Dear Don,
Our friend Mike Ryman sent me a copy of your book, Air Raid Nights & Radio Days. My name is Jerry Udell and I was born December 30, 1939, in Indianapolis. My mother, father and I attended Shortridge High School. I attended Hanover College from 1958 to 1960 and graduated from Indiana University in 1963. We lived in two northside locations until I left in1963 for the Washington, DC area where my wife and I and two daughters essentially have lived for the past 57 years.
I loved every page of “Air Raid Nights!” You and I lived parallel lives–just on different sides of town. It brought back so many memories and I want to share some of them with you.
I only read about 4–10 pages a night, as I wanted to savor every moment. I didn’t want your book to end. Here are some of my musings that your writing brought back to the front of my brain that I hadn’t thought of in years–or decades.
Fibber McGee and Molly in Whistful Vista
This hysterical post WWII half-hour serial was one of my favorites! Ours was the last generation to hear these broadcasts live. “Don’t open that closet, McGee…”
Civil Defense Warden
My dad was a manufacturers’ representative and traveled throughout the Midwest. He sold parts that his casting and forging plants made to fit the needs of major companies such as GE and Allison Division of General Motors. (Family lore has it that he even had a part that made its way to Tinian for installation on the Enola Gay.)
Late one night I was watching my dad who was shaving in preparation for an early morning sales call. We had one light bulb on over the sink. We both jumped as there was a loud rapping on our window. We peeked out and were greeted by a helmet clad, flashlight-wielding air raid warden ordering us, “Turn off that light right now!” We did so immediately!
Dad and I never discussed just how the “Japs,” as the enemy was commonly referred to in the war era, could fly over half the US from Japan to central Indiana and discover our single light bulb on which to presumably drop a bomb. We just obeyed our air raid warden’s command.
In retrospect, the whole experience of a helmeted volunteer and our immediate unquestioning obedience to his order seems to define the unity, spirit and determination of Americans during the war.
Victory Field
Mom and dad would take me to Victory Field to see a couple of games a year.
I actually played on the field as a member of the Junior Baseball all-star team of the mid 50’s. During the summer of last year while moving from our long-time residence to our current retirement community, I discovered pictures of me playing 1st base in that game! This was one of the thousands of moving decisions I had to make in closing down the only house we had ever known. Save or toss. Save or toss. Yeah, I saved them!
Craig’s for Hot Fudge Sunday.
My Grandmother Ruske and my mom would take me on the streetcar to Craig’s for a hot fudge sundae a couple times a year. Can you imagine taking a public conveyance halfway through Indianapolis for what now can be purchased on virtually every commercial street corner in America? How times have changed!
James Whitcomb Riley
“James” seemed to be one of the biggest names in Hoosier history when I was a kid growing up. However, I don’t remember ever being required to read his poems at any level of my education. Plus, I don’t recall any other contribution he made to history. He must have had a great agent!
Governor Henry F. Schricker
This is the first Indiana politician whose name I heard, but like James Whitcomb Riley, I don’t recall hearing his name associated with any particular issue or accomplishment. Perhaps this is because people of our era didn’t expect government to do much after the war.
But still, it does strike me as unusual, since I spent 10 years on U. S. Senator Birch E. Bayh’s staff and another 3 years on another Senate staff, that I hadn’t heard something about him.
Bob Hope
You had a “brush” with Bob Hope as a kid with your connection with the movie in which you were an extra. I had mine as a junior in high school where I saw him in concert at the Indiana State Fairgrounds. How many people do you suppose he “touched,” in some way, shape or form during his stunning lifetime? When you see the films of him entertaining the troops overseas for decades and you realize—he never spent a Christmas at home with his family and that many thousands of the troops he entertained probably never made it home—it can’t help but bring a tear to your eye.
Thanks for the memories, Bob. I’m one of the millions you touched and am so proud to say so!
Kate Smith and God Bless America
Right Person—Right Time—Right Song
Nobody can “revisionist history” her out of my heart!
Boy Scout Oath
I hadn’t read it for decades. It’s still as good today as it was when it was written. If I were on the drafting committee I would probably have added, “Follow these rules, boys, and you will probably lead a pretty good life.”
Chicken Dinner
A chicken dinner in your and my day began with your Aunt Les and my Grandma Ruske buying the live chicken, killing it with their bare hands, plucking its feathers, butchering it and finally frying it. I witnessed the early part of this process, but fortunately never really connected the gruesome execution with the delicious meal at the dinner table.
Today a dad picks up the fully cooked chicken at the Safeway on the way home from work for $5.95. Mom adds a few frozen side dishes and “voila!” chicken dinner for the whole family!
Not everything in the “good old days” was better than “today’s days.”
Starlight Musicals at Butler Bowl
My Grandmother (of the chicken dinner fame) took me to see my first musical at Starlight. I believe it was “Desert Song.”
The night may have planted a seed. Today, my wife and I usher at four theaters in Montgomery County, Maryland. As you might expect, since the County is a Washington DC suburb, the talent is exceptional. Ushering is a great retirement avocation. Not much “heavy lifting” and you see 16 free plays a year.
Riverside Amusement Park
I’d go to Riverside Amusement Park about once a year but was at the adjacent baseball diamonds countless times as a member of the Shortridge baseball team. The baseball part of the park was enormous with maybe 10-12 diamonds which were built at widely varying elevations.
