Between Battles

Seaman First Class Everett Gunning 

My dad wrote to Everett every week, and Everett wrote back almost as often, although his letters were censored and didn't include any information about the fighting.

Here’s one written just before the Battle of Cape Esperance:

10/1/1942

Dear Don,

You and Mother are the only ones I have heard from for a long time. You and Mother tell me all the news. There is so little I can write in answer. I guess only my real friends answer. My girl in San Francisco, California is the only one I miss hearing from. A friend of mine, who has seen Jean since I left says she still loves me, but I may need Jimmy’s mother to get me an Indian girl. They are my weakness anyway.

I made Seaman 1^st Class finally. That is the best news I have had for some time. I am studying for something else now.

Your Bud, Everett.

Everett was obviously homesick but he was also caught up in the excitement of his adventures. The Enid Daily Eagle, Everett’s hometown paper, reported:

Gunning wrote that he certainly would like to spend the holidays at home with his parents at Enid. Pearl Harbor precluded that. Then he wrote again that he regretted the fact that he had missed spending the last two Christmas seasons with his folks “but will see you next Christmas if I have to whip the Japs first…. If I could get home for a visit then I would be ready to go to Tokyo.”

While Everett was dodging bullets on the high seas, Boyd was still training in jungle warfare in Hawaii. He wrote to my parents about the beautiful orchids there:

10/25/42: Dear Don,

Your letter came per today and it is good to know that your family is all well and that you are still turning them out (He means the B17 bombers). Give Jimmy and Robin my best regards, and tell Jim that I would like to pin some of these natural plentiful orchids on her with my compliments. They had the annual orchid show in Honolulu this week but I didn’t get a chance to go. I would like to see you all - and especially that Robin. If you are taking any snap shots send me one occasionally. I may get a chance to show them to Everett. I worried about him for a while but know he is okay now, and expect to see him one of these days. Write him that I would like to hear from him. Work hard, you are in the best spot in the world and I’m counting on you. If you go to Norman spend some time with El and the boys. They are lonesome at times and would be glad to have you. I’m fine and don’t expect to spend all my life or even the best part of it here.

Sincerely Boyd

Ironically, Boyd’s comment about being relieved that Everett was okay was written just two weeks after the Battle of Cape Esperance and a little over two weeks before the Battle of Guadalcanal, when Everett narrowly escaped being killed.

Shortly after the Battle of Cape Esperance, Everett had another close call. As the San Francisco was cruising back to port, one of her sailors spotted a torpedo heading straight for the ship. Word of the sighting was quickly passed up to the bridge where the pilot turned the ship away in time to avoid being hit, but one of the other cruisers, the Chester, was not so lucky. She was struck and badly damaged.

Everett told another story about being attacked by Japanese bombers. I’m not sure when it was. He said they were escorting a convoy at the time, so it could have been during the battle when the carrier Wasp was sunk, or following the Battle of Cape Esperance. The episode was reported in a newspaper article written while Everett was home on leave in December of 1942:

While in the Solomons, the San Francisco was in a battle, along with some other American vessels which had convoyed a group of transports with supplies for the men there, with 17 huge Jap bombers, carrying torpedoes. The San Francisco did something which no other ship has ever done - shoot down a bomber with their big guns. (Everett said) “When the shell hit that bomber it blew into bits. That scared the Japs so bad they dropped their eggs harmlessly and ran.”

The Battle of Cape Esperance had been an empty victory. As Admiral Scott retreated with most of his task force to the American base at Noumea, the destroyer McCalla stayed behind to rescue the survivors. Many of the men from the sunken destroyer Duncan drowned or were eaten by sharks during the night. As for the Japanese survivors, many drowned because they refused to grasp the ropes thrown to them by American sailors, a grisly scene for the sailors who witnessed it.

Shortly after the battle, the Tokyo Express resumed, bringing more supplies and men down the “slot” to reinforce the Japanese forces on Guadalcanal. By late October the Japanese were ready, and three units marched through the jungle and surrounded the US marines defending Henderson Field. On October 23 and again on the 24th, wave after wave of Japanese soldiers ran across the Matanikau river to the north and across what came to be known as “bloody ridge” to the south screaming “banzai” and “death to Americans.” The American troops were terrified but ready. 3500 Japanese troops were killed in the desperate attempt to overrun the American base, compared to American losses of 200.

