Eleanor New
John Dillon
Mr. Thomas
US History X, Period 7
2 May 2006
Eleanor New
John Dillon: Starting the interview with my grandmother, now.
Eleanor New: Starting with the bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7th 1942….
Dillon: One….
New: 1941?!.... oh… are you sure you want to interview me?
Dillon: It’s ok… memory lapse…
New: I came home from church and it was announced on the radio that it had been bombed, and it was my horror that it was going to be the end of the world. If we ever had a war like WWI again it’d be the end of the world. And Dick (grandfather) at that time was in his senior year at USC and was on break in Greenfield. And he said that he was entering the draft board in California…
Dillon: So this was right after the bombing of Pearl Harbor?
New: Oh, No… he had already been registered for the draft. The draft had been going on since before the bombing because of the escalating tension in Europe, and we thought that we might eventually have to help out over there. Anyway, Dick said, “I’m going to go enter the draft in California, because with all of those people out there they’ll never get to me.” Haha, and as soon as he was registered he was called up. And so then he was moved up to Camp Roberts about midway up in California and he and some of his buddies had come down to L.A. to visit his Aunt Eda May, then Eda May had gone over to this little store to make sandwiches for the boys… now Dick and his buddies had the weekend off… and it was at that time that someone came into the store and said that someone had bombed Pearl Harbor! And someone asked where it was and they said they thought it was somewhere near San Pedro… Haha… because no one knew where it was… And Dick’s Uncle Andy chased them down and found them and said “You guys have got to get back!” so he paid one of the store clerks to drive them back to Camp Roberts saying “These men are needed there!” And after that there was a time where not a lot got done. And Dick was up in Washington State, guarding a bridge and they were rounding up men to go to the Pacific front, and because he could type, he didn’t have to go. So his typing skills saved him, in that sense… After that they military sent him to OCS because they saw that he had the aptitude for an officer, and then at about that time… well what I really want to tell you about is how this nation united…
Dillon: Yeah!
New: Well, everything went to the military. People saved food, and bacon grease and sugar. None of us complained we just made due with what we had. People had defense jobs. Even I had a defense job.
Dillon: What do you mean, “Defense Job”?
New: Well, when I was in high school, I saw that they were recruiting nurses and I thought that it was a good idea, and so I thought I would join so I could go into the Army and help people. Well, I didn’t make it. The war was over before I graduated. But I still did have a defense job. In the summers I would work for RCA, where I wound antennae wire for submarines.
Dillon: Oh, cool!...
New: People had jobs like that all over the country. Everything seemed to be benefiting the military. There weren’t any cars being built except for the military, and houses stopped being built. Things were just put on pause. But you know, there was a unity among everyone. Of course, though, there were gripers, but by and large people just kept working.
Dillon: What was it like living through FDR’s Presidency?
New: Oh, yes he was such a great leader and an encourager. “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.” He seemed to be very wise in all of the decisions he made. He rationed all of the supplies, and we all had ration stamps, for meat and flour, um butter occasionally and sugar sometimes. And the people shared them with somebody else. And we did live in farm community, so everybody had food. And everyone in the community looked out for each other and not very many people went hungry. And um… this ended the depression. After this, the manufacturing jobs sprang up and everyone went to work for the military. FDR’s job creations got the country jazzed up and turned the attention from the people working to get the country out of the depression, to working to support the army.
Dillon: How does America seem now, compared to during the war?
New: Well, there was a lot more national loyalty. We were pretty much isolated, because of the oceans, and now we’re just a part of that big ol’ messy world. And my sister joined the WAC. And she was a Sergeant, and she was a cryptographer in New Guinea. Now Dick had made tons of friends before they left for the war, and he just loved these guys, and it was so hard for him to keep going in Europe… because all of his friends had been killed. And when he came home, none to tell the family members of what had happened, they wouldn’t welcome him. I mean there was someone who had been through every thing they had, and he didn’t get it? Why not him? And that was another thing that he kept asking himself, was, “Why didn’t I die also?” He just battled on. Even after his entire platoon had been wiped out. Everyone but him and one other man was killed. But granddad was hurt in the war, too. There was one time where he was shot in the jaw, by like either shrapnel or a sniper, he never knew. And he also was in a Jeep, and he still doesn’t know what happened but out of nowhere, a plane came and strafed them, and the driver was killed and the jeep dumped in a ditch, and Grandad ended up with a broken leg. And then there was one other time where he had been on a night maneuver and he was walking next to a tank, and the barrel of the tank swung around and the next thing he knew he was in a hospital. He had been unconscious for about 5 days with a serious concussion. But he would talk about how the most horrible things would happen. He said that one time he was talking to a runner and he was just talking to him, and a sniper just picked him off right in front of him.
Dillon: After the war, was there ever an at ease moment, where you could enjoy the peace of everything you all had been working for for so long?
New: Yes, and then it was just sort of a regrouping of economy. There weren’t cars, there weren’t houses, there wasn’t any place to live… I’m trying to think of the name of this town (Levittown)… in New York… where this builder (Levitt) came in and just built tons of these cheap houses for the veterans. Oh darn, what a horrible brain.
Dillon: What was it like when America had found out about the bombing of Japan?
New: Well immediately we felt sorry, because we all knew of the destruction, and of the innocent people who had died. And it was also very very frightening. We also knew that things would never be the same and it was so tragic because we knew that it had to be done. And it was so frightening because we knew that there would never be the same kind of peace that we had had before that. When Dick came back from the war, he went back to USC and he couldn’t sleep at night and so he and Uncle Andy would go out and walk all night. Then we met and married and the Korean War started and he knew he would be called up. And he applied for regular Army and that’s when he took up the Army as a career. END.