World War II
In World War I, airplanes were a relatively new item. The Wright brothers made their first sustained flight on December 17, 1903, so by 1918, they were still barely more than a novelty, but that didn’t matter. The world needed these machines, if the Allied countries were to win World War I. I’m sure that no one really knew how these new machines were going to work out, and I can only imagine how the pilots that had to fly those first planes felt about not only flying in them, but doing combat in them. One of those first crew members was Stephen W Thompson, a 24-year-old gunner on a French aircraft in February 1918.
Thompson was born on March 20, 1894, in West Plains, Missouri. When the United States entered World War I in April 1917, Thompson was a senior in electrical engineering at the University of Missouri. Men were needed to go and fight, so the school announced that seniors who joined the military before graduation would receive their diplomas in June. Being a loyal American, Thompson enlisted in the Army. He was sent for basic training at Fort Riley, Kansas, and by June he was sent to Fort Monroe, Virginia for training in the Coast Artillery Corps. The train ride to his post would change his life forever, when he spotted an airplane in the sky. It was the first one he had ever seen, and when he got the opportunity, he went to the flying field, the Curtis School at Newport News, and asked if he could take a ride. He figured it might be the only chance he would get, and he didn’t want to miss out. Thomas Scott Baldwin, who had been a famous performer in his own balloons and dirigibles, was in charge and he agreed to give Thompson a ride. The plane 
was a Curtiss JN-4 Jenny and the pilot was Edward Stinson, a prominent flyer at the time who later founded the Stinson Aircraft Company.
After his ride, in which Stinson did a number of aerobatic maneuvers, including looping the loop five times in a row, Thompson said that the only thing that kept him from falling out of the plane at the top of the last loop was the lap belt. I can only imagine how he felt, but that flight changed Thompson’s whole life. He decided to apply for duty in the Air Service. He was accepted, and on February 5, 1918, flying as a gunner on a French aircraft in February 1918, he became the first member of the United States military to shoot down an enemy aircraft. He was not the first person to shoot down another aircraft, because Kiffin Rockwell achieved an earlier aerial victory as an American volunteer member of the French Lafayette Escadrille in 1916. Nevertheless, Thompson was the first “official soldier” to do so. That day, the 1st Aero Squadron had not yet begun combat operations, and Thompson visited a French unit with a fellow member of the 1st Aero Squadron. The men were invited to fly as gunner-bombardiers with the French on a bombing raid over Saarbrücken, Germany. Well, nobody had to ask them twice. The run was successful, but after they had dropped their bombs, the squadron was attacked by Albatros D III fighters. Immediately taking action, Thompson shot down one of them, thereby 
carrying out the first aerial victory by any member of the US military. He was awarded the Croix de Guerre with Palm for the action.
After the war Thompson worked at McCook Field for several years as an engineer. Today, McCook Field is Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Following his time at McCook Field, he became a high school mathematics teacher. During World War II, he taught preflight and meteorology. He maintained an interest in aviation and in 1940 he received US Patent Number 2,210,642 for a tailless flying wing. He died on October 9, 1977, in Dayton, Ohio at age 83.
It’s hard for me to believe that my uncle, Bill Spencer has been in Heaven for more than three years already. Uncle Bill chose Christmas Day to go. I think maybe he wanted to spend the holiday with his parents and siblings. He was the last of the original family to go to Heaven, and with Covid stalking the world, he didn’t get to see his children as much either. Since Uncle Bill had Dementia, he probably didn’t realize that he didn’t get to see much of his family, but they knew it, and it made them sad. There were months and months during which they could not go visit him, and sadly it didn’t matter that all these precautions were taken. Uncle Bill still got Covid, and by Christmas Day, he was ready to go home. And so, on Christmas Day 2020, the Spencer brothers got back together again.
