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An Interview with Julian Levin, for the Rutgers Oral History Archives of World War II. Interview conducted by Sandra Stewart Holyoak and Rupali Parikh in New Brunswick, New Jersey, on June 5, 2002. Transcript by Domingo Duarte and Kathryn Tracy Rizzi and Julian Levin and Sandra Stewart Holyoak. Permission to quote from this transcript must be obtained from the Rutgers Oral History Archives of World War II.
Sandra Stewart Holyoak: This
begins an interview on June 5, 2002 with Mr. Julian Levin in New Brunswick, New
Jersey with Sandra Stewart Holyoak and …
Rupali Parikh: Rupali Parikh.
SH: To begin the interview, Mr.
Levin, I'd like to thank you for making the drive down here today to sit for
the interview. Please, tell me about
your father.
Julian Levin: My father was born
in the United States. He was born in
1898 in New York City, and he passed away in 1963.
SH: Can you tell me what he did
and what his educational background was?
JL: Well, he had a high school
education. He was in World War I. He served in France. He was wounded … in World War I. … Then he went into, he worked at Macy's, in
the furniture department, for several years, and then he became … active in the
building business with his brothers. They built garden apartments and houses in New Jersey.
SH: Did they move from New York
to New Jersey?
JL: I believe so, yes. They moved from New York City into Jersey
sometime in his younger days. I'm not
sure exactly when.
SH: Had his father been a
contractor, or where did his experience come from?
JL: No, his father was, I
believe, was in the lumber business, and eventually, he moved down to Lakewood
and lived in Lakewood on a farm [for] most of his adult years with one of his
daughters and her husband.
SH: It's interesting that he
would go from New York to Lakewood. Can
you tell me about your father's military career? Did he speak of what it was like in World War I?
JL: Not too often. He had a Purple Heart. He was in the [Meuse]-Argonne, and rumor has
it, or folk stories has it, that he was the first Jewish boy to volunteer in
New York City. Whether that's true, I
have no idea. … He was a volunteer.
SH: Did he have a lot of
brothers and sisters?
JL: He had two brothers and a
sister.
SH: Were they part of an
extended family that you knew when you were growing up?
JL: Well, my aunt, who had the
farm in Lakewood, we used to go visit her quite a bit. She lived there with her husband and my
grandfather and grandmother, and his two brothers were in the building business
and we saw them on occasion. We weren't
[very] close. ...
SH: Tell me about your mother,
please.
JL: My mother was born in the
same year as my father, I believe, 1898, and, I believe, she was born in Newark
and she married my father right after the war and she had three brothers and a
sister and she was a housewife for just about all her life.
SH: So she married your father
right out of high school. Did she go to
college?
JL: No. She met my father before the war, I believe.
SH: Did they ever talk about how
they met?
JL: If they did, I don't
recall. I don't recall. My sister might know, but I don't recall.
SH: Well, tell me about your
family then. Where do you fit? Do you have brothers and sisters? I understand you have a sister.
JL: I have one sister who is
three and a half years younger than I am, and she's married. She has two children.
SH: Where were you born and
when?
JL: I was born in Newark in
1924, May 6.
SH: So your mother and father,
did they meet in New York and come to Jersey? Do you know?
JL: I believe so, yes.
SH: So they hadn't been in New
Jersey too long when you were born.
JL: I don't know. I really couldn't say, but I was born in
1924. They were married in 1919, I
think, so it couldn't have been too long.
SH: Can you tell me what your
earliest memories of growing up are?
JL: I think my early memories
are when we lived in East Orange. We
moved to East Orange when I was, I don't know, three or four years old. That's where my sister was born. So I suppose that's my earliest
memories. At least, they were in East
Orange.
SH: You started your elementary
school then in East Orange.
JL: Yes, I did.
SH: Did you live in East Orange
all of the time?
[tape paused]
SH: In East Orange, when did you
start school?
JL: I must have started school
in 1929, I guess, 1930.
SH: What do you remember about
the Depression?
JL: I don't. I remember that we never, I, as a child,
never realized there was a Depression. My parents weren't wealthy, far from it, but I never felt deprived.
SH: Do you know if your father
was able to continue working?
