The Last War Blog

It was ten years after the war, both my parents had died, I was working and my oldest brother had recently moved his relatively new bride into the farmhouse.

I had volunteered to help him with the haying on my day off and we were out in the "back fifty" with the tractor and wagon and had on a huge load of bales. All of a sudden he jumped down off the wagon yelling" FIRE!---FIRE!"" and stared running towards a column of smoke he had spotted in the direction of the house. "COME ON-- SOMETHING IS ON FIRE" he called back to me.

(Fire struck fear in the hearts of even the bravest farmers because of the losses suffered to it. In our own case,over the years, fire had taken 1) the barn--kids and matches, 2) the house--chimney fire 3) our father--gasoline fire.)

When we finally got within sight of the house, sure enough, there was a thick pall of smoke around it! He ran in the front door calling for his wife and I ran around back where the smoke seemed the thickest. There to my relief was my new sister-in-law tending to a large bonfire she had started.

When things calmed down a bit, we asked her what she was doing and were told she was"house -cleaning". The fire was obviously made from a large pile of paper that she had soaked with kerosene and it was literally "burning like a house on fire."

Turned out that she had cleaned out the huge bureau in an upstairs bedroom to make room for her "stuff". Trouble was the bureau had contained my brother's collection of every weekly issue of The Starweekly Magazine covering the entire World War II. This magazine was printed in the style of to-day's "Hello" tabloid. It consisted of only pictures with a short paragraph under each to explain them. The pictures were either photographs by war correspondents, or mostly water colour paintings done by war artists. The front cover was always a painting of an attacking airplane, tank, or warship in full colour. The only advertising that I remember was of pin-up girls urging you to buy Victory Bonds. My brother was very meticulous and each copy was in perfect condition. They were all in order of date and tied in a bundle for each year with a red xmas ribbon.

I glanced at my brother whose face was pale despite his farmers tan and he seemed to be almost shaking. Thinking WW lll was about to start any minute, I decided to head for the house for a drink of water. Looking back, I saw him put his arm around her and heard him tell her how worried he had been and how happy he was that she was ok---I guess love conquers all.

NEXT ----Going to the movies


Always remember
to forget
the things that
made you sad.
But never forget
to remember
the things that
made you glad.

_Gaelic insight

Helping The War Effort

During the last week of school in June 1942, a large army truck arrived at our country school.
The two young soldiers unloaded two big bales of jute bags and dragged them right up the steps and into the school. Their appearance seemed to fluster Miss Davis, our 1st year teacher who was not used to dealing with brash young men like these. They took right over and explained to us kids that they were enlisting all of us to help out with the war effort and even better, we would be paid for our work. They then handed Miss Davis some papers and left as quickly as they had arrived.

After studying the papers for a minute or so, Miss Davis enlisted some of the big boys to haul the bales into the library room, out of sight. Curiosity had us all on the edge of our seats, but the teacher told us we would have to wait until the last day of school on Friday to find out more.

You can imagine how excited we were by Friday. Finally, just before we were dismissed for the year, she had the bags dragged back out to the front of the classroom. She told us our
contribution to the war effort was to provide the materials to make synthetic rubber tires for the army and also life preservers for the navy! To our amazement, the army wanted us to pick MILKWEED, leaves (for the milk) for the tires and seed fluff for life preservers ( I think they called the fluff Kapoc). Furthermore they would pay us .08 cents a pound for leaves and .18 cents for fluff!

Since we all lived on farms, and all the farm pastures were full of an endless supply of milkweed, we had pictures of being rich when we cashed in next September. Everyone took several of the huge bags and the instruction sheet. (the report cards we had just received were largely ignored)

It turned out that this project had to be put on hold until August when the seed pods were ripe. They had to be picked first and at just the right time so the fluff was fluffy, but had not blown away. The leaves were to be picked later.

I figured the trick was to pick the pods a little early, take them home and let them dry before breaking them open. This way none would escape on the wind. My disappointment grew as the bags filled with fluff but the scales hardly moved!

Next came the leaves. If you have ever picked a milkweed leaf, you will know that it is almost impossible to do without getting the "milk" on your hands,on face, in your mouth, on your clothes etc. Injesting milkweed milk also makes small boys sick. At least the leaves were heavier than fluff and in my minds eye I could see the money piling up a I weighed each days effort. My father put a pinprick in my dreams of wealth after he read the instruction sheet and pointed out the leaves had to be perfectly dried to avoid mould when packed in the bags. I spread the leaves out on the thrash floor in the barn and when they were dry they did not weigh up much better than the fluff.

I got a ride to school with my bags on the pick-up day. I had calculated my summer's work to be worth $12.60. I complained when the soldier paid me only $12.00 and was told they were rounding DOWN to the nearest dollar.

NEXT -- The last war blog

Life is like a
cup of tea
It's all in how
you make it

Irish Insight