Meanwhile a Japanese carrier group waited near the Santa Cruz Islands east of Guadalcanal ready to land planes on Henderson Field after their infantry had overrun the marines. They were unable to take Henderson Field, but they did find and attack two US carriers, the Hornet and the Enterprise, sinking the Hornet and two US destroyers while suffering only minor damage to their own ships.

By this time the struggle for Guadalcanal had become famous. Several reporters had landed with the troops, and their hair raising reports of the marines' brave defense of the little airstrip there catapulted the struggle into a national issue. President Roosevelt himself told the admirals of CINCPAC to make sure the troops on Guadalcanal got everything they needed. Admiral Halsey, who had taken over command of the South Pacific theater from the indecisive Admiral Ghormley, told the marine General Vandergrift, “I’ll promise you everything I’ve got.” 

Meanwhile, Everett’s ship, the USS San Francisco, was taking on supplies at Noumea, New Caledonia, getting ready to return to action.

Field Mice in Wichita

First, I have a public service announcement. The management, Google, has informed me that in order to continue to find my blog you'll have to create a Google account. I hope that doesn't cause a problem for anyone. Most people use Google anyway. It's more user friendly, and it's easier to find stuff, at least I think so. 

Back to my subject for the day. Although I 've been trying to stick to the story of my uncles during WWII, something in Boyd's last letter reminded me of a story my parents told me about their first house in Wichita. My mother Wenonah wasn't happy with the apartment where they moved first, to say the least. As I mentioned in my post of October 23, 2015, her landlady burned her trash right next to the clothesline where Wenonah hung my diapers, so as soon as they were able - my parents rented a house.

The house was located on the edge of town, and there were a lot of mice living a field nearby, so my parents' problems changed from inconsiderate neighbors to little mice running around the house. My dad got busy setting traps, poison, and plugging all the openings he could find in the floor. That's when he learned that steel wool was better for this than wooden patches or putty, because the mice couldn't chew through it. He must have written to Boyd about his mouse problem for him to joke about scaring them away with a picture from the war. 

Anyway, the story that impressed me most about Don's battle with the mice was how he killed them by hand. He said that the mice had free reign over the house at night and they were still busy when he got up for work in the morning, so while it was still dark outside, he would sneak into the kitchen and turn on the light. This would catch a mouse of two in the middle of the floor. The mice would try and run, but they couldn't get any traction on the linoleum floor, so Don was able to reach down and swat them up against the wall, killing them instantly.

Everett Rejoins the Action

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Everett and the other survivors from the battleship Oklahoma were given their choice of ships for their next assignment. Everett chose the USS San Francisco, a heavy cruiser which had been at Pearl Harbor for repairs at the time of the Japanese attack but had not been hit. He avoided being assigned to one of the battleships, targets of the Japanese at Pearl Harbor. What he couldn’t know was that the USS San Francisco would be chosen as the admiral’s flagship, and would be involved in some of the heaviest fighting of the war.

The repairs on the USS San Francisco were cut short, and by mid-December she was heading back out into the Pacific with Everett aboard. For the first few months of 1942 the San Francisco operated out of Pearl Harbor. She was first sent to defend American troops on Wake Island, but was ordered to withdraw when news of Wake’s fall reached fleet command. Next, the San Francisco supported reinforcements to Samoa, one of the next targets of Japanese expansion, and she shelled Japanese installations in the Gilbert and Marshall Islands. From there the San Francisco joined a task force heading for Rabaul, in New Guinae, the center of Japanese operations for the South Pacific, but they were attacked by Japanese bombers and turned back.

By the time the USS San Francisco returned to Pearl Harbor in March of 1942, the ship had not received any fresh supplies of food for almost three months. Everett told Don and Wenonah that with no fresh fruit or vegetables, his hair started falling out, and his fingernails started peeling off.