JL: My father worked in Macy's,
at that time. My grandparents and my
aunt lived with us, and I didn't realize it, at the time, of course, but they
had a pretty tough time, but I wasn't aware of it. I was not aware of it.
SH: For some people, that's
exactly how they remember the Depression. All of a sudden, their family members were living with them.
JL: As a matter-of-fact, I found
out later that my grandparents actually owned the house we lived in.
SH: Oh, really?
JL: I didn't know that at first,
at the time, but I was never aware of any deprivations.
SH: As a young man, were you
involved in Cub Scouts or Boy Scouts?
JL: No.
SH: Was your family involved in
the synagogue at all?
JL: Well, when we moved to
Hillside, yes. We were only in East
Orange until I was about seven or eight. As a matter-of-fact, we did belong to a synagogue in East Orange, now
that I recall. When we moved to
Hillside, that's where I really spent most of my growing up years.
SH: So you really started in
maybe the second or third grade then.
JL: I think I was in third
grade, when we moved to Hillside.
SH: What was it like to
move? Do you remember?
JL: No, I really don't.
SH: Was it exciting?
JL: No, I really have very
little recollection of our moving.
SH: Did your grandparents come
with you?
JL: My grandmother had passed
away by then, and my grandfather came with us, and he and I shared a room until
he died.
SH: So this was your mother's
father.
JL: My mother's father.
SH: Did your mother's sister
continue to live with you?
JL: She did.
SH: That's interesting to have
that many generations of the family living together.
JL: Oh, in those days, I don't
think it was that unusual.
SH: Really?
JL: My aunt was a hunchback, a
cripple. I mean, she could get around,
do everything, but she did most of the cooking, and she lived with us until she
died.
SH: Did your mother work outside
of the home?
JL: No, my mother never
worked. She may have worked a couple of
weeks, but she never worked at all.
SH: Tell me what it was like to
go to school in Hillside. Were there
certain subjects that you really liked?
JL: I was always interested in
history, political science, liberal arts, reading. I read a lot.
SH: Were you involved in any
sports or after-school activities?
JL: Well, not sports per se, but
we played a lot afterwards, you know. I
had a group of friends in Hillside and we used to …
SH: Was this a very
family-oriented neighborhood?
JL: Yeah, it was pretty family
oriented. They were all single homes.
SH: When you moved to Hillside,
was your father still working for Macy's?
JL: No, he was working for his
brothers then.
SH: He'd gone to work for his
brothers then.
JL: He had gone to work for his
brothers by then in the building business.
SH: So this would have been in
the early '30s when you moved to Hillside.
JL: I believe so, yes.
SH: Can you tell me about being
in junior high school and then where you went to high school?
JL: I went all through the
Hillside school system, junior high, high school in Hillside.
SH: Was it a good school?
JL: Yes, I think so, at the
time, and I had good teachers. I had
one teacher who I maintained a very close relationship with until last year
when she died. She died at ninety-eight. She was my Latin teacher.
SH: Latin.
JL: My wife and my sister, we
were very close to her all these years.
SH: So your wife knew her, as
well.
JL: Oh, yes, after we married,
she knew her.
SH: That's wonderful. Other than the Latin teacher, who were some
of your memorable teachers in high school?
JL: She was so far above
everybody else that I think she outshone everybody, and she was my most
memorable teacher by far.
SH: Were you involved in any
sort of musical activities or clubs?
JL: I belonged to a few clubs,
chess club, photography club, I think. I was not that active in high school.
SH: Did you have to work at any
after-school job?
JL: No.
SH: What kind of political
discussions went on in your household?
JL: My parents were very, my
father and mother, they were political, but most of my political discussions
were with my Latin teacher.
SH: Really?
JL: Well, that's why she was a
very unusual person, and we used to stay after school, the whole class, and she
would carry on discussions with [us]. This was, of course, during World War II, or just before the beginning
of World War II.
SH: What were the discussions
about?
JL: Well, she was very
pro-British, and we talked about intervention, and, of course, in those days,
there was the big isolationist sentiment in the United States. This was about '39, '40, and we were
carrying on these discussions.
SH: Did she talk about Hitler
and his rise to power?
JL: Oh, of course. She was German, too. She was very much aware.
SH: Was she?
JL: … She was very much aware.
