"We who were the children of World War II never forgot." ---- Moggie Bickham
For many moons, I featured heroic local veterans who fought the Second World War. My interest was in no small part because my father was in that number. While I was born long after the war, the children who grew up during wartime offer valuable perspective.
Following a journey to Copenhagen in 2023, I conversed with a Danish lady, my opponent in a friendly game at my bridge club. My tour of her country was stellar, from a guided walk through Christiansborg Palace where kings and queens have ruled for centuries to our sighting of the Little Mermaid statue inspired by Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale.
But the Dane who hailed from The City of Spires (Copenhagen) did not harp on any of those pleasantries. Instead, she described her native Denmark as German-controlled during World War II. Explaining further, she informed that the Danes had dairy which the Germans needed to feed their troops. While she never went hungry as a youth during the war, Kirsten had an indelible memory of the sirens warning of German air raids --- for her, "Sirens still set off alarms." Eye opening, for the daughter of a World War II reconnaissance pilot.
And it was similarly so when I read a poignant piece penned by Moggie Bickham (1933-2006) who was a renowned writer for "The Era-Leader" when I wore a younger woman's clothes. A superb writer, she was the daughter of Hunter E. Dobson (1901-1964), a volunteer veteran of both World Wars, and wife Margaret Tobias Dobson. So, without further ado, in her own words, Moggie Dobson Bickham's memories of World War II, as originally published in The Era-Leader:
"My first memory of World War II, when I was eight years old, is linked to the bombing at Pearl Harbor. My father and mother hovered around the radio, listening to every word. The four Dobson kids, Bill, 14; Nelie, 10, me and little brother, Frank, 6, hovered around them because we had never seen our parents so upset. None of us had any idea what a 'Pearl Harbor' was, or that it would change our lives in so many ways.
Just days later my dad kept going off and coming back home where he and my mom had secret discussions. I think I recall my mom being not too happy. The radio remained the focus of their attention and, then one day, my dad got all dressed up in a Chief Petty Officer's uniform, said goodbye and was off to the war. He was a veteran of World War I, and now he would become a World War II veteran. Too old to be in the regular Navy, he joined the Seabees as a civil engineer.
Up until that time in our lives, our daddy was home every night. When Pearl Harbor was bombed he was building roads for the CCC, a Roosevelt program which helped put people to work during the aftermath of the great depression.”
“Now my mom was left to tend to the 'homefront.' With four kids, mom had more ration cards than many of the 'rich' folks. We didn't have a car (few people in Mandeville did), so the gasoline shortage wasn't a problem. But I remember her wheeling and dealing for coffee and using the bitter chicory as a filler. We all were allowed 'coffee milk' which wasn't very appealing with chicory.
Later, my big brother, Bill, was one of the leaders in the school scrap metal drive. He and a bunch of other high school kids collected and piled everything from cars to cans into a huge pile in front of the school. Apparently people gave up andirons, stoves, old automobiles, tools, and anything metal they could find to add to the pile. The older kids who could drive would spend days loading old trucks and hauling things back. I don't believe they spent much time in school that session.
Margarine is something else that I remember vividly. You had this white lump of lard-like stuff and some powdery orangish stuff and we had to mix it together so it would look like butter. It wasn't even close. Believe me the margarine of the '40's was nothing like some of the tasty margarines of today. Butter, unless you had your own cow, was non-existent.
And, for most kids, chocolate candy was a rarity. Not so with the Dobson kids. It seems that servicemen got rations containing Hershey bars, Peppermint patties, (the two I recall) etc., so my dad would save his until he got a nice box full and then mail them to us. What a great time we had when the package came. Mom tried to 'ration' it out to us, but it disappeared within a few days. I remember sneaking candy to some of my friends --- at least they were friends as long as the Hershey bars lasted.
My little brother and I would save our pennies --- they were much harder to come by in those days-and go to the post office to buy 'war stamps'. Convinced that Hitler would find our stamp books, we placed them in tin cans and buried them in the back yard. They were never redeemed.
Many more images come to me as a child during WWII: Our personal fear and hatred for Hitler and Hirohito, the sound of sirens when 'practice' air raids were conducted by the Civil Air Patrol, mom putting up black curtains and a star in our window.
Our dad was one of the few we knew who was actually away at war, so we Dobson kids lorded it over the hero-less kids in the neighborhood. News from the front was shown at the movies (we were Saturday regulars) and we'd actually cheer each time it showed our guys bombing their guys.
Then it was over. The president had died, the new president we never heard of ushered in the Atomic Age, my dad came home from service in Africa and Sicily, unharmed, but somehow different, we moved to Hammond, welcomed a baby sister, and life went on. We grew up, married, had children, lost our parents, went through good times and bad.
But we who were children of World War II, never forgot. For many of us, it was the demarcation line between the innocence of childhood and the realization that the world was not always a safe haven for kids.
Every young generation since has learned the same thing, and more's the pity."