On one occasion, we were playing on the most highly elevated diamond. I was a right-handed batter. I swung late on a pitch which I hit on the extreme end of the bat. The ball was wildly rotating and cleared the first baseman’s head by about 4 feet. You could hear the ball make a weird spinning noise. It barely stayed fair and then bounced a hard right straight down the giant hill on which our diamond was set. It ended up on the lower playing field right in front of a startled short stop who quickly realized what was happening as the catcher, pitcher and first baseman from our game were racing down the hill to set up some kind of relay system to get the ball up on our diamond to stop my running the bases.
I nearly “succumbed” while rounding second base and heading for third. At 5’10” and 150 pounds, I didn’t have much practice running out home runs! Meanwhile, my ball was gradually making it up to our playing field. I crossed home “safe!” and collapsed in the arms of my congratulating teammates—many were hysterically laughing. I had just hit the most bizarre, funkiest homerun in Shortridge history!
Indiana State Fairgrounds
I lived a block and a half from one of the scores of small gates to the State Fairgrounds. This gate led directly into the midway rides and sideshows. When my mom and dad purchased our house, they bought the next-door vacant lot which served as the neighborhood baseball and football field. But once a year it became my back-to-school “gold mine!” My parents let me turn the lot into a State Fair parking lot for the Labor Day weekend crowd.
I made a sign and welcomed in the customers – “Park all day!!! 1 ½ blocks to the Fair Midway. Only 35 cents!!!”
My dad did all the parking – while I collected all the money. Every square inch of our front and side yards was covered with cars. I ended up with a total of $35- $50 every year! It was some operation!!
Kilroy History
Of course, I remembered the phrase, “Kilroy was here,” but I never heard the “story behind the story.” Great history by you! There are some subjects that remain indelible in my 40’s and 50’s childhood that you didn’t mention or didn’t mention in depth in “Air Raid Nights.” They include:
BB Guns
BB Guns in the pre-teen years were about as much a passion as a driver’s license and a car were to the mid-teen years. The movie “Christmas Story” and Ralphie were “real” in our neighborhood.
My dad was an excellent carpenter. He made a shooting gallery with moving animals on it for me in our basement. When spring came, we moved our shooting outside. Target shooting outside usually consisted of walking through the alleys and firing away at just about anything non-living that you can imagine—usually stuff in the neighbors’ trash, discarded soda bottles, etc.
Can you imagine if you looked out your back window today and saw two or three kids walking through your neighborhood with Red Ryder BB guns? From a distance the gun looks a lot like a Winchester 73—the gun that opened the West. How times have changed!
Broad Ripple
Broad Ripple was becoming a quaint extension of Indianapolis during the 50’s, but to most of us, it was just the home of our northside rival. We all knew a few kids from our rival school, but in general there wasn’t that much interaction.
It wasn’t until I entered Hanover College and was having trouble with Biology that I met an attractive Broad Ripple co-ed who happened to be a straight A student. I asked her if she would tutor me for a midterm. She agreed. We discovered that we lived on adjacent streets at home—but 17 blocks apart.
She got her A in biology. I got through. Mission accomplished!
We decided to date that summer. I asked her if she liked bowling. She said “yes.” When I picked her up and met her mom and dad, I noticed a bookcase full of bowling trophies in the living room. I asked her if they were her dad’s. She modestly replied, “No, they’re mine.” She trounced me on the lanes that night but more importantly, she ultimately became my wife and our 61-year romance continues to this day.
Basketball
The legend, lore and reality of Indiana high school basketball probably reached its zenith in the 50’s and 60’s or at least until the Indiana State High School Basketball Association changed the format by dividing the single state championship into several divisions based on school population.
Interestingly enough, given the basketball climate in the 50’s, when a high school student bought a ticket to the “sectionals,” (first round games), and had all his teachers initial the ticket, he was excused from school to attend the afternoon sessions. Who could pass up this opportunity? —one of Hoosier’s many “finest” traditions!
There would be no more “David and Goliath” stories that in real life would in give us the Milan State Championship in 1954. This upset was immortalized by “coach” Gene Hackman’s portrayal in what is widely acclaimed as the best sports movie ever made — “Hoosiers”.
The Indianapolis 500
For me and my friends, the Indianapolis 500 was an all-consuming 30-day passion.
For me the second saddest day of the year (second to the day after Christmas!) was the day after the race. As Hoosier and Shortridge Alumni Kurt Vonnegut said, “Growing up in Indianapolis in the 50’s was the Indianapolis 500 and 364 days of miniature golf.” We lived and breathed the 500 for the entire month of May.
My dad told me that he thought my first visit to the track was at age 5. I remember as a teenager hearing the golden-throated voice of Tom Carnegie the track announcer saying, “He’s done it! A new track record–150 miles an hour for Parnelli Jones.” Everyone pretty much agreed–“That’s it! They’re never going to go much faster.”
I think you would agree that everybody should go to at least one Indianapolis 500? There is nothing like being in a crowd of 450,000 of your fellow humans and hearing the command, “Drivers, start your engines!” And having 33 cars cross the start/finish line at 230 miles per hour. You may hate it or you may love it, but you’ll agree, “There is nothing else like it.”
Flanner Buchanan Funeral Home
A place where, if I still lived in Indianapolis, I’d be spending more and more of my time as I and my classmates have pretty much all turned 80 years old or older by now.
Thanks for bringing back all these memories, Don!
Jerry Udell