SH: Were you aware of any Bund
activities in the Hillside area?
JL: Any Bund? … Well, in Irvington there were. It was really the center of the Bund. I'm not sure that I was aware of it, at that
time, but it was there. … Of course, we
had anti-Semitism in Hillside.
SH: Really? Did you experience it first-hand?
JL: I did occasionally, you
know, in school.
SH: What would happen to you?
JL: They used to beat us up
sometimes, you know, get into fights. Nothing like today with guns or anything, but, you know, remarks made,
just generally speaking, but it was not too pervasive.
SH: These discussion groups that
your Latin teacher had after school, were they geared towards all of the kids,
anybody who wanted to stay, or just to those in her class?
JL: My recollection is that it
was just the ones who wanted to stay. Nobody was forced to stay. It
certainly was not part of the school program. It was just something she did, and I guess anybody could stop in. I don't recall. It may have been my last class of the day, and it just ran over.
SH: Did you take any of these
discussions home to your family?
JL: Oh, I believe I did,
yes. We discussed it quite often,
especially since my father was a veteran of World War I.
SH: What about Franklin Delano
Roosevelt's programs? What did your
family think of them?
JL: They were very pro-Roosevelt
and very pro-anything that he was for. … They were very, very pro-Roosevelt, my parents. They were lifelong Democrats, and we still
are.
SH: Did your father talk at all
about any of the union organizing that was going on in New Jersey?
JL: Unions? No.
SH: I just wondered if he was
involved with any unions, because he was a builder.
JL: No, no.
SH: When did you first realize
that you wanted to go to college?
JL: Well, I guess I always …
SH: It was expected.
JL: It was expected, yeah.
SH: Did you apply for any of the
state scholarships?
JL: I don't recall. I don't think so.
SH: When you first decided to go
to college, did you apply only to Rutgers, or did you go to other universities
and look around?
JL: We never looked around, but
I think I applied to one or two other universities. I don't recall what they were at this time, where they were, but
I think it was pretty well set that I was going to go to Rutgers.
SH: Did you come down and tour
the campus or get interviewed?
JL: Yes, but I don't recall the
interview.
SH: What did you think you
wanted to major in?
JL: I wanted to be a lawyer.
SH: Did you? What year did you enter Rutgers?
JL: I saw it in 1941.
SH: September of 1941. Tell us what it was like to be on campus,
and then we'll proceed into the attack on Pearl Harbor.
JL: Well, in 1941, I think there
were about 1,500 students at Rutgers, maybe 1,600, and, of course, Pearl Harbor
was just a couple of months away, and it was a very war-oriented campus.
SH: Was it really, even before
the war?
JL: I believe so. The draft had already started. … My main recollection is that all the
freshman had to wear the beanies and white socks, and if an upperclassman
whistled, we had to start running. Oh,
we had to carry market bags with us, with our books in them, and if they blew
the whistle, we had to start running [and] we had to stay on certain paths.
SH: Oh, really?
JL: That's my recollection of
being a freshman at Rutgers.
SH: Where were you housed, when
you first came to Rutgers?
JL: I lived on Somerset Street
in a private home, in my freshman year, and then I moved into, I became, I
belonged to Sigma Alpha Mu fraternity.
SH: Was that your sophomore
year?
JL: My sophomore year, and I
moved into the fraternity house. That
was on Easton Avenue … during the war,
and when I came back from service, I lived in Ford Hall.
SH: Was ROTC mandatory?
JL: Yes, it was.
SH: So you were part of that.
JL: I think it was mandatory for
your freshman year. I'm not sure about
the sophomore year, but it was mandatory, yes.
SH: What about chapel? I know that there was mandatory chapel.
JL: There was.
SH: What do you remember about
that?
JL: Well, I remember that we had
to attend chapel so many times a semester, and it was mandatory, not every
Sunday, but there were, I don't know, maybe six Sundays or eight Sundays, and
we had to attend. Whether you were
Jewish, or Christian, or whatever, you had to attend.
SH: Some of the speakers weren't
religiously oriented, correct?
JL: I don't recall. I probably slept through most of them.
SH: You had to sit alphabetically
and by class, right?
JL: I just don't remember.
SH: Did they take attendance?
JL: Oh, yeah.