My dad, Allen Spencer was two years younger than his brother, Bill, but they were the very best of friends. When they were together, you didn’t have to ask them to talk about their childhood, all you have to do was sit back and listen, because the stories were the talk of the day. They had so many great adventures. They would go fishing, swimming, and boating with friends. They also loved getting into mischief, and dynamite was one of 
their favorite mischief makers. They normally used dynamite to remove tree stumps, but they weren’t above the Independence Day “fireworks” display or the “gate post” experiment. They were very industrious boys, and in those days, before things like video games, television (while it did exist, was not common in every household), and telephones (they were first in homes in 1856, but only 35% of homes in the 1920s had one), kids actually played outside, and used their imaginations. These brothers had the best time. They rode their bicycles for miles and miles. They hopped the trains…no, not like illegally. These boys had a pass, because their dad worked on the trains, but they never simply boarded a train…they hopped the train, even though they were scolded for it, they hopped the trains anyway. Danger be hanged!! Oh, the adventures they had.
When the United States entered World War II, the brothers were all set to go into the Army Air Force together, but Uncle Bill had a hernia and flat feet, so they wouldn’t take him. My dad went in alone, and his big brother, who had always been there to take care of him, was…well, a little frantic about it. He didn’t want my dad to go 
without him. He worried about his little brother. Sending any family member into the military in times of war, is something any family would worry about, and Uncle Bill was no exception. So, while his brother fought in the war, Uncle Bill worked on the planes here at home. Uncle Bill was a welder, and his skills were very important in the building of the planes that would fight and eventually win World War II. His was a very important job, and I am very proud of the part he played in the victory. Today would have been Uncle Bill’s 102nd birthday. Happy birthday in Heaven, Uncle Bill. We love and miss you very much.
Erno Rubik is a name that is known worldwide…well, maybe not the name Erno, but certainly the name Rubik. Erno Rubik Jr was born on July 13, 1944, in Budapest, Hungary, to Erno Rubik Sr, a flight engineer at the Esztergom aircraft factory, and Magdolna Szántó, a poet. He was born during World War II and has lived all of his life in Hungary. He credits his father as his inspiration for his successes. The younger Rubik became famous for inventing the Rubik’s Cube and other puzzles, but his work isn’t all about puzzles. In fact, much of his recent work involves the promotion of science in education. Rubik is also involved with several organizations such as Beyond Rubik’s Cube, the Rubik Learning Initiative, and the Judit Polgar Foundation. All of these organizations aim to engage students in science, mathematics, and problem solving at a young age.
All his life, the younger Rubik displayed artistic abilities. He attended the Secondary 
School of Fine and Applied Arts, from 1958 to 1962, specializing in sculpture. He attended the Budapest University of Technology from 1962 to 1967, where he also became a member of the Architecture Faculty. He then attended the Hungarian Academy of Applied Arts and was in the Faculty of Interior Architecture and Design from 1967 to 1971. While a professor of design at the academy, Rubik pursued his hobby of building geometric models. One of these became the prototype of his cube. It was made of 27 wooden blocks, with seems common to Rubik’s Cube experts of today, but when it was built, it actually took Rubik a month to solve the problem of the cube!! Go figure!! As of June 2018, the world record for solving the Rubik’s Cube is 4.22 seconds.
The Rubik’s Cube proved to be a useful tool for teaching algebraic group theory, and in late 1977 Konsumex, Hungary’s state trading company, began marketing it. From there, in 1980, the Rubik’s Cube went global. It was marketed throughout the world, and over 100 million authorized units, with an estimated 50 million unauthorized imitations, were sold, mostly during its subsequent three years of popularity. I guess you could say that Erno Rubik had arrived!! Approximately 50 books were published describing how to solve the puzzle of Rubik’s Cube. Following his cube’s popularity, Rubik opened a studio to develop designs in 1984. One of the products that came out of that studio was another popular puzzle toy, Rubik’s Magic.
When a soldier is told to guard an area for his country, he does just that, but on this occasion, this job of “guarding” an area, or an island in this case, was taken to extremes. For a time, the Allies struggled against the Japanese, but by 1945, the tide of World War II had turned decisively against Japan. The Japanese got really nervous as the Americans advanced across the Pacific, drawing ever closer to the Japanese home islands. The American strategists set their sights on Iwo Jima, a small volcanic island about 750 miles south of Tokyo. They saw it as a suitable staging area for an eventual invasion of Japan. Of course, the Japanese were very aware of the threat posed by Iwo Jima landing in American hands. So, they knew they had to garrison the island.
