I often think of lost friends. At Fremont High School in ’39 the California National Guard had a program where students could attend a weekly evening one-hour meeting and get paid $30 per month. My neighbors and classmates, Bob and Bill Wilson tried to interest me in this easy money, but I had read Dalton Trumbo’s WW1 novel, “Johnny got his gun” and that book scared me to abhor the threat of being cannon fodder. During the Fall of ’41, I went to Exposition Park and sat with Bill and Bob where the 160th Infantry was assembled. The boys were sleeping that night in pup tents waiting for transportation to the Philippine Islands. In this visit I wished them well but said nothing about my resolve to avoid being cannon fodder. About 4 months later we got the word that Mac Arthur had surrendered the 160th to the Japanese, affirming my resolution to keep out of it.

I had a job which deferred my being drafted. My draft card had granted the deferment until “Nov. 31st 1943, a joyful “typo” since November only has 30 days.

Many other friends had volunteered to enlist, Bill Adamson, Jerry Jolequer, Chester and Ervin Mateer, Jack Watts, Tom Magurty, Walter Blighly and others forgotten and numerous. I had a new auto and worked 80 hours per week, but one tired day in July ’43, Chester’s grandmother asked me across the backyard fence “Why aren’t you over there fighting?” To avoid further embarrassment, I chose to volunteer(in lieu of being drafted into the army) in a non-combatant outfit; the Sea bees “Join the Navy and follow your trade”.

At Boot Camp we had Marine Corps Drill Instructors, 40 mile marches with 40 pounds of equipment, bayonet practice, obstacle courses, short haircuts, followed by weapons training in anti aircraft target shooting, trench mortars rifle range, building barbed wire entanglements, amphibious obstacles, live ammo belly crawling, the whole infantry tamale. I was a re-enforcement in the 6th NCB relieved from Guadalcanal, entititled to wear the shoulder patch of the 1st Marines.

47 days on a troopship, one night in May ’45 I clambered down a cargo net into an LCI and under heavy overhead lighting by AA fire at a Japanese obsevation plane, waded ashore on an Okinawan beach to pitch my shelter half.

We were put to work building roads and harbor improvements, never saw any Japanese and were never close to any of the action known as “The Battle of Okinawa” and all felt relieved two and a half months later when we were told about the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and that we could forget about the plan for us to take the beaches of Honshu.

Bob Wilson died on the Bataan Death March. Tom Magurty was shot down defending London from a Blitz. Jack Watts was lost at sea. Jerry Jolequer was shot down over France. Walter Blighly was shot down over New Guinea and Bill Adamson was shot down on the last day of the European War over Ploesti Rumania.

XB-19 after completion

Bob continued working at Interstate Aircraft (by now part of Douglas) as an illustrator this year on the XB-19 project. He worked on the maintenance manual for the XB19 at this time. He replaced the project leader, Oliver Shea, after he was fired for taking too much vacation. He did much of the illustration, but when Tom Armstrong came aboard, after being fired by Walt Disney for striking, the quality really shot up. There might be a copy of this manual at some aircraft museum, such as the one at Wright Field. Bob said it is a real work of art. Robert took a 2 week vacation this summer, and climbed Mount Whitney with his friend Tim Gorline. They painted their initials within 100' of summit on steep west side in red paint. Also on this trip they climbed San Gorgonio. This proved to be too long a vacation, and Bob was fired when he got back, and then immediately drafted. His uncle Bob determined he was headed for the Army, but managed to get him a spot in the Navy Seabees, where he became a 3rd class machinist mate, which paid over $90/month. He then went off to boot camp, finally winding up with the CBMU 570 (Maintenance Unit of the Sea Bees).

About 9/1/43, he railroaded to Boot Camp, Camp Peary VA (Now the training camp for the FBI) to train with the 18th Super CB. About 11/1/43 Bob joined the CB maintenance Unit 570 at the Amphibious Training Base at Hutchinson's Island, Fort Pierce FL.(Construction and training support for the US Navy demolition Teams and for the Joint Army-Navy Experimental and Testing Board.aka JANET).

Bob remembers he managed to get 2-3 weeks leave for the holidays this year. He had to go N to NYC, where he went to the top of the Empire State Building. He heard a commotion when he got there: a man had just jumped off. When he got down to street level, they were still mopping up the blood. He went into a candy store, and when people saw his uniform, ushered him to the front of the line, where he got a nice box of chocolates. When he got to L.A., he gave them to his girlfriend, Robin Patterson. He only had 5 days at Christmas before he had to head back to base.

Boot camp?

Bob with sister Marian

Bob, Thor, and new niece Janet in carriage