After being resupplied at Pearl Harbor, the USS San Francisco was sent back to the states for three weeks, and then she joined a convoy carrying a large force of American troops, along with food and munitions, to New Zealand.

About that time, Everett decided to get married, to a girl he had met in San Francisco. They had opened up a joint bank account and he had started sending her money.  Boyd, who was still in artillery training stateside, wrote to Don, worried that their little brother might actually go through with the marriage:

4/7/1942:  

Dear Don and Jimmy, thanks for the letter. It was good to hear that Jimmy is getting along so well. You both must be getting used to the inconvenience of having a baby by now (actually I wouldn't be born for another 2 months). You may not think I am an expert on the subject but every time I look at those pictures of my two it makes me feel old and expert.

Everett’s letter about getting married sounds like a joke at first but he must be serious since he wrote us both the same thing. I am going to write him and tell him that I’d like to see him before he definitely makes up his mind. If he is really in love with this gal O.K, I wouldn’t meddle or interfere, but after all, so far she has been just one of many & he probably hasn’t even seen her for 6 months.

He should at wait until he has some time off to think it over. He couldn’t live with her now even if they were married, & if he doesn’t come through this war, all the marriage would mean is a pension for her as his wife when actually they never had a chance to live together.

By the way don’t worry about writing capt. On my letters. The rule here is that promotions come only after a full year of active duty. Even though I have a lot of seniority, I still won’t be promoted for some time.

This is a swell camp, and I hope I will get to stay a while. Eleanor is coming out as soon as we know & it should be settled any day.

Hope you don’t have to get in this. Stay right with your job and your family if you possibly can, and don’t volunteer.

If you have any trouble with those Kansas field mice you can put this picture where they’ll see it.

It was taken at Moro Bay near here where Jap Subs have sunk several oil tankers. Good luck to you kids. Sincerely, Boyd

In June, the Japanese landed troops on the island of Guadalcanal, just east of Australia, the main supply base for Allied forces. The US command immediately made plans to retake the island, and two months later, US marines landed on the beach and took the almost completed airstrip, which they named Henderson Field, after a pilot killed in the battle of Midway.

The marine landing was covered by several cruisers and by air support from three aircraft carriers, commanded by Admiral Frank Fletcher. When the Japanese navy attacked the transport ships unloading supplies for the marines, admiral Fletcher, fearing that he would lose his carriers, withdrew, leaving the cruisers and transports unprotected. What followed was the Battle of Savo Island, the worst defeat in US naval history, with almost 2000 US casualties.  

After the Battle of Savo Island, Everett’s ship, the USS San Francisco, headed for Guadalcanal.

The War in the Pacific

Good News! ChickasawPress.com is up and running if you would like to buy a copy of Wenonah’s Story on line.

With this post, I’m going to go back to the story of my dad’s brothers, Boyd and Everett, during WWII. Sorry for jumping around like this. If you’d like to review Everett’s escape from the sinking Battleship Oklahoma at Pearl Harbor, see my post of September 20, 2015.

Both my uncles served in the Pacific Theater. I did some reading about the war, and by knowing that Boyd was in the 161^st Infantry Regiment, and that Everett was on the USS San Francisco, I was able to follow them through the war, and also to fit together what I know about their personal experiences. I didn’t get much help from Don’s older brother Boyd. He never talked about his war time memories with Don, and his son, my cousin Tom Gunning, told me that the whole subject of the war was off limits in their house. On the other hand, Don’s younger brother Everett seemed to enjoy recounting his experiences. He told my parents several stories, and while on leave, he was interviewed by the local newspaper and radio station in his home town of Enid, Oklahoma.

To give you a little background, the Japanese rapidly followed up their victory at Pearl Harbor by taking Hong Kong, Guam and Wake Island. Then they marched through French Indochina and Thailand into Burma, and down the Malay peninsula toward Singapore, sweeping British and Dutch troops and naval vessels aside as they went. By mid-March they had taken Singapore, defended by 85,000 British troops, and the Dutch East Indies with their rich oil stores. In April 100,000 American and Philippine troops under General Jonathan Wainwright surrendered to the Japanese on the Philippine island of Luzon. By the time I was born in May, 1942, many began to think the Japanese were invincible. My mother Wenonah was terrified.

