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A year after the 'Day of Infamy'
December 7, 1941 ... Franklin D. Roosevelt urged Americans to observe the Dec. 7th first anniversary as a day of silence ... "in the remembrance of a great infamy."
He did not deliver an address on that date nor take official notice of the anniversary. On this sixty-first anniversary, we still remember, but not so quietly. Such an observance now is usually a media event, which isn't all bad. The young see the attack on Pearl Harbor over and over so they will remember too ... it can happen.
In November 1942, a plane with a pair of gliders in tow were spotted near McCook and the Bystander reported, "multi-motored bombers are as numerous over McCook as 'grasshoppers' were back in 1939 ... and not a ship has landed as yet on the new field." He also noted that some of the truck drivers were of the age that they would soon be "wheeling P-38's over Africa and the Pacific. A P-38 is one rig on which they can't dent fenders, but look out Axis!"
The Gazette of Nov. 24 noted that since McCook was on an almost direct air line with Wichita, Kan., to Alliance, Neb., the big bombers towing troop and cargo gliders were presumed to be on their way from the factory in Wichita to the airfield in Alliance. The aerial "trains" were almost a common sight by late November.
"The Bystander" in the Nov. 21, 1942, McCook Daily Gazette said that he heard that men were leaving McCook just as fast as they had come in to take the new jobs on the Army Air Field. Construction men pretty much had their pick of jobs at that time and many of these men were from Texas, Missouri and Oklahoma. McCook had been experiencing its first real cold weather and snow flurries ... and the men were heading back towards warmer weather. The columnist got his information from, "a fellow whose job lets him watch the roads leading out of town."
There were 127 acres for sale at the north end of Main Avenue offered by Carl Marsh. There were 46 acres under cultivation and the balance in good grass. You also got an all-modern 5-bedroom house, good barn, silo, stanchions for five cows and a big chicken house. Wonder how much that same 127 acres would sell for today with its "improvements."
Book Week was celebrated at Valentine (East Ward) school on Nov. 20, with a parade of storybook characters in the school auditorium. Mrs. Emmett Trosper and Millicent Slaby were the judges. Among those winning prizes were Suzanne Gochis as "Scarlet O'Hara," Betty Breland as "Donald Duck," Donald Motter as "Mr. McGregor," Norma Steel as "Cinderella" and Marilee Mattox as "Daisy Mae."
Staff Sgt.Ralph Felling, for whom the east side ball field is named, was learning to fly the Army's Winger Commando troop and cargo gliders at the South Plains Army flying school at Lubbock, Texas, according to an item in the Personals of Monday, Nov. 23, 1942, Gazette.
Mrs. Ivan Smith was in the news again in November. The U.S. Navy was going to select a typical Navy Mother and McCook swung into action to nominate and promote their very own Eunice Smith. She had three boys in the service, two in the Navy: William, who was in radio aviation at Pearl Harbor the morning of Dec. 7, 61 years ago, and Robert, Yeoman on the U.S.S. Pennsylvania. She wrote the song which was adopted by the Navy Mother of America as their official song. She also assisted in starting McCook's Navy Mothers club six months before this announcement. They started with 20 and at this time in Nov. 1942, had 70 members.
A few days later, on Nov. 24, there was a story on the front page of the Gazette identifying William Smith as one of the men being rescued from a disabled Catalina flying boat. Several McCook boys stationed in Hawaii took the Gazette and Bill saw his own photo on page 3 of the Oct. 29, 1942, Gazette. Without referring to the accident or giving any details, he had written to his parent in McCook, told them to look at the photo and had written, "That's us."
Harry Jenkins of Norcatur, Kan., had an ad in the Nov. 27, 1942, Gazette advertising his upcoming auction. "Hitler destroys machine shop business of Jenk's Shop" was the headline on the ad. Jenk went on to add that he was going out to "help lick the stuffin' out of him" before he could ruin someone else's business.