Ymakage Kufuku and Matsudo Linsoki were two Japanese machine gunners assigned to the island’s garrison. I can only imagine how they must have felt, knowing that the attack was imminent, and that they could only sit and wait for it. In February of 1945, Iwo Jima was invaded in one of the fiercest and bloodiest battles of the entire Pacific War. The Japanese soldiers fought frantically, almost to the last man. Japanese soldiers were taught that it was more honorable to die that survive, if they lost the war. They were taught that rather than surrender, the honorable thing to do was to commit suicide, so out of a garrison of 21,000 Japanese, nearly 20,000 died before the island was declared secured.
Kufuku and Linsoki were among the few Japanese soldiers who didn’t die in the fighting and didn’t commit suicide. They also believing what their government told them about Americans torturing and killing prisoners, so they were too afraid to surrender. The two men felt like they had no choice but to go underground. They also expected that soon the Japanese would be able to take the island back, so they hid during the day in the multitude of tunnels that were all over the island. They came out at night pilfer food and other necessaries from the American garrison’s supply and trash dumps. It was a tough kind of life, but by doing this, Kufuku and Linsoki managed to survive for a long time in a barren and inhospitable island that was mighty short on both vegetation and game. The Americans weren’t interested in exploring Iwo Jima’s hard landscape, a fact that allowed the two Japanese soldiers to go unnoticed for years.
Finally, on January 6th, 1949, two US Air Force corporals in a Jeep spotted a couple of pedestrians in uniforms that looked to be a few sizes too big. The men were walking alongside a road. The soldiers thought the men were Chinese laborers. The men spoke no English and they didn’t seem to want to talk, but the American airmen just assumed they were hitchhiking to the island’s main base and gave them a lift. They dropped them off in front of the garrison’s headquarters building. That probably left Kufuku and Linsoki a little bit unnerved. Nevertheless, they didn’t want to seem suspicious, so they wandered around the American base for hours, at least until a passing American sergeant realized that they were Japanese and took them in. The men were 
interrogated, and afterward, they took their captors to their hideout. There, to their amazement, the Americans found a cave richly stocked with canned foods, flashlights, batteries, uniforms, boots, shoes, socks, and other goods that the pair had been pilfering over the years. I’m quite sure they recognized some of the items from the base. While the Japanese soldiers did no real harm, their self-imposed secret mission had come to an end.
During World War II, a number of royal families considered leaving their countries for a time, due to potential dangers to them and their families. Many of the royals decided that they shouldn’t leave. As for Prince Bernhard, husband of Crown Princess Juliana was serving in the Royal Airforce. It was thought that Princess Juliana, and her daughters would be safer in Canada, so they relocated in in June of 1940. In the years she was there, the couple became pregnant with their third child, who would now be born in Canada, unless something drastically changed.
With the relocation of the royal family, and now the impending birth, which could, I suppose cause a bit of a problem like the one that exists in the United States, when a child who could later go on to run for president, is born in another country. Our law requires that the child be born on US soil, like a military base or something. Of course, that may not be the law in the Netherlands, but whatever the case may be, the Canadian government was compelled to do something anyway. So, the decision was made that in 1943, the Canadian government temporarily declared a maternity ward of Ottawa Civic Hospital to be extraterritorial. This struck me as funny, because at first glance, I thought it said extraterrestrial!! I thought, “What are they talking about??” Then, I realized that my first glance had been 
deceiving. I suppose that is good news for the royal family of the Netherlands, who would not be the parents of an alien from outer space.
Comedy aside, this change was made because Dutch princess Margriet was to be born at the maternity ward of Ottawa Civic Hospital. With this change, the maternity ward suddenly fell outside of the Canadian domain, causing it to be unaffiliated with any jurisdiction and technically international territory. The purpose was to ensure that the newborn would derive her citizenship from her mother only, thus making her solely Dutch. While this change didn’t matter much since Princess Margriet was a girl, and thereby third in line for the throne. It could have been very important, if the child had been male, and as such, the heir of Princess Juliana. Many countries with a royal family move the sons ahead of any older sisters in the line of succession to the throne. England recently changed that law, meaning that HRH Princess Charlotte (currently 3rd) was not passed by HRH Prince Louis 
(currently 4th) in the line of succession there.
