Gravity, Burma Bridge Busters, and Uncle David
If there is one thing I now know for certain, it is that our stories have gravity and weight. Years ago, I started documenting the life and work of my client, Jack Jouett, whose father was hired by Chiang Kai Shek to help establish the Chinese air force. Years later, Jack himself spent most of World War II working in the China-Burma-India (CBI) theater, a part of history about which I was at the time woefully uninformed. I spent a lot of time learning more than I ever thought I would want to know about World War II, aviation, and the CBI Theater. I also talked at length about it to almost anyone who would listen. Because I cared about Jack’s story, other people were drawn to it as well.
One of those other people was my father, who subsequently learned more than he ever thought he would want to know about World War II, aviation, and the CBI Theater. Once you’ve made a decision to learn about something, you start to notice details that you might otherwise have let slip by you. The gravity of an idea has a way of pulling them into your orbit.
Which is what happened last May. My parents attended the 90th birthday party of my mother’s uncle, David George, who lived about an hour away from them. I remember Uncle David from childhood visits. He was always cheerful and engaging, and a family favorite. When my parents showed up for his party, they arrived a bit earlier than most of the guests and sat around the table chatting. My father’s attention was captured by a framed set of images that included a photo of a younger Dave in a military uniform, and a flag with a bit of writing in Chinese. Years earlier, my father might not have noticed it. Now he was curious, drawn.
“What’s that all about?” he asked.
“The flag and the Chinese writing is a piece of cloth I had sewn on the back of my flight jacket when we flew B-25′s in World War II,” David said.
“You were in airplanes in World War II?” my dad asked him, feeling stories collide. “Over China?”
“Well, yeah,” said David. “the CBI.”
In the years I had been working on Jack’s story, talking about Jack’s story, I hadn’t known that a member of my own family, someone I knew and had talked to, had been in the same area of the war. I had never thought to ask.
It turned out that the flag was something called a “blood chit,” usually made of silk and sewn to the jacket giving instructions to people discovering the soldier in the event of a crash. Translated, the Chinese characters say:
This foreign person has come to China to help in the war effort. Soldiers and civilians, one and all, should rescue, protect and provide him with medical care.”
Horrifying and comforting all at the same time. It also often implied that a reward would be given for caring for a downed soldier. This bit of fabric apparently meant enough to David that, all these years later, it hung on his wall.
Other guests started arriving for the party and interrupted their conversation. Several times over the summer, however, my dad drove to David’s house and he learned the details of his life. These details built a story that now acquired a weight all its own. My dad gathered photographs, did research, taped interviews, and typed up what he learned. He sent a draft of the story to me. I’ll share a little bit of it.
In 1940, David Nobel George graduated from a small high school in Rifle, Colorado, on the western slope of the Colorado Rockies, and enlisted in the Army Air Corps. He was sent to Army bases around the U. S. to train on bomber aircraft. Training was haphazard, with the limited use of one bomber and broomsticks for rifles. The bombing of Pearl Harbor in December of 1941 shifted everything. David and his crew were sent by truck to Muroc Dry Lake in California, now Edwards Air Force Base. Training continued in earnest.
Chiang Kai-Shek (yes, here he is again…) had negotiated with the U. S. to obtain airplanes for its air force to use in the CBI Theater. Through the Lend-Lease program, the U. S. arranged to deliver 33 Lockheed-Hudson A-29 planes to China, using the opportunity to transfer 33 of the U.S. Army Air Corps’ own B-25 bomber pilots and crews to their bases in the CBI. All in all, 33 planes, 33 pilots, and 33 mechanics, or crew chiefs, prepared for the trip.
David George was one of the crew chiefs being sent, and was sent for A-29 training and to get the planes ready for transport to China. They picked up the planes on June 13, 1942. Dave’s plane was the first of the A-29′s to take off from West Palm Beach, Florida, following the same route established for all U. S. pilots to the CBI Theater, with stops in Brazil, Ascension Island in the middle of the Atlantic, Africa, the Sudan and on. Both David and my client Jack followed the same flight path.
