REFLECTIONS ON A BLESSED AND HAPPY LIFE NO 23 WORLD WAR II

As mentioned before, the years of WWII matched almost exactly my years at Concordia Academy for grades 9-12.

Preface: I want to be very clear. World War II was not about me. I did no heroics, performed no great acts, and endured no great personal sacrifice. Compared to so many others my life was easy. Millions suffered and died. Many Americans (and other) families suffered terrible deprivation, pain and loss. Many of my fellows Americans were incredibly brave. They represented me. They saved the USA from enemies. I am the beneficiary of all of this valor, patriotism and sacrifice. So while I reflect upon my life during those days I do so in great humility and clarity of understanding that I had it easy.

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My years in high school very nearly match the years of the USA being officially at war in WWII.  I entered high school September 5,1941 and Japan bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7,1941. Germany surrendered to the allies on May7, 1945; I graduated from high school on May 10,1945 and Japan surrendered on August 14, 1945.

I had gone home for the weekend and was “playing catch” out in our back yard with my siblings on that Dec. 7th afternoon. My father came out and in a very serious voice ordered us all into his “study”. There he informed us that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor. He knew it meant war and that would have incredible consequences for the world. He had us all sit and join him in prayer.

It immediately came close to home. The son of a neighbor was in the Navy and at Pearl Harbor. He was serving on the US Arizona and we knew it was hit by Japanese bombs…and by New Year’s Day the family had received word that he was officially “missing in action:” We feared the worst. He was eventually declared, “Killed in action.”

In a spirit of patriotism many of the young people enlisted. Soon my Father received confidential letters from the military. We lived in a German community and many of the servicemen from that community volunteered or were chosen to do confidential interpretation, code breaking and similar work. My dad had been their grade school principal and knew that many of them never went to high school. He very carefully documented their expertise in their native German language and vouched for their patriotism.

It became a time for us to follow the news with great interest. We listened to the radio. At Concordia Academy we had only one newspaper available to us in the library and we perused it eagerly.

Soon the streets were filled with men (and a few women) in uniform. Then we all experienced rationing. My parents carefully used their sugar-rationing card to get sugar to can fruits and vegetables. Dad had an A classification for his gasoline allotment and he was always determined to use as little gasoline as possible. No new tires. Old ones were recapped.

The military training activity around us became intensified. When we lived in Walburg we saw tanks rumble by our house on maneuvers from Ft. Hood to Camp Swift. When we moved to San Antonio we were completely amid airmen from all the airbases there. My trips to and from home were all by “hitchhikers thumb.“ The courtesy rule for us non-military was that we would stand at the end of the line so that they would get preference.

Even as there was good news about the Allies advance there was always great anxiety, as we personally knew so many friends and relatives on the front lines. We kept the newspaper maps and articles handy. New names became familiar: Iwo Jima, Anzio, The Dessert Fox, Doolittle, MacArthur, and Eisenhower etc. etc. It was a time of great anxiety always mixed with the hope for an early victory.