After Wainwright’s surrender, the American and Filipino prisoners, exhausted after 4 months of fighting, and suffering from malnutrition, malaria and dysentery, were marched 80 miles up the Bataan Peninsula by their Japanese captors. The stragglers were beaten and even bayoneted if they failed to keep up. 600 Americans and 10,000 Filipinos lost their lives during the ordeal, afterwards known as the “Bataan Death March.” Boyd’s unit, the 161^st Infantry Regiment, was on its way to the Philippines at the time of the Japanese attack. If he had been there, he would have been among those on the Death March. As it was, he was sent to the island of Guadalcanal instead.

The first American successes in the Pacific war were the result of intelligence efforts.  On April 28, 1942, about the same time as fall of the Philippines, the Japanese sent a fleet of transport ships carrying troops to establish a base at Port Moresby in Papua, New Guinea. From there they hoped to launch attacks on Australia, America’s main supply base. Orders for the movement were decrypted by American Intelligence, and the Japanese convoy was met in the Coral Sea by planes from two US aircraft carriers, the Lexington and the Yorktown. Although the Americans were overmatched by superior Japanese planes and torpedoes, they managed to turn back the Japanese troop transports and Port Moresby was never taken.

The next move in Japan’s strategic plan was to take Midway Island, about half way between Japan and Hawaii. It was then held by a small US force, and had the Japanese been able to take it, they could have again  threatened Hawaii, the Americans’ main naval base in the Pacific. Again US naval intelligence deciphered the Japanese orders, and on the day of the attack, June 4, 1942, the Americans took the Japanese by  surprise and sunk four of their six aircraft carriers. The Americans only lost one carrier out of their four, reversing the balance of naval power in the Pacific war in our favor. 

General Jonathan Wainwright remained a Japanese prisoner in Manchuria until the end of the war. 

Finding a Job

During Don’s senior year at OU he began to think about getting a job. His major up to that point had been office management, and after visiting a few businesses he discovered that no one was interested in hiring a fresh college graduate as a manager, regardless of his degree, so Don changed his major to accounting. He talked with his counselor and discovered that it would take him another year to get the required credits, and it wouldn’t be easy because the courses would all be upper division.  

Meanwhile Don was losing his roommate. His brother Boyd was graduating from law school and getting married to Eleanor Adderhold, the Kappa girl that Don had coached on how to use her elbows playing basketball. Boyd and Eleanor were going to New Orleans on their honeymoon and had invited Don to go along. It would be a nice break, but then Don would have to find a better job. He couldn’t support himself any longer by delivering laundry. There were no athletic scholarships in the ‘30’s.  

I know. It’s pretty funny that Boyd and Eleanor invited Don to go with them on their honeymoon, but that’s just what they did. When I asked Don why, he said, “ Well, it was a nice trip. I guess they just thought I should have a chance to go along too.”

 

Boyd and Eleanor in 1838

 

The next problem was finding a job. Up to that time playing basketball had taken a lot of Don’s time and energy, and he had also relied a lot on Boyd’s resourcefulness to support the two of them, but now Boyd had a wife to support so Don was on his own.  

It was hard for Don to find a job in Norman because of all the college students needing work. He had gone to Coach McDermott during the second semester of his senior year for help. The coach had cosigned a loan for him for $80. $30 for the second semester, and $50 for summer school. McDermott told Don that he would be retiring as basketball coach after the next season to take the job of athletic director, and then he might be able to offer Don a job on the basketball coaching staff, but at the time being there were no jobs open.  

Don’s father was also trying to get him a job, asking his customers if any of them were hiring. Grandfather’s shop was right off the town square, and every man in town got his hair cut there. They all knew Don too, if not from high school, at least from his years as a star at OU. Finally Grandfather found a man who agreed to talk to Don about a job. His name was Peppers.  

Mr. Peppers lived in Enid, but he owned a gasoline refinery in Oklahoma City. He told Grandfather to send Don over to talk with him. After Don talked with Peppers he was excited. He had been open about wanting to become an accountant, but Peppers told him that was no problem, that he would transfer him to his accounting department when he got his degree. 

