, he continued his story. He was in the Polish Army when the German tanks rolled through and overran the Polish Army on September 1, 1939. He had been captured and conscripted into the German Army. In time, his unit was sent to North Africa with Rommel's divisions to fight against the British forces there as France and Great Britain declared war against Germany when Poland was attacked.

As his bottle was now empty, I bought both of us a new warm beer and urged him to continue. It was in North Africa in late 1942 and early 1943 that the Allied Forces finally defeated the German military and captured many of the units. My new beer drinking friend was on of those rounded up and in time offered to don a British Army uniform and fight against the Germans again.

He had fought against, with, and now against the German forces. I asked him if this had created a problem of loyalty for him as I guessed it would have. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a very worn, faded picture of a pretty young woman and a young baby. "This is my wife and baby-I have not seen them since I was captured in 1939 by the Germans," he answered in a soft voice. "I will fight in any military just to get this war over so I can return to my wife and daughter. That is my loyalty!"

I had no answer but I understood, and have wondered many times if he ever returned to His Loyalty.

I Love a Parade

by Pat Brokaw

With the annual Homecoming Game and Parade coming in a few months, I began to reflect on the many parades I have enjoyed over a period of more than 80 years. As I think back, I have only a hazy memory of most of them, but they certainly were an important and interesting part of my life.

The Macy's Thanksgiving parades have a long history, and many people all over the country have been able to enjoy them since the TV screen has been displaying spectacular floats as the bands and marchers make their way down the streets of New York City every Thanksgiving Day. I grew up in East Orange, New Jersey, and an associate store of Macy's in Newark matched its NYC counterpart with a parade of its own. Bamberger's Department Store was a very popular store in Newark, and people from neighboring cities and towns turned out to watch the local marching bands and floats for many years while I was growing up, and even when I married and had a family, we continued the tradition since it was a great introduction to the Christmas season. Also, all that fresh air stimulated our appetite for turkey dinner! I guess the local parade faded into extinction once Macy's was shown on national TV.

In 1954 we bought our first house in Edison, New Jersey. Nearby Metuchen had its own parade to introduce the Christmas season, and we excitedly lined the streets downtown on our first holiday season there. The parade lasted about 10 minutes. We were terribly let down. Somehow things improved greatly in the ensuing years, and it became an exciting event in our own lives for a long time.

Then, of course, there were the 4th of July parades, when Brokaw girl and boy scouts as well as Little Leaguers marched on a sunny (hot) day, and we parents cheered them on. Dad usually had a tear in his eye and a lump in his throat as the young people marched by. the United States flag had the same effect on him (probably because of his four years in the Marine Corps).

Our youngest child, Jean, took baton twirling lessons while we lived in Harrisonburg, Virginia, and, of course, there were weekly parades all summer long in the nearby towns on Friday afternoons. The marchers had to be very careful when they followed the horses that sometimes participated in the parade!

When we moved to Iowa City in 1976, we were introduced to the University of Iowa Homecoming Parade. While the children were growing up, we faithfully attended those parades- sometimes in the cold or rain- and kept our tradition alive.

Now that I am living at Oaknoll, our group of 13 or so goes in style on the Oaknoll bus, attends the Chili Supper at the Methodist Church, then sits on folding chairs (brought along on the bus) and eagerly awaits the start of the parade. One year the groups that usually decorated a float with "disposable" theme-oriented items, voted to do something different. With the theme "The Excitement is Building," each float contained a section of wall, which would later be donated to Habitat for Humanity to help victims of the recent flood. This seemed like an inspired way to participate with a purpose.

What makes parades so unique and exciting? Is it the band music, the marchers' enthusiasm, the fresh air, the candy thrown to waiting but impatient children, or the general atmosphere of celebration? I would guess it is a little bit of each!

So, I hope parades will continue to thrive and give old and young alike the thrill of bands and marchers.

Hospitals

by Jonni Ellsworth (excerpt from her memoirs)

I have always lived in or near hospitals and sometimes it seems my life has been ruled by them. I was born in February, 1944 in the Philadelphia Naval Complex at the shipyard as my father was in the Navy. It would be over a year before he returned from the World War II pacific theatre. He had been educated first at Cornell University in Ithaca, NY, and then medical school at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec and residency at Cornell Medical Center in New York City. When the war broke out he was working as an internist at the state tuberculosis sanitarium in Ithaca and not so long after I was born, my mother and older sister, age 2 1/2, returned to Ithaca to live.

When he returned in the summer of 1945, we moved from our apartment on Buffalo Street to one attached to and opening into the hospital and he resumed work with TB patients. I remember little of this period up to that apartment but I do remember it. By then, I was 2 1/2 years old and walking and talking. I discovered-most likely by following him- that he sometimes didn't pay attention to quiet children below a certain height and that exploring the wards and getting to know the patients was a matter of staying close to the high desk that the receptionist sat in at the hospital's front hall so she couldn't see me and when she was distracted, darting through the glass doors into the wards. I usually didn't get very far until one of the orderlies spotted me and I was escorted firmly back to my apartment. The patients who were contagious were kept behind locked doors in separate wards so I wasn't in any real danger but I became quite used to large people in white coats, the smells of the wards and labs with their interesting equipment.

