The Parents

While I named this blog, My Father in the War, I wasn’t exactly straight. It was my parents’ war. My mother, Anita Dorothy Stueart Terrell, was as involved as my father. I was blessed to be able to interview them on audio tape during a Thanksgiving vacation at the Gulf Coast several years ago. Dick and Nita (as their family and friends called them) were married in a double wedding with my mother’s best friend and her fiancée. The other husband was sadly killed early in the war. Here is part of that interview to give you a perspective on what they endured even from the beginning (Keep in mind my father sometimes used a rather salty language; I debated about editing it down, but decided to keep it as close to their “voice” as possible).

Dick: We got married on the second of January in 1942, and when we came back from our honeymoon, I had that “Dear John” notice, “you have been selected to serve you country.”
We just went out to the Hot Springs Airport and took civilian pilot training. CPT, it was called. We did this to try to get in the Army Air Corps and to keep from being drafted. Since I had already gotten my draft notice when I joined the CPT, the draft was held up. Jiggs Nobles was my instructor; he died just a few weeks ago. We flew those little old Piper Cubs. I think you had to have eight hours of instruction before they would let you solo, and I’ll tell you what, flying that airplane ─ without the instructor ─ the first time was scary, but I did all right. I.G. Brown, who used to be the sheriff, was one of the instructors, but he was mainly a ground school instructor. But we learned it.

Nita: We went on our honeymoon to Dallas; it was Grand Prairie, I believe.

Dick: We wanted to be in the Air Corps. We had agreed to join the U.S. Army Air Corps when we took the course and got out of that training, which lasted three or four months. When we got married, I was still working for Arkansas Power & Light. Somewhere along the line, I quit. Then they came up with a job surveying for a power line that they needed done in Hot Springs, and they gave me a crew and I did that, and when that was over with, I went to work for Nita's daddy (M.L. Stueart ─ we grandkids called him Big Daddy – he owned a grocery warehouse and 13 grocery stores). Man, that was terrible. I loaded groceries and drove a truck. I didn't anymore know how to drive truck than anyone. We lived on Hawthorne and Central, up above the church part of the time. You know where Jack Benny’s liquor store is? Penny and Frances lived out there in apartments, and we stayed with them for a while.

Nita: Then he left in September of 1942, and I moved into Mother and Daddy's.

Dick: Nita carried myself and old Petey Parsley over to Little Rock. We spent the night over there.

Nita: Petey was an ace with the B-52. He was Raymond Clinton's (Bill Clinton’s uncle) nephew.

Dick: He slipped on an airplane wing and hurt his back. He was out for while and then went back. His sister was named Virginia, a good looking woman. Remember where Aunt Elise (Dick’s sister) stayed a couple of years ago by the Hamilton House. She lived catty-corner across the street. They had that liquor store where “Just Add Water” is now. She was married to Gabe Crawford first. We got a train in Little Rock and went to San Antonio. It was myself, and an old boy named Gray from Little Rock and another boy named Caruthers from Little Rock and then Bill Mitchell from up at Morrilton. There were five of us including Petey and me.

First thing we heard when we got to San Antonio was, "You'll be sorry." We heard that from then on. They told us to bring a toothbrush and not even another change of clothes. It was hotter then hell, and we stayed in those clothes for two weeks. You could stand them up they were so damn dirty. We were living in a tent city at that time. Finally they gave us some clothes and moved us across the road to some barracks. I guess we took pre-flight after we moved from the tents, which is the ground school before they began flight training. Of course, it was easy for me because I had had that CPT training.

Nita: And the first free week-end he had, the girls (Nita had two sisters, Helen and Frances) took me to Little Rock, and I got on the train to San Antonio. When I got on the train, there wasn't any place to sit, and of course, I had taken all these clothes. I had to sit on my suitcase all the way to San Antonio. One of the enlisted men on the train helped me get my suitcase off. It was so heavy. I took a taxi to the Gunner Hotel where we had reservations. We went to a tea dance. That hotel was where all the military hung out.

Dick: Cadets were running every which way. In 1945 (after the war), when we got back down there, it was all first and mostly second lieutenants. That was the same bunch running around the same way. There was one old boy from other North Little Rock. We saw him, and ask him if he was going downtown. And he said, "Yeah, and I swore to myself I wasn't going down there sober again. Them damn Mexicans, they drive like mad men.” (See, I warned you.)

There’s more interview to come. Just think about wearing the same clothes for two weeks or carrying a bag with so many clothes you can’t pick it up!