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Truck Story
For 36 years (1966-2002), an adult education class
called the “Pt. Loma Old Men & Women’s Athletic Club” met Mondays and
Wednesdays at 5pm in the girl’s gym at Pt. Loma High School for exercise
and volleyball. Chuck Morgan was the only coach and since his retirement
in 2002, surviving members of the club have been meeting in a nearby
church for exercise only.
February 19, 2003
Presbyterian Church
San Diego, California
During a rest break that afternoon, Gerhart Mehner revealed to me that
he had been a nineteen year old U.S. Army truck driver in the South
Pacific during World War II. At a reunion of his Americal Division in
2002, Gerhart reminisced about a number of his experiences.
Gerhart standing next to a truck
“On Cebu we were told to haul down some prisoners off the
ridges. We had to have special guards on the trucks to protect them from
Phillippinos who wanted to drag them off the trucks.”
“I was on guard duty one night in Leyte and all of a sudden somebody
came through the jungle to our outpost. He was a Japanese officer and
indicated he wanted to surrender.
We took him to the officer of the outpost and he surrendered.
By that time, we didn’t have many problems with the enemy giving-up.”
“There was good leadership on the beach. I had a full load of chemical
mortar rounds on my truck. I came in on the second wave and the
beachmaster stopped me and said the beach was mined. He stopped me just
in time. The engineers pulled out a mine just ahead of the front wheels
of my truck. The beach would have been gone and I wouldn’t be here today
with 2 1/2 tons of mortar rounds on that truck.”
June 14, 1947
Parkersburg, West Virginia
I stepped off the train that evening after riding the rails from my home
in Long Beach, California to spend the summer working for my Uncle Mac
who was an International Harvester and Kaiser-Frazier dealer. I had just
graduated from Jordan High School and had surrendered a summer art
scholarship at the Long Beach Art Academy where, for the first time in
my life, had spent three hours staring at a nude model in a life drawing
class.
The next morning I climbed into and behind the wheel of a war surplus
U.S. Army 6x6 truck, and with another identical vehicle in tow, joined
five other drivers in a convoy of twelve trucks headed for “Marlon
Brando’s Waterfront” in Brooklyn, New York. Uncle Mac was exporting the
trucks to South America.
Army 6x6 truck
Before leaving, Mac placed in my possession $600. cash for the travel
expenses on the two-day trip. In 1947 that seemed to me to be a fortune.
Having never driven a truck before and not having a proper license, I
had to follow the gear shifting diagram plaque on the dash just to get
started. There was no instruction. On the way to the convoy meeting
place (in a strange city) I mistakenly turned into a narrow cul-de-sac
and had to back-out.
Uncle Mac on right
After delivering the trucks to the dock, the other drivers caught a
train back to Parkersburg, and I met Uncle Mac in his suite at the
Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York. It soon became apparent why he had
given me $600. We proceeded to have a wonderful night on the town I’ll
never forget.
After seeing the original cast in “Oklahoma,” we had dinner at the
Diamond Horseshoe nightclub where I drank beer for the first time and
witnessed my father’s brother getting drunk.
As fast as he would throw cash around that night in a number of bars, I
would pick-it-up for its return to him the next day.
General sightseeing in Manhattan followed the next day before our
train ride back to Parkersburg and more adventures for an innocent and
naive 17 year old.
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