SH: Did you ever have any
meetings or discussions with Dean Metzger?
JL: I don't recall any
one-to-ones with Dean Metzger. ...
SH: President Clothier?
JL: I don't think so.
SH: Can you tell me who your
roommates were on Somerset Street?
JL: Well, on Somerset Street, I
don't remember his name. I never got to
know him very well, and after the first year, I think, he dropped out of
school. I don't recall. … When I lived in the fraternity, my
roommate was a fraternity brother, Sander Weinstein, who was killed during the
war. He was killed in battle, and that
was at the fraternity house. Then I
lived in Highland Park for a little while, also. … At Ford Hall, my roommate was my friend from high school, Jerry
Grunt.
SH: Oh, really? Tell me about the activities that were going
on for freshmen in Rutgers that first year. What were some of the social activities or sports? Did you go to football games?
JL: Yeah, we did. We went to the football games, went to the
basketball games, and they had intramural sports and they had clubs. Of course, it was nothing like it is today.
SH: Where were you and what do
you remember about Pearl Harbor?
JL: I remember that very, very
vividly. I was down at Lakeland at my
aunt and uncle's farm, and we were watching a Giant's football game. Of course, it was December, and we were
listening to it on the radio, not watching, I'm sorry, we were listening to it
on the radio, and the news came across of Pearl Harbor being bombed. That's how I remember it very well.
SH: Did you, at that time, know
where Pearl Harbor was?
JL: I have no idea, probably
not.
SH: Some men have told us that
they had to go to an atlas.
JL: Yeah, probably not.
SH: What was your family's
reaction?
JL: Shock and horror. I guess I seem to remember that I said to
myself, "Well, I guess I'll be in the Army pretty soon."
SH: Did you come back to campus
right away? Did you continue with your
regular classes?
JL: No, we came back. This was in December … and I had started in
September. I was a freshman.
SH: So you came back to campus
that weekend.
JL: I went back to school, and I
finished my sophomore year.
SH: Do you remember the next day
when President Clothier gathered everybody at Kirkpatrick Chapel? Do you remember that discussion?
JL: Yes, I have a faint
recollection of it, but I don't recall his exact words.
SH: Did you notice that men were
already signing up or enlisting right away?
JL: I don't recall.
SH: Do you remember anyone being
against the war and demonstrating?
JL: You mean after Pearl Harbor?
SH: Before Pearl Harbor.
JL: Oh, sure.
SH: Really?
JL: Sure, you know the
isolationist sentiment was very strong in the United States.
SH: Was it here on campus?
JL: Oh, sure.
SH: Really?
JL: They had chapters; they had
America First. I'm sure you've heard
about America First. The Senate of the
United States … had many isolationists, Burton K. Wheeler and people like that
… Lindberg, Charles Lindberg, was one
of the foremost opponents of war intervention.
SH: Before Pearl Harbor, what
were the big headlines that you remember?
JL: Before Pearl Harbor? Well, I think that World War II started in
1939, the invasion of France, the Battle of Great Britain …
SH: Did you go to movies and
things like that? Did you get a lot of
your news from newsreels, or was it just from the newspapers?
JL: We'd get a lot from the
newsreels in the movies.
SH: … The second half of your
freshman year, you said you really didn't notice your class size change.
JL: Well, I think our population
dropped off, because a lot of the men enlisted, and I guess some of the ROTC
was called up. Some of the boys were in
the enlisted Reserve, so they were called up right away.
SH: Did it change your focus on
school at all to see all these men go off to war?
JL: I don't think so.
SH: What about after that first
semester, after Pearl Harbor, which would have been the second semester of your
freshman year, what did you do that summer?
JL: That summer, I worked in an
A&P in Hillside. I worked as a
stock boy. You know, it was a
neighborhood store. It wasn't a
supermarket. That's what I did the
summer of my freshman year.
SH: When did you pledge?
JL: I pledged my fraternity as a
sophomore.
SH: So when you came back your
sophomore year, you went back to Somerset Street.
JL: No, I lived in the
fraternity house even as a pledge.
SH: Oh, really?
JL: Yes, yes. I lived in the fraternity house for one
year, as a sophomore.
SH: You took the second year of
ROTC, as a sophomore. Is that correct?