The birth of Princess Margriet came about thusly. “It was the height of the Second World War, things were still not going well for the Allies, when a brief bit of good news came in the midst of darkness. The German forces had already rolled over much of Europe, smashing resistance before them, including the brave but futile defense of Holland. The Dutch Crown Princess Juliana and her two daughters had fled the German invasion and arrived in Canada in June 1940. On January 9, 1943, Dutch Princess Margriet was born at the Ottawa Civic Hospital. Crown Prince Bernhard came from London where he was serving with the Royal Air Force, to be present for the birth. The Royal Family returned to Holland shortly after the war.”
When my dad, Staff Sergeant Allen Spencer, was serving in the Army Air Force during World War II, rationing was not an unusual thing. Nevertheless, most of us think of rationing to be in the form of gas rationing. That is pretty much the kind of rationing we have heard being used these days, but on January 8, 1941, the government of the United Kingdom began a different kind of rationing…food. I can see the value of such a thing, because by limiting the amount of food each person could have, they could ensure that everyone was able to get enough food to sustain them. People weren’t going to gain weight on the amount of food allowed, but they could survive. I suppose the fact that there were so many extra people, in the form of the military forces, just added to the need to ration.
Of course, some food rationing occurred before this date too. Rationing was introduced temporarily by the government of the United Kingdom several times during the 20th century, during and immediately after a war. At the start of World War II in 1939, the United Kingdom was importing 20 million long tons of food per year, including about 70% of its cheese and sugar, almost 80% of its fruit and about 70% of its cereals and fats. It also imported more than half of its meat and relied on imported feed to support its domestic meat production. The civilian population of the country alone, was about 50 million. It was one of the principal strategies of the Germans in the Battle of the Atlantic to attack shipping bound for Britain, restricting British industry and 
potentially starving nations into submission. Siege tactics were not unusual and have been used throughout history by several countries.
So, to deal with the various forms of shortages, and sometimes extreme shortages, the Ministry of Food instituted a system of rationing. Basically, the Ministry of Food would buy most rationed items, forcing anyone who wanted some of these items to register at chosen shops. Upon registration, they were provided with a ration book containing coupons. The shopkeeper was provided with enough food for registered customers. Purchasers had to present ration books when shopping so that the coupon or coupons could be cancelled as these pertained to rationed items. Rationed items had to be purchased and paid for as usual, although their price was strictly controlled by the government and many essential foodstuffs were subsidized. Basically, rationing restricted what items and what amount could be purchased, as well as what they would cost. To make matters worse the items that were not rationed could be scarce, because the Ministry of Food did not purchase said items. The priced for some of the unrationed items were also controlled by the Ministry of Food, and for many people those prices were too high for them to be able to afford, causing people to try to cheat the system, and merchants to try to either assist the people or to gouge the public in order to make a buck. This brought penalties for 
breaking the laws of rationing.
During the World War II, rationing was not restricted to food, and was part of a strategy including controlled prices, subsidies, and government-enforced standards. The goal for this controlled pricing and rationing was to manage scarcity and prioritize the armed forces and essential services with the supplies they needed first. They did still try to make available to everyone, an adequate and affordable supply of goods of acceptable quality. I suppose that how well they accomplished their goal, would be a matter of opinion. Of course, like all wars, World War II ended, as did the rationing of the time, but rationing has returned a number of times, and will again, should the need arise.
My uncle, George Hushman was a handsome man, and I’m sure that was what first attracted my aunt, Evelyn (Byer) Hushman to her future husband. I’m also sure that Uncle George was just as taken with Aunt Evelyn’s beauty. They never had eyes for another after that. Uncle George had been raised at the Orphaned Children’s Home in Casper, Wyoming, and really what he craved most, was a family he could call his own. He had some good friends, including my son-in-law, Kevin Petersen great uncle, who sadly was lost at sea during World War II. Still, Uncle George maintained his relationship with the family for many years to come, even calling Kevin’s great grandma, Hettie Saint John, his grandmother, as did his children. Nevertheless, the Byer family would become his own family, when he married my Aunt Evelyn on September 1, 1947, after his own service in the Navy and World War II ended.
