The Ant’s-Eye View
By M A C
AT GUARD CAMP
(Camp Dodge, Iowa)
Well, it’s practically like home down here—Mason City on one side, Fort Dodge on the other, and Webster City right down the middle. We pulled in this morning at 11 o’clock, and things seem to be settling into routine—couple of the guys already nursing sunburn, a softball game, several swimming, and almost everyone catching a Sunday afternoon nap—while I work.
Doc Savage and Willis Hanson got well-deserved promotions from corporal to sergeant; Claude Burr is a new corporal, and Harold Trusty is a new fifth grade corporal. And here’s the full roster of the guys down here at Iowa State Guard camp:
Captain William C. Fastenow; First Lieutenant John F. Dodge; Second Lieutenant John A. Whaley.
First Sergeant Meyer Yonder; Staff Sergeant Milo L. Foster, Sergeants Clyde Burr, Willis J. Hanson, George B. McCollough, Seymour E. McComb and R. E. Savage. Corporals Claude Burt, Carl Calson, Wally Long, W. C. McConaughy and Carl P. Palmer, Technicians Kermit Doolittle, Maris Johnson and Harold Trusty.
Privates Carl Ainslie, Darrell Brandt, Glenn Galloway, Lyle Gordon, Ben Hedlund, Donald Jondalm Maynard Kurtz, Joe Lepper, Russell McCollough, Harold Olmstead, George Patrou, Donald Paul, Lloyd Richardson, Donald Songe, Herman Taylor and Warren Worthington.
That’s the mob. My tent is far the nicest one in the row, of course, and the boys fixed up a hall-tree to hang clothes on, all over the center-pole, that makes it look like a Christmas tree without lights. We are the only ones with a walk into the tent, too—a board laid down just in case it rains. Which it is sure to.
Swede Carlson jr. is the old-timer of the gang, having been here more times than he can remember. He knows all the answers and all the spots…Glenn Galloway is a brand new recruit—we haven’t him with a uniform yet…Milo Foster has sunburn trouble.
Sergeant McCollough, our head cook, made a little mistake on the coffee for Sunday dinner, and we weren’t sure whether it was tea, coffee or bean soup—he wasn’t either…Corporal Wally Long has been sleeping all afternoon.
The sessions begin in earnest tomorrow. Today we’re just loafing. I went swimmng with several of the guys, and when we were leaving the pool a bunch of Wacs came in. We wanted to stay and watch them, but suddenly realized they were all lieutenants, and rather than keep saluting girls all day we moved out in good order. Nobody leaves the camp today. We’re on guard duty Thursday. Maybe I can keep you posted.
Source: Daily Freeman Journal, Webster City, IA, July 11, 1944
**MAC, the author, is H. C. McConaughy of the Freeman-Journal Advertising Staff & the creator of the popular news column, The Ant's Eye View.