JL: I think so. If it was mandatory, I took it. If it wasn't, I didn't take it.
SH: You had already signed up
for the draft.
JL: Oh, yes.
SH: Was that before you came to
Rutgers or during your freshman year?
JL: I don't recall. I think you had to sign up when you were
eighteen. I don't recall when I signed
up.
SH: When did you get your draft
notice?
JL: Well, I got my notice, I
believe, during my sophomore year. At
that time, you could get a deferment until the semester was over. So, I believe, I got my draft notice
sometime around maybe January or February, and I got a deferment until May …
and I went in right away after that.
SH: You said your roommate was
lost during the war. Was he on
basically the same time frame as you were?
JL: He was a little younger than
I, and, I think, he enlisted.
SH: Did he?
JL: Yes.
SH: How did you hear that he had
been lost?
JL: When did I find out? I think I found out when I got a letter from
one of my fraternity brothers, when I was overseas.
SH: So you were already
overseas.
JL: They had notified me, and he
had told me about a couple of our fraternity brothers that had been lost during
the war.
SH: Originally, you would have
been the Class of '45.
JL: That's correct.
SH: When you enlisted in the
spring of '43, did you think of enlisting in something besides the Army?
JL: I didn't enlist. I was drafted.
SH: Had you thought of trying to
enlist, rather than being drafted?
JL: No, I never thought of
enlisting.
SH: Tell me about what
happened. This was at the end of your
sophomore year. Where did you go? How did your induction begin?
JL: I guess I went home. For how long, I don't recall, but I was, I
might have gotten my draft notice. You
see, I think in those days, when you got your deferment, you already were told
when to report. … If you were deferred
in January until the semester was [over, you] already had [been told] a day to
[report]. I may have even been in the
Army, at the time. I'd been sworn in
before.
SH: Did you report to Fort Dix?
JL: Yes, I did.
SH: What was that like?
JL: I was only there three or
four days. It was more indoctrination.
SH: What were you assigned to,
and where did you go from there?
JL: After Fort Dix, I went to
Fort McClellan for basic training. That's in Alabama, and I spent thirteen or seventeen weeks there, basic
training, and then I went, oh, I was in the ASTP program. I don't know if you …
SH: Well, tell me about that.
JL: Well, the ASTP was a program
that college students could enroll in, when they were in the Army. You enrolled in that before you were drafted
or enlisted. It had two branches, the
engineering and foreign service. The
engineering branch was where you were trained to be engineers and eventually go
overseas. The Foreign Service was
basically for occupation duty after the war was over, and you were being
trained there in foreign languages and to be part of the occupation
forces. I enrolled in it, thinking that
if I were accepted, I would be in the Foreign Service program, but as will
happen in the Army, they assigned me to engineering.
SH: A man who liked history and
political science.
JL: Yeah … I didn't have the
slightest idea. So after I finished my
basic training at Fort McClellan, they shipped me out to the Citadel.
SH: Oh, down in South Carolina.
JL: Down in South Carolina, in
an engineering program, and I kept telling them, "No, I'm not supposed to be in
here," but that's where I wound up. … I
was there for three months, and I don't know how I didn't flunk out, because I
had no knowledge of the courses that we were supposed to be taking, but I
lasted for three months. … Then, I
believe, the war in Europe got very heavy. I think it was during the Battle of the Bulge, and they discontinued the
program, so then we all went our own way.
SH: Tell me what it was like for
a young man from Hillside, New Jersey to suddenly be in the Deep South.
JL: Well, I was sheltered
there. I was at the Citadel with, I
guess, ninety-nine percent of the other soldiers were from the North. … Charleston was a pretty cosmopolitan city,
and I don't think we had, we never wandered far.
SH: Did you get to do any
sightseeing in Charleston?
JL: Well, I knew
Charleston. Yeah, I knew Charleston.
SH: As a young man, had you done
any traveling before you were in the Army? Did your family take vacations?
JL: We took vacations, but we
never traveled overseas, or anything like that, no. We went to Asbury Park and Bradley Beach and Atlantic City. That was about it.
SH: Some people talked about how
it was their first really long train ride.
JL: It was probably mine,
probably was, yeah.
SH: They talked about getting
into Washington, DC and being totally amazed at the war effort and all the
activities going on.