Since my parents, Allen and Collene Spencer (Aunt Evelyn’s sister) were always close, the two families spent a lot of time together. I got to know Uncle George very well. He was a soft-spoken man who always made us feel welcome in their home. The living room of their home, which they and the rest of the Byer family built, had an unusually large front window area. It was more than a bay window. There was room for a bunch (maybe even 10) little kids to play behind those curtains, and the window gave us all the light we needed to see and have a playhouse atmosphere. Our playing and laughter never seemed to bother the parents, or if it did, they didn’t show it. Maybe it was the fact that we weren’t bothering them that made the difference.
The two couples did many things together, including bowling, and it was probably their bowling that got my sisters and me interested in bowling. I have been bowling now for 45 years…probably longer than anyone in my family, and maybe both families, and it all started with my parents, Uncle George, and Aunt Evelyn. I’m sure 
that for the two couples, bowling was a nice night out, and it wasn’t too costly either. Of course, eventually, most couples decide they have had enough of bowling, and it’s time to let the younger generation have a go at it. So, as the saying goes, they just “picked up their toys and went home.” That seems to happen at a certain age…some people take longer than others. I am proud of all the years they bowled, and thankful for the fun they passed on to us. Today would have been my Uncle George’s 97th birthday. Happy birthday in Heaven, Uncle George. We love and miss you very much.
There are some national events that stay in our thoughts and hearts forever. The Pearl Harbor is one of those events. The attack on Pearl Harbor was so destructive and so unexpected that it shocked everyone…well, most everyone anyway. President Franklin D Roosevelt knew that Japan would likely attack, but thought it would be in the western Pacific Ocean, especially the Philippians. Pearl Harbor was considered an unlikely target. Roosevelt wanted to enter the war, but he wanted to attack Germany, whom he considered to be the bigger threat. In fact, he had ordered the attack on any U-Boats found in the west side of the Atlantic. So, technically the US was already in the war…most people just didn’t know that. Still, the attack on Pearl Harbor was horrific and the United States had to retaliate.
The attack on Pearl Harbor took so many people by surprise. It was a Sunday morning, and many of the military personnel were off base attending church services. The Japanese knew that the ships, planes, and the base in general would be seriously understaffed at the time of the attack. Of course, on the flip side, the fact that so many of the military personnel were away from the base at the time of the attack, meant that the base was able to get back up and running quickly and when we did enter the war, the Japanese were surprised about the attacks coming back at them. Of course, as we all know, the Allies went on to win the war against the Axis nation, including Germany and Japan. It’s been said that people shouldn’t wake the sleeping giant, and that is a wise statement. The Japanese awakened the United States to the fact that appeasing your enemies will not prevent an attack. It takes a show of military might to inform our enemies that it is wise to back away and let the sleeping giants lie.
Of course, the victory that was won following the attack of Pearl Harbor and the US entrance into World War II, came at a high price. A total of 2,403 people (both civilians and soldiers), not to mention ships, airplanes, and 
other military equipment. After the attack, the people of the United States were…angry!! We quickly geared up and the war was on for the United States. Our delay could never bring back the people we lost, but we would certainly avenge their loss. Today we remember those we lost, and those who went out to take up the fight to protect our country from such a horrendous attack.
I had never heard the expression, “war sand” before, but when I think about it, the presence of it makes perfect sense. It would be impossible to have any kind of a battle and not leave behind spent bullets, as well as bits of shrapnel from bombs littering the battlefield. In the case of the D-Day Battle, there were more that 5,000 tons of bombs that littered the beaches of Normandy. The beaches were literal chaos, and it was all they could do to rescue the wounded, recover the bodies, and remove the equipment, much less save bits of metal and spent bullets left behind. On D-Day, more than 5,000 tons of bombs were dropped by the Allies on the Axis powers as part of the prelude to the Normandy landings…and then there was the bullets and such that hit the beaches during the battle.