David’s trip was more eventful, however. Leaving Sudan, David’s plane lost an engine and did an emergency landing on a small airstrip in Asmara, Eritrea. David was, of course, in charge of fixing the plane. There was a Douglas Aircraft depot 35 miles away through the mountains, but they somehow had to get the plane there. They pulled the wings off the plane, turned the landing gear around, put the tail wheel of the plane in the back of a jeep and towed Dave’s plane through the mountains to the other base. Dave learned that another A-29 had lost an engine as well. He sent the remaining good engine from his plane to Khartoum to repair the other plane and had the bad engine returned to him. For the next two months and 20 days, David rebuilt both failed engines and put his plane back together. He and his pilot resumed their flight to China, traveling through Karachi (then India, now Pakistan), on through Lahsa, Tibet, and finally into China. Instead of being the first A-29 to arrive, Dave’s was the last.
Having delivered his plane, Dave and his pilot were transferred back to their post in Karachi as part of the 10th Air Force. They were assigned to squadrons for bombing missions on B-25′s. Dave’s squad, the 490th, started in India at Malir Air Base, where they developed and perfected low-level ridge bombing, called “skip bombing.” They became so successful one of the generals started calling them the Burma Bridge Busters. Their skip bombing technique did the heaviest damage to the Japanese, taking out railroads, airfields, communications areas, supply bases and, of course, bridges. The insignia for their plane was the Skull and Wings.
Above is a picture of David’s squad (he is second from the right on the back row). As the crew chief, it was his responsibility to make sure that the plane could fly, and to repair it when it couldn’t. David told my father stories of mission after mission from those years as their squadron moved across India toward Burma. On the 47th mission:
The pilot brought it home all shot up. It had a big ack-ack shell go off right under the left wing. By the time I got it back up in the air again, I’d changed one engine, two gas tanks, an oil tank, and the left wing, all on that side. We did all that work out in an open-air environment. The only cable that was not cut was the right aileron cable. The others all had nicks in them. They didn’t have potentiometers to tell them how tight to adjust the replacement cables (since many were salvaged from other damaged planes) so I would just feel the tension on the other ones and try to get the same feel. It took about three months to rebuild that plane. The wing that I got to replace it with was a later model than my airplane and it tended to fly just a little yaw. They could trim it out and it would be okay. . . . I tweaked it just a fuzz more and it went on to complete over 100 missions without a turnback due to mechanical issues, so it must have been okay.
This was an understatement. Over 100 missions without mechanical failure, in the middle of a war, in spite of enemy sabotage, on-the-fly repairs, touch and go landings, and heavy use. Dave’s plane was the first to reach this milestone. It was considered quite an accomplishment, and on the day of the 100th mission, January 20, 1944, a reporter came to their base in Assam, India, to record it, singling out David George for his excellent work.
After writing up all of David’s interviews, my father decided to compile everything into one big notebook. He made a copy of David’s photo with the blood chit flag and put it on the front cover. About two weeks ago, he drove up to David’s house and handed him the notebook, another piece of evidence of his life to go with the framed flag on the wall.
Last Saturday, November 19th, my dad called me. Uncle David had died that morning, quietly, peacefully. Dad was sad, of course, sorry not to have time to have gathered more of the pieces of David’s life, wondering if he had captured enough.
But this week, which included our country’s Thanksgiving celebration, I am mostly grateful that David’s orbit crossed over into my father’s and, ultimately, into my own. His story has substance and weight. I know with certainty that it will connect to other stories, other people.
With thanks to David Nobel George, 1921-2011.
A Time To Speak
Just over a year ago, on October 6, 2010, I got a phone call at 6:30 a.m. from my niece, Sadie, the daughter of my youngest sister, Karyl. She told me through sobs that her father, my sister’s husband Pat, had been killed in a freak car accident that morning. It seemed unreal. Pat was 45 years old, engaged in life, and one of the strongest men I had ever known. All the extended members of our family flew to Colorado where Karyl’s family lived, and the next few days were a blur of flowers, plastic-wrapped food, phone calls and planning. We were getting ready to drive Karyl to the funeral home for a 4:00 appointment to finalize details and I asked her how soon she wanted to go. “About 45 years from now,” she said.