JL: Well, I took a very long
train ride. … I don't know if I'm
getting ahead of myself …
SH: Go ahead, please.
JL: I took a very long train
ride … when I was shipped overseas. I
went from Newark to California.
SH: Well, we'll talk about that
in a minute. At the Citadel, the
courses were very strenuous, and, as you said, it was in subject area that you
weren't really familiar with. Were
there a lot of people helping each other out?
JL: I was very fortunate that
when I first got there, I met a friend of mine from Hillside High School, and
we kind of bumped into each other and we roomed together. … He was an engineering major, so he kind of
helped me along, you know. I would
never have gotten through the second semester, if they had continued the program. [laughter] That, I can assure you, but he helped me along.
SH: What about the drill
sergeants in basic training? Were they
tough?
JL: They were mean.
SH: How did they, the cadre,
treat you?
JL: Well, they were very
tough. I remember, if you sat there and
[were] listening to a lecture on whatever, and if you dozed off a little,
they'd walk around with a long cane, and you had these helmet liners on, and
they'd rap you over the head. You know,
they'd rap you over the head. They were
all raw-boned Southerners, six-foot-six, regular Army, and, I guess, they did
their job pretty well, though.
SH: Did you feel well trained at
the time?
JL: In retrospect, there were
times when you used to laugh about them. They were not educated. We were
all … young college kids there, and we used to, I suppose, make fun of them,
but in retrospect, as I look back, they did a pretty good job.
SH: You talked a little bit
about anti-Semitism at Hillside. How
was it in the Army?
JL: Well, I did experience some
anti-Semitism in the Army, but it was to be expected. I did overseas. When I
was overseas, I experienced some anti-Semitism, but nothing that was so
obtrusive that I couldn't handle it. I
wouldn't say it was a major factor, no.
RP: Was it like the teasing in
high school, or was it more severe overseas?
JL: I would say it was less,
yes.
SH: Tell us about the ASTP
program when it broke up. How much
notice did you have?
JL: My recollection is that
during the Battle of the Bulge, when the war was intensifying in Europe, this
was … the end of '43, beginning of '44, that they needed manpower, and they
just broke up the program. We were
notified, and then we were assigned to, you know, we were all sent our own way.
SH: How much time was there
between the notice that ASTP was ending and when you found yourself heading to
your new assignment?
JL: Oh, right away, but I didn't
go overseas right away. I don't know
how it happened, but I wound up, again, in basic training in the artillery. [laughter]
SH: Where was this?
JL: This was in Camp Rucker,
Alabama. I went through another basic
training, and before I finished that, I was shipped overseas.
SH: Really?
JL: Yeah.
SH: Knowing about the Battle of
the Bulge, did you expect to go to Europe?
JL: I had no idea. I really didn't know.
SH: Tell us about your artillery
training, how extensive that was and what you were trained to do.
JL: I was trained to be a
forward observer or a, I don't remember the word. We used to have to plot the bridge for the artillery. In other words, when they fired, they had to
know where they were shooting at, and we would. I was a forward observer for a while, and then at times, I was
back with the artillery. … Now that I
remember, though, I didn't go into the artillery. I was an MP. Now thinking
about it, it comes back to me. I was
trained in the artillery, but when I was shipped overseas, I don't know if I'm
getting ahead of myself, I was in the MPs, and then I went back to the
artillery.
SH: When you were at Camp
Rucker, when you were there for your training in the artillery, were your
instructors older? What kinds of
experiences did they have? Were you
aware of their backgrounds?
JL: No, but they were all
older. They were all older.
SH: Regular Army?
JL: Some were regular Army. Some had already been in combat and [had]
come back.
SH: Did they talk about it at
all?
JL: They did.
SH: Do you remember any stories
they told you?
JL: I don't recall that, no.
SH: What did you do for
recreation, before you went overseas?
JL: You mean at Camp
Rucker? We had a PX, and that's about
all we did, because these camps were in the middle of nowhere. We used to call home. I remember … every Sunday morning lining up
in the telephone booth to call home. …
When I was at Fort McClellan, I visited a friend of my father's, who was with
him in World War I, and they were also at Fort McClellan, and he married a
southern girl and settled in Alabama. So I visited their home a couple of times, but other than that, not
much.