 

So Don went to work in the plant. Here’s a picture of Don with Mr. Peppers at a softball game. I have a feeling that Peppers may have had the idea in the back of his mind that Don would be a good addition to the company softball team:

 

Don and C. C. Peppers, 1938

 

For the next year Don worked nights at Peppers' refinery in Oklahoma City, and then drove to Norman to go to school during the days. It was a grueling schedule. The work at Peppers was dangerous too. Don had to inspect and maintain the pipes which carried liquid and gaseous petroleum products. There could be an explosion at any time. He also had climb into the big oil tanks which were sometimes filled with deadly fumes.   

Don didn’t tell me about all the dangers of working at Peppers’ plant, but he did tell me about one terrifying experience he had there. He was working the night shift as usual and it was raining. The rain was coming down hard and it was difficult to see, but over the sound of the wind and thunder he could hear the roar of an engine, so he went out to investigate. It was a big oil tanker bringing in a load of oil to be refined.  

Don could tell that the tanker was going to have trouble because there was a power line that crossed the road about half way up the road to the plant. When the weather was good they would have a man climb up on the trucks to lift the wires up high enough to clear the tanks. It was dangerous work at any time but today on the wet slippery surface of the tanker it seemed like suicide, but the plant manager said they had to unload the oil that night, so one on the workers was chosen to climb up on the tank to lift the wires. Luckily it wasn’t Don.  

As Don watched, the man inched his way along the top of the truck, holding the power line up with a tree branch. Suddenly his feet slipped. He fell on the tanker, and as he did he lost his grip on the branch and the power line fell across his chest. There was a flash of light, and then the man slid off the truck to the ground, dead. Don had nightmares about it for years.

 Don at Peppers Refinery, 1938

 

 

 

Don, the Bully

Don worked hard in his classes at OU, but he also worked hard to excel in sports. He not only went out for basketball, but also track. He ran the mile, the mile relay and he threw the javelin.  

Don was exceptionally strong in his arms. He had boxed since grade school, and he worked on improving his arm strength. He told me once that he used to do 300 push ups every night. When I was little I asked him why he didn’t have big muscles like weight lifters, and he told me that they weren’t a strong as they looked. He said that he had beat one of the weight lifters at OU in arm wrestling. 

Apparently Don didn’t quit fighting at OU, and from what I can gather he was short tempered and used to push people around. I didn’t find that out from him. It was Jim who told me that Don's brother Boyd had pulled him aside once or twice to tell him that he couldn’t keep bullying people and succeed as an adult.  

Don still spent his summers in Fay while he was in college, and he was something of a hero there, especially after he made the basketball team. When I went to stay with my cousin Bud in Fay, his dad, Uncle Check, told me that Don worked at a dairy one summer, and that he could unload ten gallon milk containers out of a truck without taking down the tailgate. I guess working on the farm helped Don stay in condition. He told me once that the hardest work he had ever done was to dig a well by hand.  

 

Don at Aunt Laura's Dairy in Canton, Oklahoma

(Cousin Marvin Gunning on L, Laura on R, Don next to Laura)

 

One summer Don had a job surveying for the county, and he told me a funny story about an old farmer he met that summer. What Don was supposed to do was to measure the dimensions of each farmer’s fields. He had a chain of a certain length, and he was supposed to walk along the fence line and count the number of chain lengths on the sides of each field.  

Don said as he walked up to one farmer’s house, he saw the farmer sitting out on his porch in the sun. The man told Don that the sun was good for his arthritis. He said that his boys worked his farm now, because he hadn’t been able to work for several years because of the arthritis. Don asked if any of his boys were around, that he was going to need someone at the other end of his chain. The old farmer said his boys weren’t there, but he’d try to help. 

Don said that the old farmer walked slow, but they eventually walked around every field, and the farmer kept going, even though the chain was heavy and sometimes Don was almost dragging him along. Don said he was feeling guilty about putting the old farmer through such a hard day’s work when they finally got back to the house, but to his surprise the farmer had a smile on his face. He thanked Don for putting him through the work out, and said that he hadn’t felt better in years.  