In the past year, I’ve been surprised by a number of things. One was my absolute reluctance to write about the situation. I, who usually find it helpful to write about everything, suddenly found myself unable to put words together. I couldn’t seem to find a way to describe to myself or anyone else what was going on in my family, and writing about anything else seemed trivial and pointless. For about two months, I was horribly, inexplicably weary of words. It reminded me of the passage from Ecclesiastes about there being a time for everything, including “a time to keep silent and a time to speak.” For me, it was apparently time to keep silent. I didn’t really feel like I had an alternative.
I was, however, also surprised by my sister. I had always known her to be smart, funny and capable. But over the next few months through long phone conversations, I discovered that Karyl was also very wise. While going through devastating grief, holding a full-time job, and parenting her four children by herself, she was also able to articulate what the process felt like, and to educate me and others about what was and was not helpful when going through the grieving process. Here I was, the writer with nothing to say, while my little sister suddenly had volumes of wisdom to share. It finally occurred to me that, for her, it was time to speak. These were ideas she needed to share. I knew with certainty that she should write a book and that I could help her write it.
But not right away. We decided to allow Karyl and her family to navigate the hurdles of the first year. And there were plenty of hurdles. Actually, there still are plenty of hurdles. Nevertheless, we’ve kept notes, which I compiled in one, very long single-spaced document. After the one-year anniversary of Pat’s death, Karyl and I talked about starting the process of actually writing the book. We planned to meet in Colorado for several days, which is why I find myself writing this post from the living room in Karyl’s home. Karyl took time off work and my husband Doug and our daughter Sarah came along. This week, Karyl and I settled down with journals and notes and my computer. We’ve begun.
I hadn’t counted on the project pulling other surprises our way, however. Our parents also live in Colorado but their house is an hour away from Karyl’s. We really wanted to see them while we were in town so we asked if they would mind having all of us over for dinner one night. They improved on the idea; since our families will be in different places over Thanksgiving, my mom decided to host an early Thanksgiving dinner, complete with turkey, corn pudding, potatoes and pumpkin pie. She’s invited aunts, uncles and cousins. This was a bonus I hadn’t considered.
But that wasn’t all. Although it is a cliche, it is nevertheless true that tragedy has a way of refocusing priorities, which in my case meant spending more time with my sisters. With me in Oregon, Karyl in Colorado, and our other sister Karla in Texas, it was too easy for years to pass without seeing each other. No more. The three of us got together four times in the year since Pat died, visiting each other in Austin, Denver and my home in Lake Oswego. So it probably wasn’t that surprising when Karyl and I started talking this week, we both felt we needed Karla with us as well. Karyl called Karla yesterday, Thursday morning. Karla and her husband juggled plans, booked tickets, and will arrive late tonight. In a year filled with some of the most horrible things we could imagine, we can still be caught off guard by unexpected grace.
Today, after working for much of the day, we took a break. We decided to go for a run and then soak in the hot tub. Sitting there, looking out over the lights of Denver, I finally felt like I was ready to start writing about this big event that has blown through our family. I asked Karyl if she would mind if I occasionally wrote about our process in this blog, and she agreed.
God bless her. It is, once again, a time to speak.
Playing School
When I was little, while other kids played house, I preferred to play school. Instead of dolls and dishes and those wonderful little play kitchens I saw at my friends’ homes, I was happier with coffee cups filled with pencils, stacks of paper, rolls of scotch tape, and whatever crayons I could scrounge from around the house. Often, my sisters were the only playmates available to me and I somehow talked them into being my students. Truth be told, I might not have given them much choice, but they were fairly tolerant of my schemes. The school room could be a corner of the living room, or high up in our crooked tree house perched over the creek. One time I think I even set up space in the dog house, but that was quickly vetoed by both my sisters and the dog.
Interestingly, my fascination with teaching never seemed to extend to my career aspirations. That slot was filled early on. I knew from about age seven that I wanted to be a writer. In my wilder moments, I would also dream of illustrating my own books. However, no matter how much I loved my classes, or how excited I got about school supplies, I never identified with being a teacher. I didn’t chase after it as a career goal.
