SOLDIERS COMING HOME

I was three years old when World War Two ended, but I remember it well. I remember the celebration and the commotion of the college boys racing up and down Seerley Boulevard hanging on to the running boards of their old jalopies, blowing their horns and cranking up air raid sirens. It scared me because I didn't understand what was happening. But I knew it was something big. My mother finally caught up with me as I ran toward the spectacle on Seerley Boulevard and we both stood on the curb and watched it all.

The boys were coming home! Everything was going to be all right. But as the boys came home, what were they going to do then? Many went to college.

Cedar Falls, Iowa, a quiet community of about fifteen thousand residents, was home to Iowa State Teachers' College, and it became the home of hundreds of men returning from the war.

Prior to then most of the students at the college were young women. But now, many students were men. These men were more mature than the college boys of the past. Many were married with families, which created a big problem. Where were they going to live?

My family had a basement apartment in our house, and we rented it out to a number of young couples who were students at the college. It was clean and comfortable with a backyard private entrance so we wouldn't run into each other. While the apartment had a toilet and laundry, the renters had to go upstairs to bathe. No one seemed to mind.

The first couple who lived in our apartment were Jim and Onalae Jenson. Jim had been a student at I.S.T.C, but he was drafted into the Army Air Corps and served in Europe. As a bomber pilot he flew numerous missions, was shot down and captured. But he was able to escape with the assistance of the French Underground. Later Jim was shot down a second time and held for two and a half years. He was given a garbage disposal assignment under heavy guard. As the war wore down security was loosened somewhat. Jim drove a horse wagon of garbage out of the camp and just kept going until he was rescued by the French once again.

Jim finished his studies at I.S.T.C and decided to become a veterinarian. He finished his degree at Iowa State College in Ames, Iowa, and started his practice specializing in large animals in southern California. Jim cared for many of the horses used in Hollywood.

I recently heard from Onalae. Jim has passed away. It was Onalae who told me Jim's stories.

Bob Siddens, the renowned wrestling coach, and his wife Jo, also lived in our basement apartment. Bob used to take me up to the wrestling room on Saturday mornings and show me how to wrestle. He also showed me how to stand on my head. Over the years there were at least ten couples who lived downstairs.

Many other homeowners were doing the same, but the housing was very tight. More housing was needed to meet the demand.

When the war was over the military was loaded with surpluses, especially Quonset buildings. One by one, Quonset by Quonset, Sunset Village emerged from a field south of the I.S.TC. campus. Sunset Village served the housing needs of hundreds of students and their families from 1947 until 1972 when it was demolished, and replaced by apartments facilities.

Many of my friends and classmates lived in Sunset Village. Even a number of faculty members lived in Sunset Village.

I used to go with some of my friends to deliver the local newspapers. It gave me an opportunity to take a look inside a Quonset hut. The Quonset was split into two apartments, making a small facility even smaller. It was tight and hard to keep clean depending on the weather. The roads were not well surfaced. The rent was affordable and the demand was high. They took what they could get. Hot in the summer and cold in the winter. There was no insulation.

I'm going back to Cedar Falls this summer, just for a short time. But I think I'll drive down Seerley Boulevard after I drive past my old home on Walnut Street.

I'm going to take some pictures of College Hill. More to come.




My Teachers were Heroes Too!

The mission at Iowa State Teachers College was to train the best teachers for the children in the state of Iowa, and that mission has been upheld.

To accomplish that mission there had to be a tremendous effort on the part of the instructors and professors who taught their student how to teach. Among those special people there were those who also served gallantly during World War Two:

1: Dr. Howard Vander Beek guided assault landing crafts onto the beaches at Normandy. He taught English at the Price Laboratory School and was a professor at the college.

2: Dr. Randall Bebb, who taught at the Lab School, flew supplies over the "hump" from India into China. He also was a professor at the college.

3: Dr. Ross Nielson served a combat information officer on a Navy destroyer. He, also was teacher at the Lab School and at the college.

4: Dr. William Happ's engine failed on a training flight over Lake Michigan. He dreaded water for nearly two days before he was rescued. As a result he insisted on building a indoor swimming pool at the Lab School. He taught hundreds of children how to swim.

THE LITTLE COTTAGE ON THE COLLEGE CAMPUS OR EVEN THE KINDERGARTEN TEACHER WAS A Ph.D.

Dr. Dorothy Koehring was my first teacher. She was a small woman in her late fifties with gray hair and kind eyes. She taught nursery school and kindergarten, and we all loved her.

My sister, Barbara, would walk me up the little sidewalk to the Iowa State Teachers College campus. Mother would say, "Take Randall by the handle and lead him off to school." My dad asked me what I did at school, and I said I played and played and played.

Iowa State Teachers College was one of the premier colleges in the country for the training of teachers. Its mission was to prepare young men and women to become teachers. My dad was a professor at the college.

To achieve that mission the college had to teach students how to teach. For that purpose a laboratory school was developed where college students could develop their skills. As a child I attended that school from nursery school through high school. My teachers were all professors at the college and most of them had a Ph.D. They taught both at the college and at the Lab School. Many times there would be college students observing the classes I was attending. My teachers were actually teaching two classes at the same time, one for my classes and the college students who were observing. It was a school within a school.

I have been in school since I was four years old as a student and as a teacher for forty six years. My grandmother was a teacher, my mother taught in a community college, and my dad was a professor, and my brother and his wife were teachers as well. Most of my best friends were teachers.

Iowa State Teachers College became the State College of Iowa, and later the University of Northern Iowa. The university has grown tremendously. The little cottage on the campus is long gone.

I'm sitting in my computer room listening to some BLUES ROCK on my iPhone and remembering Miss Koehring, Dr. Paul Brimm, Mardell Mohn, Mrs. Blackman, Bud Happ, Dwight Curtis, Corrine Harper, Howard Vanderbeek, Marguerite Struble, Al Moon, Marshall Schools, Al Potter, Mrs. Holmberg, John Aldrich, Thomas Wikstrom and Ross Nielson

From my yearbook: "The Malcolm Price Laboratory School is an important part of the Iowa State Teachers College. It is here in the Laboratory School that the college students who plan to become teachers have practical, first-hand experiences in the learning to be teachers. We, all of us, have a responsibility to help them in every way possible to become good teachers for the boys and girls in the state of Iowa."