What I didn't become familiar with was other children my age to play with except when my mother made the effort to contact the families on the grounds for a play date. Most of their children were older so often my sister Ann (11 months older than me) and I played with each other. When she went to kindergarten, it was pretty lonesome. Mom would read to me and I could go visit the head of the hospital maintenance who lived in a building we called the "H" building. He had a female beagle who regularly supplied the hospital environment with puppies. The visits were cut short when one of the physicians acquired a German shepherd trained as an attack dog to, "teach his son responsibility." The dog was disposed of after it bit a policeman called out to investigate and had to be euthanized.

When I was old enough to attend kindergarten, my life perked up a bit.

Jazz in the Afternoon

Photo essay by Claudine Harris
(taken at the Iowa City Jazz Festival, July 3, 2011)

 They came early, well prepared to wait.

 The main stage struck a sharp silhouette.

 Listeners clustered under the trees, sprawled

 on blankets, chatted with friends, wandered over

 to the many food stands on Iowa Avenue, . . .

 

...or found a shady ledge for a musical snooze

Oaknoll's Crabapple Tree

by Sam Becker

I sit in your courtyard
An ever-changing life- an ever-changing show,
Reminding you of all lives' constant flow.

In spring I don a colorful cloak
To brighten and cheer your days,
To show the beauty of life's ways.

In summer I turn a mass of green; lo,
A shelter for birds within,
And shade for Oaknollians below.

In fall new colors show
Tan and orange and brown.
Slowly, my leaves drift down.

In winter I stand and gaunt and bare,
Arms stretched out as though in prayer.

Like you, I need some time to rest.

But then spring comes again,
I waken, return to life refreshed.
God-blessed by sun and rain,

The cycle starts again.

The Books of My Childhood

By Kay Green (excerpt from her memoirs)

I have been a reader ever since my early childhood. Plus, my mother read aloud often. I have felt sorry that many of the so-called "series" books have disappeared from current usage. I know that many of today's children's books stir the imagination.

My childhood favorites often taught history or geography or good moral values. Of course, Elsie Dinsmore was a stupidly moral tale which I could not stand.

One of the earliest ones I remember was Honey Bunch, Her First Trip on the Great Lakes (geography, even though the book wasn't too marvelous, I learned all about the five lakes).

Then there were the Twin books. I still have a copy of The Dutch Twins somewhere. The Belgian Twins depicted a child's view of some of the effects of World War I on the village where they lived.

Then we pick up some of the little maid books: The Little Maid of Old New York, Old Ft.The Little Maid of  Ticonderoga, and The Little Maid of Old Boston, give pictures of a child's view of events in the American revolution.

One of my favorites was The Little Colonel's House Party, which tells the story of a young girl's invitations to three friends to come for a month's visit in the home of the Little Colonel in Kentucky. The girls represent wealth, poverty but goodness, and a middle class artistic young lady from Kansas.

This story has some good sound moral values involved. One I remember was where Elizabeth had promised her godmother that she would mail a letter that must get on the evening train. They were all going to a picnic where games and fun were to be a part of the evening.

In the midst of the fun, Elizabeth remembers the letter in her pocket she had promised to mail. Slipping away quietly, she climbed on her horse to ride to the railroad station in the dark of night fearful of any who might accost her. The train whistled in the distance as she arrived at the station. The postmistress unlocked the mail bag and accepted the letter. Here was a clear example of a promise that must be kept.

Some other favorites were Heidi and A Little Princess. The latter tells the story of a child of a wealthy family whose mother is dead and whose father was somewhere in India. Her father had placed her in a private school where she was welcomed by Miss Minchen. When her father had apparently died, and her fortune was lost, all her luxuries were gone and she was reduced to the role of scullery maid and given a room in the attic.

My mom read aloud books like The Swiss Family Robinson and Robinson Crusoe. As I grew older, I read Louisa May Alcott's books, Little Women, Little Men, Jo's Boys, and Rose in Bloom, all of which depicted life in a different time and place.

I know that today's children would not be willing to read them, but I have done so several times, picturing in my mind the houses and scenes where they could have taken place. They have enriched my life so much and have reinforced my personal values a great deal. That's the viewpoint of a woman who has lived 87 years.

Stray

By Lois Muehl

(from her first collection of poetry, DARK/LIGHT, published by lulu press.)

Mind you, I wasn't
looking for a cat,
certainly not that scrawny
half-grown female
someone dumped on Friday.
I saw her first skulking
toward my bird feeder.
I knocked the window.
Cat froze. She blinked
her tawny eyes at me
but wouldn't move. I ran out
to shoo her off. Instead,
she arched around my feet,
purred to hint of a dish of milk,
a bite or two of chicken
would be welcome. So I fed
her hunger and my own,
once or twice stroking
her brown coat that, close up
seemed mixed of cinnamon,
nutmeg, cloves and saffron.
"Monday sure," I warned her,
"I'm calling the Shelter."
Sunday from the store
I brought home cat food
and a collar with a bell.
"Your name," I told her,
"is Spice."