That doesn’t mean that it didn’t chase after me. Time after time, while pursuing other goals, I’d find myself taking on teaching roles, with students other than my long-suffering sisters. I was a TA in graduate school, tutoring one-on-one, or setting up small groups to help panicked counseling students figure out statistics. To pick up extra cash one year, it seemed like a fun exercise to teach GRE prep courses. And after I finished my masters degree in counseling, I was not drawn to mental health clinics and private practice like some of my classmates. Instead, I went to work in the counseling department at the local community college. I did mental health work, of course, but I also taught classes–in career development, student success strategies, personal development and writing. I was, after all those years, a teacher, sharing with other people what I knew and what I believed to be true. But I also learned first-hand how empowering education is all by itself. Being a teacher isn’t one-directional, with me off-loading a body of knowledge to a waiting audience. A good teacher, in my opinion, is a guide who helps someone figure out for themselves what they need to know.
I finally figured out that it’s not so much the role of being a teacher that draws me, but education itself. Actually, I can break it down even further. Learning is powerful. There is really nothing that gives me more joy than learning something new, growing my understanding of a subject–any subject. The only thing that can equal that sense of satisfaction is being along for the ride as someone else learns something new. This, I now realize, was the pay-off in all my years of parenting, of counseling, or writing and, of course, teaching.
And now, so many years after those afternoons when I pushed my sisters through spelling tests and math problems, I am somewhat surprised that through my work with I Am Story Studios, I have become a writer, an illustrator and, at last, a teacher. I’ve done workshops for years, usually at conferences, churches or private organizations. Now, however, I’m pleased to announce that I have four classes next month that are open to everyone. Or at least, everyone within commuting distance:
Telling Your Story 2 Pages at a Time:
I’ve noticed that when many people set out to write their stories, they make two mistakes: 1) they try to write too much, and 2) they try to write too soon. As a result, they get overwhelmed and stop. Worse, they don’t start at all. Fortunately, there are easy fixes for these problems, and this two-hour workshop will show you what they are, and help you create a 2-page story about your life. The registration fee for this class includes copies of my books Half Past Perfect and Story Starters. This class is offered at two different times.
Date: Tuesday, October 4, 2011 OR Thursday, October 27, 2011, 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Where: Oswego Heritage House, Lake Oswego, Oregon
Cost: $49, including all materials
Introduction to Art Journaling
Making art is a way to explore what we believe, and to make visible the stories and thought patterns by which we live. Using the basic vocabulary of art–color, imagery, texture, shape–we gain access to what we think, even if we never verbalize it. If we commit to art making on a consistent basis, however, it can open a wonder-filled world of creative expression, healing, stress-reduction and, at times, transformation. This introductory class will be a playful, art-filled opportunity to explore the techniques of art journaling. We will learn about different materials and media, discuss journaling prompts, and create one complete art journaling page.
When: Thursday, October 13, 2011, 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Where: Oswego Heritage House, Lake Oswego, Oregon
Cost: $49, including all materials
Creating Heritage: Telling Someone Else’s Story
You probably know someone whose story should be captured, perhaps a parent, a grandparent, an interesting neighbor. But how do you begin? This workshop will help. You’ll learn about valuable resources, intriguing prompts to draw out details, interviewing ideas, and brainstorming about your project. In addition, you’ll receive an organizational notebook that will help you break down the project into meaningful pieces.
When: Thursday, October 20, 2011, 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Where: Oswego Heritage House, Lake Oswego, Oregon
Cost: $49, including workbook
So, that’s it for Fall, 2011. I’m looking for people to join me in these learning experiences. For more information or to register, click on the above links or go to the “Workshop” section at www.IAmStory.com. You can also email me at barbara@iamstory.com.
I look forward to hearing from you!
Camp Status, by Elizabeth Taylor
(This is a story based on information told by Simon Klachefsky, a Holocaust survivor.)
Polish prisoners.
They’re worse than the Germans.
When we were herded out of our neighborhoods, the Poles watched, making no secret of the fact that they wanted us gone – a polite way of saying ‘dead’. Whole families shot because these traitors ratted us out.
Jews have spent centuries being strangers in our own countries, but the hatred has never run as deep as it does now, in 1944. The Poles didn’t provide one bullet to the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. They watched while those doomed souls fought to the last man and woman. We got the news of the massacre here at Auschwitz. The Germans can’t keep their mouths shut when they want to brag about the death-toll of the Yellow-Banded.