SH: You were on base most of the
time, so there was really no interaction with the civilians.
JL: No, very little, if
any. Well, Fort McClellan was in
Anniston. We didn't get very many
passes. We were in basic training, and
I recall going in once or twice, but there was nothing there.
SH: Not much in Charleston
either?
JL: Well, Charleston was when I
was at the Citadel. Yeah, there was a
lot in Charleston. Charleston was a
great city.
SH: Because there were so many
different …
JL: In Charleston …
SH: The Navy was such a big
thing. Was there any friction between
the services?
JL: I don't recall any. I'm sure there was, but I don't recall any,
no.
SH: You were going to say
something about Charleston.
JL: Well, in Charleston, I went
to Jewish services. I met a very young
girl, whose family lived in Charleston, and she showed me around for about
seven or eight weeks while I was still there, and we became very friendly. A very funny thing happened. After the war, I was working for my uncle
and my father, managing some apartments in Union, and in she walks. She had married a man from New Jersey, and
they had settled in New Jersey, and here she comes. It was just like a bolt out of the blue.
SH: Had you kept in contact at
all?
JL: No.
SH: Did you get a leave to come
home, before you went to your next assignment?
JL: From the Citadel? I don't remember. From the Citadel, I went to Camp Rucker. I don't remember if I came home. I probably did.
SH: You said your training was
cut short at Camp Rucker. Did you come
home from Camp Rucker, before you went overseas?
JL: There, I got four or five
days … and then they gave me a ticket. I traveled by myself …
SH: From Newark or New York?
JL: … To San Francisco. That's where I joined up with the troops.
SH: Who were you assigned to, at
that point?
JL: I wasn't assigned to anybody
that I know of, and we got on the boat …
SH: Do you know what the name of
the ship was?
JL: … Oh, it was a, no, I really
don't recall. It was a troopship, you
know. It was a troopship, but I don't
recall the name.
SH: Did you get seasick?
JL: No, I never did.
SH: You're one of the lucky
ones.
JL: No, I was. No, I never did.
SH: Where were you to go from
San Francisco then?
JL: From San Francisco, we
landed for a few days in Fiji, and then from Fiji, I became a replacement for
the 37th Infantry Division … They
dropped me off at Bougainville, up in the Solomon Islands, and that's where I
joined the outfit that I stayed with for the rest the war.
SH: What did you do in
Bougainville?
JL: I was assigned to the MPs on
Bougainville, but I think right after that, they realized I was in the wrong
end, and they reassigned me to the field artillery.
SH: Tell me what it was like to
be in the South Pacific. Did you stop
in Hawaii on your way over?
JL: No.
SH: You went straight to Fiji.
JL: I went to Fiji, and then I
went to Bougainville.
SH: What did you do while you
were onboard ship?
JL: I read a lot, swabbed decks,
did KP, slept a lot, played cards, shot crap, you know.
SH: Did you make any money?
JL: I don't recall. Money didn't mean very much to us in those
days. I wasn't married. I had no real responsibilities. But that was about what we did. It was a long trip.
SH: It must have been boring.
JL: You know, it was very
boring.
SH: Did they keep you busy
drilling?
JL: Yeah … we had ship drills,
and things like that, but I don't think so.
SH: Were you traveling in a
convoy?
JL: We were in a convoy.
SH: What was that like?
JL: A lot of ships.
SH: Any incidents that you
remember?
JL: No. We used to have these, you know, drills, but
I don't recall any, no.
SH: How soon did you know what
you were going to be doing?
JL: Not until we got there.
SH: Tell me what it looked like
and what you remember.
JL: About Bougainville? Jungle. You have to remember that when I got there, the fighting in Bougainville
was just about over, if not over, so it was very boring. There was nothing to do at all. I remembered snakes. I remember that you had to take your shoes
inside your tent, not to leave them outside at night, because if you left them
outside, scorpions [and] God knows what [else] would be inside your shoes. It rained all the time.
SH: What training did you have
to prepare you for living in the tropics like that?
JL: We didn't have any drills.
SH: Really? There were no cautionary …
JL: Oh, we took Atabrine.
SH: You started right away?
JL: Oh, yeah. We would take it before, I think, when we
got on the ship.