I don’t think Don continued his boxing matches after he went to college, but he didn’t lose his self-confidence. Uncle Check told me another incident that happened at a rodeo they went to together. Check said they were sitting in the first row, and that one of the cowboys tossed a bucket of water on the ground in front of them, splashing mud up on their pants. He said that Don said something to the cowboy about what he could do with his water, and the cowboy said, “Why don’t you make me?” At that point Don stood up to his full 6 ft, 4 inches, and started to climb over the fence. The cowboy retreated.  

I used to try to imagine what Don was like in school. The stories I heard of him as a young man portrayed him as cocky and belligerent, a person totally different from my father. I never once heard Don raise his voice, let alone lose his temper. He was always calm, gentle, and understanding. He never seemed to assert himself, but people respected his opinions. He was well liked by everyone who knew him. He was a supervisor in his job, and he was elected to positions of leadership elsewhere. He was on the vestry at church, and he was president of the Petroleum Accountants’ Association of Oklahoma.  

Don did tell me one story about why he had changed his personality. He said there was a boy at OU, a member of the track team, who admired Don for his prowess in sports, but Don considered him a pest, so he bullied him and tried to run him off. He said that in spite of Don's attitude though, the boy kept trying to make friend with him, so he gradually decided that he was wrong. He told me, “I just decided I didn’t want to be that kind of person anymore,” and he and the young man became friends.  

This story is another example to me of Don’s ability to change. I think that was the most remarkable thing about my father. A lot of people try to change or improve their  personalities, but very few are able to accomplish it. Don did, not just once, but over and over again.

 

 

Don in High School

 

 

I don’t know too much about my dad’s high school years, but he did save the year books from his sophomore and junior years, 1931 and 1932. Here's his picture from 1932:

 

Donald D Gunning, age 17

Don’s older brother Boyd was a senior in 1931, and he was outstanding and popular. He was vice-president of the senior class, and a cheerleader. He was in the glee club. He played the trumpet like his father, and was among half a dozen chosen from Enid High School to go to the All-state Band. Boyd also starred in the senior class operetta, and was on the debate team. He was beginning to work toward his goal of becoming a lawyer. Here's his picture as escort for one of the May queen candidates:

Boyd Gunning, age 18

 

There were a lot of notes written in Don’s year books. There were a lot of complimentary notes from teachers, so he seems to have been a conscientious student. Here’s one from his English teacher:  

Don, I’ve always appreciated your attitude toward everything. You have some wonderful qualities, and I’m so glad I have had you in class. Always, Ruth Scott.

 

 

Ruth Scott, 1932

Don joined the math club his junior year and here's what his math teacher wrote:

Don, You get better and better. Since you’ve been through the real drudgery of math, now you should go on and take the fourth year where you can see the real fun in math. Sincerely, Grace Smith.

 

 

Grace Smith, 1932

In the 1931 book, Don isn’t pictured with either the football or the basketball teams, but there are a lot of notes consoling him on his tough luck in football. I didn’t figure out why until I read a note from a girl in his English class:

Don, Don’t forget the time you had a broken arm and you came out to our house and practiced for the Longfellow program. Remember me as a friend, Annabel Morrow.

 

 

Annabel Morrow, 1931

He didn’t make the football team because he broke his arm! 

Here’s the note written by Enid High’s football coach, Leon  R. Vance: 

Don, I have always said sophs were my favorites. I still do. A manly sophomore has such tremendous possibilities, and you are manly. Let’s work together and accomplish some real things. Leon Vance

 

 

Leon Vance, 1931

Lloyd Zuck was in Don’s class his sophomore year but not his junior year. I don’t know if he moved, or had to drop out of school. Here’s his note: 

Don, Remember me as a friend of yours. Remember the good old times we have had. If you try you will make the football team in 1932. You are a fine kid and a good sport. Always remember me as you gaze upon this handsome picture of me. L. Z.