Then the Polish Underground had its own unsuccessful uprising. They waited until the Russians were perched at the gates of Warsaw, ready to invade Poland and fight the Germans, under the mistaken impression that the Russians would help their fascist cause. Ha! Instead, the Russians watched the Germans squelch the rebellion; glad they didn’t have to mop up the mess themselves.
So, in 1944 the Polish prisoners began to trickle into this hell-hole.
I have been here since 1941. My family was rousted from their beds in the middle of the night, stuffed at gunpoint into an airless cattle-car and shipped here pretty much when the doors opened for business. Of course, the Germans separated us as soon as we stepped off the train. There were two lines – Life and Death. My mother, father, and sister…well, they were in the best line.
At first, the camp was mostly Jews. Then a few months ago, the Polish Underground prisoners began to arrive.
But three years in the Devil’s Hotel is like graduate school.
I know things.
My one hundred pounds of bones and sallow skin know more than any Pole. I am a wise old man of twenty.
To survive I have had to do unspeakable things – tasks the Germans will not do.
Like collect filthy clothes from new Jewish prisoners as they are stripped and handed the uniforms of black and white stripes. To finger the fabric of a man who will die of starvation if he doesn’t take a one-way walk to the ovens; praying for the bumps in the lining of his pants – the wedding band, the watch, the locket, makes me loathe my very existence.
And yet, better him than me.
I am a dog who only cares about the next meal, the next drink, the next breath.
I trade those jewels for food, liquor, cigarettes, for my heart to beat one more day.
But then the Poles arrived and we in Clothing Collection were told that they could keep their clothes. They could strut around the camp with each other (the Jews would have nothing to do with them) looking…well, like they were going out for a cup of coffee with a friend. They looked normal.
The Germans had bestowed status on these traitors to make sure we knew we were the lowest of the low.
To say that this bothered me more than watching the Germans beat or starve my fellow Jews, is to speak a sickening truth.
But, as I said, I know things.
And I know the Germans are a clean race. They don’t go near the dirt, the garbage, the bugs, the germs – the belly side of camp life. We Jews clean up our own messes. Most of all, the Germans don’t come into the Jewish sleeping cabins – they are terrified of lice.
So, it was a simple matter for me to whisper in the ear of Fredrich, a German guard with whom I have done a few small transactions. I drop a tidbit of information in his ear now and then and he gives me a smoke. Yesterday, the August sun was sharp, making his red hair shine like a new penny. He bragged that he has just had sex with a Polish prisoner.
“Lucky man, my friend,” I said, nodding. “I would be envious but…”
Fredrich sucked smoke into his lungs and eyed me, squinting in the sun. “But what? Ha! You don’t have sex. You never will, Shimon Jew.” He clapped my back. “Of course you are envious of my good fortune.”
“Fredrich. You are my captor, yes. But you’ve been good to me. We smoke, sometimes we share a sip of Schnapps. I am aware of all that you’ve done.”
Fredrich blew perfect-circle smoke rings.
“So,” I continued. “It is in friendship that I tell you -”
“What? What is it?”
“The Pole you had sex with –“
“You don’t know her,” he said, frowning.
“No, but she’s not… clean,” I said.
“You mean, she has the…what is the word? Clap? How could you know this?”
I leaned closer to his face and lowered my voice. “All the Poles have…lice.”
His jaw dropped. “No. They have clean barracks. They are not with you dirty Jews. We let them bathe. Give them soap.”
I shook my head. “Oh, I know you do your best. It isn’t the fault of the…uh…hardworking Germans. It’s…”
“What, man?” Fredrich was hanging onto my wisdom like a terrified child.
“Their clothes. They bring the lice in on their clothes. And because they are allowed to keep them – to wear them everyday in the camp – well, the infestation grows at an alarming rate. The Jews have clean new uniforms but the Poles…” I shrugged. “Just be careful, my friend.”
I left Fredrich scratching his head, his chest, his private parts picking at his skin like a monkey.
The next day, the guards made the Poles strip. They were de-liced and handed the black and whites.
Now they look like us.
But they still know nothing.
Moonshine, by Barbara Allen Burke
On October 28, 1919, Congress passed the National Prohibition Act, making it illegal to sell any beverage containing more than ½ or 1 percent of alcohol.