These days, scientists estimate that 4% of the Normandy beaches are made up of shrapnel from the D-Day Landings. They have studied the sand on the beaches of Normandy, and they’ve found microscopic bits of smoothed-down shrapnel from the landings. The sand on the Normandy beaches is known as “war sand,” which is defined as “sand that is a result from wartime operations.” I had heard of beaches that are made of glass that has been rubbed smooth by the water against the ground, but I hadn’t ever thought about the water being able to smooth the sharp bits of shrapnel to make them smooth. Nevertheless, the beaches of Normandy are 
covered in a fine dust created from particles deposited there during or right before the D-Day operations of World War II. The grains are hidden among the beaches of the Normandy. It makes me wonder how many other beaches have shrapnel and bullets as a secret part of their makeup.
Earle McBride, a geologist from the University of Texas at Austin, figures the sands shrapnel level at 4%. That doesn’t seem like much, but considering the years since D-Day, and the number of people who have walked those beaches, possibly looking for closure concerning lost loved ones, 4% is quite a bit. One might wonder how he could have come to that conclusion, but apparently the sand-sized fragments of steel are magnetic, making them easily discernible under a microscope. Of course, there are still relics from the battle. The artificial landscape of eroded machinery is still detectable using special instruments in the coastal dunes.
The shrapnel content of the beaches will eventually disappear. It is estimated that at the present rate of deterioration, the magnetic particles will probably be wiped from the sands in another 100 years. The shrapnel is subject to waves, storms, and rust, which will wipe these spherical magnetic shards from the coasts. 
Strangely, Earle McBride didn’t set out to find these shards, but a visit to Omaha Beach in 1988 resulted in the discovery of these tiny remnants of shrapnel. I wonder how he noticed the shrapnel. Oddly, the shards were collected 20 years ago and only analyzed recently. Why did it take so long to examine them? Of course, I have answered my own question. While he may have known what he had, it is possible that he really didn’t or at least didn’t know the significance of what he had. He might have simply collected the sand as a keepsake of his visit. Nevertheless, upon examination, the samples revealed that the jagged-edged grains had a metallic sheen and a rust-colored coating. The angular grains proved to be magnetic…they proved to be shrapnel from that long ago battle.
When Switzerland found itself in the middle of an unusual heatwave, the Gauli Glacier melted enough to uncover the wreckage debris of an American World War II plane that crash-landed in the Bernese Alps 72 years ago. Now, when you hear about the crash of a plane, especially into a mountain or in this case, a glacier, you expect to find fatalities. Of course, this plane crashed a long time ago, and the authorities already knew the outcome of that crash. The people who found the plane in the ice, however, might not have. This plane, a C-53 Skytrooper Dakota had been traveling from Austria to Italy when it collided with the Gauli Glacier at an altitude of 10,990 feet on that fateful day.
It was November 19, 1946, and the plane carrying four crew members and eight passengers were enjoying their trip, when something went terribly wrong. When they hit the glacier, several people were injured, amazingly, there were no fatalities. Among the passengers were high-ranking United States service members traveling with relatives…four women and one 11-year-old girl. Now, they found themselves high up on a glacier, and it was likely very cold. They were stuck at the crash site for six days before rescuers found them and could 
get to them. They were forced to drink snow water and ration chocolate bars to survive, but survive they did. Many times, survival at a crash site, if you survived the initial crash, is all about using common sense and keeping your wits about you. You have to take stock of your supplies and be willing to ration what you have. You can’t let anyone get out of control, because a panic could waste vital supplies. Water is the most vital of the supplies, because while the human body can go weeks without food, it can only live a few days without water. While it would seem that water on a glacier would be plentiful, it may not be so. You would have to chip away at the ice, and then melt it to drink. In addition, you have to get it warm, or you will risk the water causing Hypothermia. This particular group managed to do things right, or at least enough right to survive the six days while they waited for rescue. Once rescued, they went on with their lives feeling very blessed to be alive.
The snow, and later, ice covered the plane as the years went by, and it was very likely forgotten…until 2012 anyway, when three young people discovered the plane’s propeller on the glacier. They continued to observe the emerging plane and as the glacier continued to melt, the scene unfolded. Today, it reportedly looks like a 
field covered in plane debris, and many people probably wonder how anyone managed to live through the initial crash…much less everyone. As the glacier melted, the plane slid down the mountainside and was expected to finally emerge at the bottom. In fact, much of the debris field might actually be caused by the melting ice.
