Tractor man tells war story

Jim Pluimer
Posted 7/24/03

Editor's note: Tractor man Bob Gardner tells his war story to youngsters Jim Pluimer and Harv Schreur during the boys' stay at Summer Lake in 1957.

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Harv and I settled into the swing without spilling a drop of ice-cold pop as Bob began his oratory. "I used to be a truck driver, you know. Back in 1941. Drove for Triangle Transfer. That was down in the Mansion Pile. Made 25 bucks a week. Wasn't a whole lot of money but we managed to buy a small house and a used car on what we got. We lived there for little over a year before I enlisted in the Army for the Truck Corps. Boy oh boy, I never in my wildest dreams thought I'd end up in Russia!" With the word "Russia," he had us both hooked.

"Took my physical down at Ft. Snelling. It was a cold bugger that year. After our physical we were told to go home. They said they'd let us know by mail whether or not we were accepted. Then on Christmas Day of 1942 - I think it was a Friday -the mailman delivered two letters to our house."

"You got mail on Christmas Day?" Harv asked.

"Yup! Even the Post Office had to work on that day. Well, I opened up the first letter. It was a set of orders from the United States Army. 'Report for duty TODAY!' it read. I was IN the Truck Corps! Boy, them boys didn't waste any time. I opened the second letter. It was also from the Army and guess what it was? My draft notice!'' Bob paused and took a long, slow sip from his pop bottle. "Know what I did with that draft notice? Ripped that sucker up and threw it away! Boy, did that ever feel good!"

"Isn't that against the law?" I asked.

"Nope! I was already in the Army; didn't need it," Bob said with a chuckle. "That same day I said good-bye to my wife and hopped on a train headed for Virginia Beach, Va. When we got there, we switched trains and headed right back for the Twin Cities! Now that didn't make any sense at all to me. From the Cities we rode the train clear out to Los Angeles, Calif., where we boarded a ship. Then we sailed across the Pacific Ocean and didn't stop until we reached New Zealand. After we loaded up on supplies, we shoved off for Australia. We were only a short ways out to sea when the radio room received an urgent message. 'ALTER YOUR COURSE!' It read. Enemy subs had just sunk a Red Cross boat 80 miles east of New Zealand and they were headed in our direction! We went 200 miles out of our way to avoid the subs, but we managed to make it to Melbourne, Australia without any trouble. It was April 12, 1942. Hundreds of people lost their lives on that day. It was a real shame.

"From Melbourne we sailed to Bombay, India. That was about as far as our ship could take us, so at the port in Bombay we transferred our gear to a British scow named the Cynthia. The Cynthia was going to take us the rest of the way. All the way to the Persian Gulf! When we boarded her, we couldn't believe our eyes! There were lizards running around everywhere! Must have been close to 50 of them buggers! Well, we only knew one way to solve that problem, so we pulled out the carbines and started shooting them! PING! PING! PING! Off the deck they'd go flying! PING! PING! Off the railing and PLOP! Into the water they'd go! We fired until we couldn't see any more lizards. That scow was a pitiful sight. Just pitiful!

"Our new captain arrived about an hour later with a bunch of locals who were busy carrying the food supply on board. He was British, and oooh brother, he didn't think much of us Americans and he let us know! We watched as the locals hauled a bunch of goat carcasses past us. The meat smelled rotten! We took a closer look and noticed maggots crawling on the carcasses! Millions of maggots!

"I looked at the captain and said, 'Boy, you guys sure eat rough around here.'

"He looked at me and said, 'That's for you!'

"The goat brigade left the ship, leaving only the captain, his Indian helper and us. Since we outnumbered him we figured if we asked real nice maybe he'd come to his senses and get us some decent food. But that captain was a stubborn old coot. He didn't want to hear ANY complaining, and he wasn't about to go back for any more food.

"As the Cynthia left her mooring the captain navigated the old scow downstream toward the Arabian Sea. A mile down the river we were still trying to negotiate with the captain, but he kept saying 'No.' Well, we thought, let's see if we can't make him change his mind. So a couple of our boys grabbed him, we tied a rope around his waist and threw him overboard. Drug him in the water for a while. Let's see how he likes that! The captain wasn't in the water for even two minutes and he was ready to talk. So we pulled him in. The SECOND he was on deck, he blew up and told us we were ALL going to be court-martialed. We threw him back in the water, started up the engine, turned the scow around, and drug that son of a gun all the way back to the docks. By that time, he was ready to get us some decent food."

It was 4:58 p.m. Bob stood up, stretched, finished his last sip of pop, checked the time and said, "Speaking of decent food, I'd better be getting back to Long Lake before my wife starts to worry about me."

"What about Russia?" Harv asked.

"I'm sure I'll catch you boys again. I'll finish the story on another day."

Mr. Gardner hopped into his flatbed, stuck his head out the window, and asked, "Sure you boys don't want to sell them bikes?" We shook our heads "no." Bob fired up the engine and yelled, "Next time I'll buy the pop."

Harv and I waved good-bye as the truck rolled out of view and continued to discuss Bob's story. "What kind of food do you think they'll end up getting?" I asked.

"I don't know." Harv replied. "Maybe goats without the maggots."

"That doesn't sound much better," I said with an undesirable post-digestive look.

"I wonder what the Commies eat?" Harv thought aloud.

"Grandpa Nick told me they ate boiled shoe leather with beets. And if they're lucky they get onions."

"Glad I don't live there," Harv said with a shiver.

"I can't believe that Mr. Gardner was actually in Russia. Do you think he's telling us the truth?"

"You bet," Harv said. "Grandpa Clyde told me Mr. Gardner has never told a fib in his life."

"Wow, Russia," I muttered.

We couldn't wait to hear more about the U.S.S.R., that big, red, globe-hungry, take-up-most-of-the-map, missile-totin', Commie floatin', spread your foam over a mug called Earth, country.

Little did we know at the time that Russia was actually founded by a bunch of Norwegians. Them buggers were Norsk!