In A Common Grave, A Common Virtue: Pvt Paul Benson, USMC (II)

Kansas City was bustling with war activities. Military and other defense personnel were everywhere. The Federal Building in downtown Kansas City, Missouri provided weather training for women in the Weather Bureau and Midland Radio School provided training under contract for military radio operators. Many of them stayed at the Hotel Commonwealth at 12th and Broadway in Kansas City, Missouri near the north end where the current Bartle Hall Covention Center now stands. Many young soldiers who stayed there sent post cards to their loved ones. Like this one from Cpl Pressley, US Army, 1943 letting his family know that he was "still here".

In 1942, Kansas City turned off the water to all of it's fountains to help the war effort by saving electricity. While at the same time, the Kansas City chapter of the American War Mothers, founded in 1917, raised money to have a fountain dedicated to all those who served in WWI[pic].

Kansas City at large had the second largest Civil Defense Corps in the United States in 1943. Paul, being a patriotic young man, may have very lwell became a member of the local defense corps as a messenger or assisting the the air warden with insuring blackout rules were followed. He definitely would have taken part in the in the nine state wide test blackout on December 4, 1942. Factories around town sounded their whistles and horns to signify "1 minute warning" to blackout.

Several major war time industries were located in and around Kansas City including the Darby Steel company in the West Bottoms, Kansas City, Kansas, not far from where Paul Benson lived. The Darby Steel Company made LCTs or Landing Craft Tanks. The factory turned out one a day and floated them 1,000 miles down the Kansas River to the Missouri and the Mississippi to reach New Orleans, prompting them to be nicknamed "Prairie Ships".

Paul could have biked down 22nd St to Park Dr and down to Kansas Highway 32, just two miles away, that runs along the Kansas River to watch the LCTs being floated. One day, in the future, Paul would go shore on Iwo Jima on an LCT made in his home city. That was in the future. In 1942, he would have also seen many trains carrying tanks, artillery, ammunition, supplies and many men on their way to the war.

The Kansas Ordnance Plant near Parsons, Kansas employed over 6,700 people and focused on building artillery shells and other explosives. Remington built a plant in Independence, MO that manufactured 200 million rounds of ammunition and the Sunflower Ordnance Plant, just south of Kansas City, KS manufactured smokeless powder and propellant.

The Kansas City area grew considerably in population as defense workers travailed by train to join the efforts here. Paul's mom or step-father might have even worked in one of the many factories. Many women in Kansas City did their part in the war effort like this young lady who worked building B-25s.

B-25 Bombers were being built by the Kansas City Aviation Co not far from where Paul lived in the Fairfax industrial area. The Fairfax factory turned out 6,608 B-25s during the course of the war. Paul would have seen B-25s take off from Fairfax Airport for their first test flight. Paul would have certainly heard about Doolittle's Raid on Tokyo in 1942 and may have felt some pride in his city for helping to build the machine responsible for the first strike against the Japanese homeland and avenging the attack on Pearl Harbor. It may have prompted Paul to play "bomber pilot" with his friends.

In early 1942, newspapers began to report that all Japanese are being moved to internment camps. There were few who knew that Germans, too, were being rounded up and sent to internment camps.

Paul would have seen a lot of men and women in uniform. Troop trains passed through Kansas City, Kansas on their way to Union Station in Kansas City, Missouri or leaving Union Station and heading to points west and south, taking newly inducted troops to their training stations. At its peak in 1945, the Union Station saw over 678,000 travelers, most of them military personnel on their way home from the war. Troops traveled from training in Texas, through Kansas City and on their way to New York where many troops embarked for Europe and North Africa. Others caught the train out to Ft Leavenworth or on to Junction City, KS to Ft Riley or south to Wichita and on to Camp Pendleton in San Diego or San Francisco. Just like they did in WWI the local Red Cross, the USO and local volunteers operated a canteen that took care of the soldiers going to and coming from war. This postcard from Pvt Thomas Melvin, thanked Mrs. Marie Rowland for her hospitality:

Nov. 15, 1943. Esteemed Mrs. Rowland: No I can't keep it to myself -- I've got to tell you what I know. You are doing a swell job! And be sure, we boys appreciate your sincere efforts.

My trip, hitch-hiking back to camp, was pretty tedious...but I did get here! Thank you ever so much for making my pass spent in K.C. a time long to be remembered! Cheerio! Yours, Thomas.

There were also many troops stationed in and around Kansas City. He would have seen uniforms of all the services. The United States Naval Reserves and other Navy operations took place right here. South of Kansas City, the US Naval Air Station Olathe, Kansas, that opened in 1942, housed the Naval Air Primary Training Center. Future astronaut John Glenn graduated from the first training class. Prior to the opening of that base, the NAPTC was conducted at the Fairfax Airport in Kansas City, Kansas. Paul would have seen flights of the bi-planes training cadets to be fighter pilots and bombers.

Ft Leavenworth trained over 19,000 officers that went on to lead 23 infantry, airborne and cavalry divisions in World War II.

Paul, like many young boys his age, was probably interested in baseball, the national past time. He might have attended local ball games hosted by the Works Progress Administration between the Naval Air Station and the Army. He may have went down to the Grenada, if he had enough money, and watched a movie with his friends like Billy the Kid Rides again. The program would have started with a cartoon like Bugs and Daffy and then catching the most recent newsreel before the main feature.