 

Lloyd Zuck Kelly, 1931

(See blog post of Feb. 13, 2013)

 

Here’s a note from someone Don must have gone to grade school with:  

Dear Don, Remember the times when we used to go swimming in sewer creek, and also when we boxed in your back yard, and the good old days at Longfellow Jr. High School. An old friend, Jim Helton.

 

 

Jim Helton, 1932

And another: 

Don, I believe I’ve known you longer than anyone going to school now and we’ve sure had some keen times. Remember the keen times we used to have over on Maple with the ponies and how you used to whip Boyd’s bun? A friend. George Miles

 

 

George Miles, 1932

Don’s older brother Boyd was his best friend and mentor, but as a young boy Don was always trying to test himself against other boys, so I guess that included Boyd.

Don didn’t make the football team again his junior year, but he made the basketball team. Here’s a comment by the captain of the football team: 

Don, You sure have had plenty of bad breaks in football. I know you would have made the team this year. But after all I think more of a fellow that can take it on the chin like you did and then come back and letter in basketball. You sure have got the right stuff. And don’t forget bad breaks won’t follow you all your life. I know you will win out in the long run. Lots of luck, Dick.

 

Dick Gerren, 1932

 

The football team didn’t do so well that year but the basketball team won fourteen out of sixteen games and came close to winning the state title, finally falling to Cherokee, whom they had beaten during the regular season 28 to 13. The basketball coach, Perry McCoy wrote:

Perry McCoy, 1932

Well Don we had a great season this year. I’m looking forward to a good season for you next year. I’ve certainly enjoyed working with you, and knowing you. Next year we’ll beat Cherokee. Best wishes. Your coach and friend, Perry McCoy.

Here's Don with the Enid High basketball team of 1932:

 

Enid Plainsmen, 1932

(Don is in the middle row, 2nd to the left of coach McCoy)

 

I don’t have Don’s annual from 1933, his senior year. I know that he sang a lead in the school operetta like his brother Boyd, because he kept a copy of the program. Also he told me he finally made the football team as well as the basketball team, and was on the first string of both. He was actually a bigger star on the football team even though it was in basketball that he excelled in college.

In one game Don caught a pass and scored the winning touchdown. He told me that when he caught the ball he was on the 5 yard line, and even though he was tackled he struggled on across the goal line, dragging his tackler with him. Here's how football games looked back then:

 

Enid High vs. Oklahoma City Central, 1931

(It's hard to see clearly, but the uniforms had no leg pads, very thin shoulder pads, and the helmets were just thick leather with no cushion)

 

Football must have been very important at Enid High. That would explain the many condolences Don received the previous two years when he didn’t make the team, and also the following remarkable event, which occurred during Don's final semester. The school principal and Mr. Vance, the football coach, the same man who had complemented Don for being “manly,” approached Don’s father with a proposition. They suggested that they arrange to have Don’s teachers flunk him so that he would have to repeat his senior year and still be eligible to play football!

Grandfather was actually considering accepting the deal. He was always a big sports fan. I remember visiting him in a nursing home in his 90’s, and he had a radio by his bedside so that he could keep up with his favorite teams.  

Anyway, in spite of the pressure, Don turned the offer down flat. He proved that he was more "manly" than his coach. He knew that it was more important to get an education than to be a football star, and he had decided to join his brother Boyd at O.U.   

 

 

Fay

No story of my dad’s life would be complete without a large part devoted to Fay, Oklahoma. There’s no way that I can do justice to this remarkable little community, but I’ll have to try.  

Don’s home was Enid, Oklahoma, where my grandfather worked as a barber, but Grandmother was from Fay, and most of her family still lived there. She visited as often as she could, and of course when she went she took her sons along with her. I was raised on stories about Fay, about my dad’s aunts, uncles and cousins. After Don got out of grade school he spent his summers in Fay, working for one of his uncles, on the farm or in town at the filling station.   

Fay would seem to be just an ordinary farming community, inhabited by hard working men and women trying to make a living and raise their families, but it had a fascination for my dad that made it seem almost magical, and he transmitted that feeling to me. 