The Act extended to the two-mile high mining town of Cripple Creek, Colorado, but four-year-old Helen, a resident of a drafty three-room house in that town, didn’t know about Prohibition and didn’t care. Other matters loomed large. Her mother, Mabel, a stout, ruddy-faced woman, sat Helen down at the kitchen table one morning, stirred precious sugar into her coffee and explained that Helen’s Uncle Frank had died. Helen wasn’t sure what that meant, apart that Uncle Frank would be carried to the cemetery and planted in the ground. She didn’t know him that well. She was mostly excited that Aunt Jessie, Frank’s widow, and their daughters, Edna and Maxine, were coming to live with them in their three-room house.
After Jessie and the girls moved in, Helen noticed that strange people came often to their house, handing Jessie fistfuls of cash for a liquid poured into dark glass bottles and old canning jars. She asked Aunt Jessie what was in the bottles, and Jessie told her it was a secret. Once, one of the bottles broke, spilling the pungent liquid in a pool on the kitchen floor. Helen helped sop of the spill with rags and thought it smelled like turpentine.
“Why are Jessie’s bottles secret, Mama?” Helen asked Mabel.
Mabel lifted a loaf of bread out of the oven. “It ain’t nothing you need to fuss over,” she said. “Just hand me that towel before I burn myself.”
One October afternoon, the girls played in the kitchen. It was an unusually warm day, and Mabel shooed them out the front door.
“You girls are under foot,” she said. “Play outside.”
Helen, Edna and Maxine spilled out of the house into the flat dirt yard. They played Ring ‘Round the Rosy, tripping over their long skirts and petticoats, falling in the dirt until all three girls were smudged and smiling.
Aunt Jessie came running up the street, lifting her skirts high enough to see her booted feet. She ran past the girls and burst through the front door, leaving it open behind her.
“They’re coming,” she yelled. “The Agents are on a raid! Mabel, you got to help me hide the bootleg.”
The girls scrambled to their feet and followed Jessie inside, watching Jessie and Mabel, scurry about the kitchen, eyes wide and fingers flying. Together they squirreled bottles and jars into cardboard boxes. The girls stared, confused.
Jessie seethed. “I’ll never be able to hide all of this.”
Edna called from the doorway. “What’s the matter, Mama?”
Jessie stopped, a dark green bottle in each hand, and stared at the girls as if she’d only just noticed them. And then she smiled.
“The girls!” she cried. “That’s it!”
Mabel continued packing boxes. “What fool thing are you talking about now?”
Jessie ignored her. “Girls, follow me,” she said. She grabbed a box clinking with bottles and carried it out to the yard. She set the box on the ground, grabbed Edna, and settled the girl on top. She carefully arranged Edna’s skirts and petticoats, covering the box completely.
“Mabel,” she called, “help me bring out them other boxes.”
By the time the agents marched up the street toward the house, Edna, Helen and Maxine sat in a small circle in the front yard, perched like hens atop hidden boxes of bootleg whiskey. They played a clapping game, careful not to disturb their overburdened skirts.
Pease porridge hot. Pease porridge cold.
Pease porridge in the pot, nine days old.
The agents, five dour men with dark hats pulled over their eyes, tramped past the girls, up the porch steps, and pounded on the front door. They carried axes and shovels. One carried a gun. “This is a raid!” they yelled, and pushed through the door. The girls kept clapping.
Some like it hot. Some like it cold.
Some like it in the pot, nine days old.
The men searched the house, overturning mattresses, emptying cupboards, spilling a bag of flour on the floor. Baby Lewellen started to cry and Mabel picked him up, settling him over her shoulder. Jessie grabbed a broom to sweep up the flour. The men upended a wooden chest. They dumped a laundry basket. Still the girls clapped.
Pease porridge hot. Pease porridge cold.
Pease porridge in the pot, nine days old.
Finally, the agents left, glaring at Jessie as they stomped away. One man looked back. “I know you’re up to something, missy.” He almost ran into the circle of girls as he walked, side-stepped to miss them, and then followed the other men down the street.
For years, even after Jessie got a job as a waitress in Denver and she and the girls moved away, Helen couldn’t hear that clapping rhyme without thinking of dark green bottles of bootleg.
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