Local radio carried war time programming. WHB hired Elinor Fox before the war began. When new regulations from the federal government regulated what could be played, Elinor Fox updated her "Women in the News" program to include women working in the many war time industries.

In 1942, Elinor Fox’s “Women in the News” began at 8:30 a.m.,19 still sponsored by the AG Grocer. “I’d interrupt my superb prose with three cans of green beans,” she smiled. On March 24, the theme was “‘V’ For Victory.” She opened:

Again good morning everyone. The women of America are working in a victory campaign to gather ten million books for Uncle Sam’s armed forces—will you lend a hand, too?

Her woman in the news that day was Miss Dorothea Hyle, Director of Publicity for the Kansas City Public Libraries.

Radio made it difficult to avoid the effects of the war during 1943 and 1944. WHB devoted an 18‐hour day on April 12, 1943, just ten days before Paul was inducted into the Marines, to sell War Bonds. For the Third War Loan drive, WHB paraded through downtown on a “Bond Wagon” with orchestras and smiling members of the WAVES and WACS. WHB, like other stations, continually urged conservation of electricity, gasoline, food and any material used in the war industry, such as tin cans, rubber goods and old rags. Recruiting for the Coast Guard and Merchant Marines was included with Selective Service information. WHB urged support of the USO. And, following the wartime code, discouraged the spread of rumors.

Paul would have heard other war time broadcasting like the "War Bond Show" or "Staff Frolic" straight from the Kansas City Canteen for the USO. There were also weekly broadcasts called "Your Navy Speaks" along with many more efforts to support the war, recruit men and women for military and civil defense and many more.

Paul might have been a Boy Scout or maybe just took part in the war efforts by helping to collect scrap iron or other much needed resources. He might have helped sell war bonds or collect books for the bookmobile to lend out to service men and women in the area.

Other young men in the neighborhood, just a few years older than Paul, would have hurried down to the local recruiters to enlist or received their draft notices to appear at a local board for physicals and assignment to the Army (including Army Air Corp) or Navy (including the Marines). Within the first 24 hours after Pearl Harbor, 150 men had enlisted at the Navy recruiting station.

He would have also seen young women in their WAC, WASP or WAVES uniforms as they went to their local administrative jobs with the military or defense. Forty young women were assigned to the Olathe Naval Air Station.

He might have also heard that there were Prisoners of War housed just north of Kansas City in Liberty. These POWs were sometimes brought down to the local stock yards to work or used as labor for local farmers.

Like this young woman of the same age, he would have experienced rationing.

We got some sort of coupon to use when purchasing new shoes. Shoe rationing was started February 9, 1943, according to an article in the Independence Examiner. Each person could buy three pair of leather shoes a year. There were other shoes available that were of imitation leather and they were ugly and you didn’t have to have a coupon to buy them.

Each person in our family was issued a food ration book and the head of the house (my Father) got a gasoline ration book. The Government issued the ration books. Meat, sugar and butter were rationed. Each stamp would allow you so much meat, so many pounds of sugar, etc. or so many gallons of gasoline. These stamps were of different colors.

If you had a friend or relative living on a farm, you may have been able to get extra gasoline from them, as they could get an unlimited amount as they were responsible for feeding the nation.

When we wanted to visit my brother that was in the Air Force at a camp close by, neighbors that didn’t have an automobile gave my Father some of their gasoline ration stamps so we could make the trip.

Everywhere that Paul looked, he would have seen posters urging rationing, more production and joining one of the services like the United States Marines. Even the trains got in on urging people to buy war bonds.

There were parades like this Armistice Day Parade featuring troops and even local community parades[(c) 1942] that always featured a patriotic theme.

He would have heard or read about Wake Island, Guam and Guadalcanal. The Marines would have been some of the toughest and best in his book. He might have even dreamed of wearing the blue uniform or fighting the "Japs" in the jungles. The Battle of Coral Sea, the Battle of Midway and many others.

All around, as he went about his days going to school, helping his mom, playing with friends or helping with the war effort, everything would have been about the war.

He might have even dreamed of one day putting on the uniform of his country and going to war. In his dreams, war was romantic. If he thought of it as dirty, he thought of it like the dirt the actors wore in the movies. It would always wash off at the end of the day. Bombs were far away and thirst would always be quenched. With all the war production going on in Kansas City, bombers, shells and ammunition were always plentiful. There were so many military men passing through, there were always enough troops for the battle. It was always the enemy who died or the other unlucky guy. If one of the good guys "bought it", there was little blood and pain was fleeting in the face of glory.

If he thought of his mother's feelings on the subject, he probably thought of her as weeping picturesquely into a kerchief, accepting a medal or certificate for his actions, proudly and stoically speaking of his bravery and service. Just like those other mothers on the newsreels. He never pictured her alone, behind closed doors, weeping uncontrollably over a yellow telegram from the War Department with the words, "Mrs. Florence Placke, We regret to inform you..."

For Paul, war was something to look forward to and he was determined to do his part.

[Part III - Paul Benson Goes to War]