When I was in college at the University of Oklahoma, Bud, one of my cousins from Fay, was also in school there studying engineering. He was a year or two ahead of me and I’ll never forget a conversation I had with him just before his graduation. He told me that he couldn’t go on in engineering, because he’d have to move away from his home and his family, so after going all the way through the engineering school, he changed his major to education, and went back home to work as a teacher in Thomas, just a short distance from his father’s farm. He became principal of the junior high school there, and that’s where he lives today.  

The other kids from Fay were the same way. My uncle Boyd, who spent his summers in Fay like my dad, worked for the University of Oklahoma, and it was a standing joke that he couldn’t get any one from Fay to go to OU. They all went to Southwestern, a junior college closer to Fay. Actually Bud was the first to attend OU, but now you know how that turned out.

 

    Boyd in Fay Band (standing between two drummers), about 1925

 

It has always intrigued me that the kids from Fay were so reluctant to leave. Maybe it’s something about farming, about working with the soil. My dad felt it too. He spent his life living in a city working for an oil company, but he told me once that he wished he had an acreage, just a small piece of land where he could go and putter around, plant a garden and some crops. He always grew flowers and vegetables in our yard, even when I was little. I used to hate his rose bushes because I would scratch myself on their thorns while I was playing.  

My mother also understood the virtues of farm life. I recently ran across a paper she wrote while she was in College in the school of social work. The paper is about Garvin County, the community where she was raised. In it she describes how farm families have a low divorce rate. She concluded that it was because everyone on a farm has to pitch in and work together, and this makes their conflicts seem less important. I think there must be something to that.  

Still, there has always been something special about Fay, and the Boyd family. I know a little bit about the Fay’s history, both from what Don told me, and from a book written in 1994, on the occasion of Fay’s centennial celebration.  

The area around Fay, north of the Canadian River, was first settled by white men during the land run of 1892. The town wasn’t named until a federal post office was placed there in 1894. When the railroad was built in 1903, it only came within one and a quarter miles of the town so the town was moved. Some of the buildings were torn down and reassembled and others were pulled by teams of horses over bridge pilings laid end to end.  

Back then Fay was a bustling town with several hotels, cafes, bars, a  grocery and dry goods store, a blacksmith shop, livery, bank, cotton gin, stockyards, a telegraph office and three newspapers. My great grandparents, Grant and Laura Boyd, came from St. Joseph, Mo. In 1893 or 4 and bought their farm west of Fay for $35, the price of a train ticket home for the man who had unsuccessfully homesteaded there after the run. They also ran a hotel. (see my post of Jan. 13, 2013)  

 

 

                                     Fay during the early 1900’s. 

 

Probably Fay’s earliest claim to fame was Joe Gillespie, who won a 1000 mile horse race in 1893. Joe was working as a cowboy breaking horses in Nebraska when some businessmen decided to organize a horse race from Chadron, Nebraska, to Chicago, Illinois, where Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show was scheduled to perform. Doc Middleton, a Nebraska horse thief, wanted to enter the race, and he asked Joe to be his guide since Joe knew the Nebraska countryside.  

After a few days, Doc fell behind from spending too much time in bars along the way, and so Joe Gillespie decided to finish the race on his own. He had two horses, Billy Shaffer and Billy Mack. Someone gave Billy Mack an extra bucket of oats along the way and foundered him, so Joe had to go on with only Billy Shaffer. Joe was six feet tall and 180 pounds, bigger than most of the other riders, so he would get off and run to give the horse some relief. When he got too tired to run, he held onto Billy Shaffer’s tail and slid along on his feet until his boot soles wore through. Joe won the race and the prize of a Colt 44 six-shooter, a new saddle and two hundred dollars. Joe and his wife stayed with Buffalo Bill’s show until it left the country to tour Europe. They decided not to travel overseas, and to move to Oklahoma where they settled in Fay.   

Billy Shaffer was always spoken of like one of the family, and Joe’s grandson, Harold Comer, who recorded his grandfather’s story, said that he was six or seven years old before he found out that Billy Shaffer was actually a horse. Billy is buried near Fay.

 

 

                           Joe Gillespie (L) and Billy Shaefer (Center).