A Blast From The Past

Many times parents do not share with their children what happened to then in their past. This is something from my past that I think my children don't know about and might be interested in, as a history lesson, if nothing else. So...

HOW I HELPED SAVE THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN OF PHILADELPHIA PA


After graduating from high school I went into the Army for a 3 year hitch so I could get the GI Bill. This was in 1952 during the cold war and we were in a hot war in Korea also.

Due to guessing, I made a good score on my Army electronics test and stayed state side to go to school, rather than going to Korea. Did not get into electronics school so they shipped me off to a 90mm anti-aircraft battery on the east coast.

I landed in gun emplacements batteries located in graveyards in and around Philadelphia Pa for two and a half years. Why were the batteries in graveyards you may ask? I did.

The only place that had any vacant unused land around Philadelphia was the graveyards. So our government leased? this land and placed our 90mm anti-aircraft batteries here.

Can you imagine a southern boy shipped to the far north Yankee land in the dead of winter?

My first anti-aircraft battery was being constructed and digging foundations, in the dead of winter, was not my cup of tea!

When they asked for volunteers to transfer to a Met unit I thought they said a Med, which would have meant a nice warm hospital deployment. WRONG!

They bundled all my gear and me in an open jeep and drove me from northern Philadelphia, in the dead of winter, down to the southwestern end of Phil. Did I wind up at a nice warm hospital? NO! NO! NO! I wound up at another 90mm anti-aircraft battery, yep you guessed it, in a graveyard !

It would seem I miss-heard and the work I was going to be doing was taking meteorological information for the 90mm anti-aircraft batteries in and around Philadelphia WHICH WERE LOCATED IN GRAVEYARDS!!!!.

So, for the next two and a half years I would be living in graveyards protecting the women and children of Philadelphia Pa.