SH: Did you turn orange?
JL: Yes, yellow, orange, we did.
SH: What kind of medical
facilities and mail service did you have?
JL: Well, the mail facilities
were good. We used to get letters from
home. … We sent letters home, and we
used to have V-mail. I'm sure you've seen
that. I used to write a letter and I
used to condense it to save space. … My
mother, of course, was a typical mother who was very worried, so I used to
write her letters, and I never, I always crossed over whatever it was. I never really told her. I said, "Everything is great," you know.
SH: What did you do as an MP?
JL: I don't think I ever
actually served as an MP. We were on
Bougainville. The fighting had ended,
and we were just sitting there, waiting to be shipped some place else. … I was in the MPs, but we didn't do
anything. I remember going to the
division library almost every other day and getting out a book and reading
it.
SH: Really?
JL: That's about all we did on
Bougainville, because, as I say, there was no more fighting.
SH: How many troops were there?
JL: A lot. My whole division was there, I guess. I don't exactly recall, but I'm sure they
were.
SH: How long did it take you to
make friends?
JL: I didn't make too many
friends, when I was in Bougainville, that I recall.
SH: Do you remember how long you
were on Bougainville?
JL: Well, I could go
backwards. I was on Bougainville, say,
I went overseas in, I wasn't there very long. I would say maybe a month or two, at the most.
---------------------------------------END OF SIDE ONE, TAPE
ONE-------------------------------------
SH: Tell me where you went from
Bougainville.
JL: Well, from Bougainville, we
were loaded on troopships, and we went in for the invasion of Luzon Island in
the Philippines.
SH: What were your specific
duties?
JL: By that time, I had been reassigned to the field
artillery. I was in the field artillery
then …
SH: What did you see when you
got to Luzon?
JL: Well, while we were on the
ship, I contacted dengue fever, which is like malaria, but it's not a disease
that comes back. In other words, you
got it once, and that's the end of it. So I had dengue fever, and I had dengue fever, actually, when we invaded
Luzon.
SH: Oh, really? Were you in the action?
JL: Well, I was in the first or
second wave, I don't recall, but when we got on the island, we found that there
was no opposition. The Japanese had
withdrawn, so we really had no opposition.
SH: What was the landing like?
JL: We had to go down the rope
ladders and get into, I guess they were called, the LCIs, Landing Craft,
Infantry. We dropped into them, and
they would take us into the island. We
had to wade through water, because they couldn't go right up to the beach, but
that was how we got there.
SH: What were you told to do
next, since there was no opposition?
JL: They just put us back into
our various commands, and we started advancing on Manila. That was the objective … the city of Manila.
SH: When did you start receiving
treatment for the fever?
JL: I think I started receiving
treatment [when] I was … shipboard, but it dissipated, and I was weak but okay.
SH: Tell us about how you
progressed to Manila.
JL: Well, the first thing that
happened to me … was my dog. I found a
dog.
SH: Really? Where was the dog?
JL: Well, the dog was
wounded. She was a fox terrier and she
was about six months old and she belonged, I believe, to a Japanese officer who
had been killed in action, and I took the dog …
SH: Where did you find it?
JL: She was just wandering
around on the beach. I took the dog,
and she got medical treatment from our corpsman, and I took her with me, and
one thing led to another, and she stayed with me for the rest of the war.
SH: Where did you carry her?
JL: I don't recall the details,
but she was very well trained. … She
would follow me and she would go out on patrol with us, occasionally. She was a very well trained dog.
SH: What did you call her? What did you name her?
JL: I named her Aparri, which
was the name of a town in the Philippines that was supposedly one of our
objectives. That's what I named her,
and it's a long story, but she came home with me.
SH: Really?
JL: Oh, yeah. She came home with me and lived with us
seven or eight years, after we got back to the United States.
SH: What did your commander
think of the fact you had this dog? Were they aware of it?
JL: Oh, sure. They were aware of [her]. She became like a mascot …
SH: Really?
JL: … Of our battery. She became like a mascot, and she came with
us all the way through the battle of Manila and the end of the war. Now, I mean, I don't know how far you want
me to go into this dog story, but it's a very interesting story.
SH: Please, tell us.
JL: While we were in Manila,
after the war ended, we were stationed in Manila for several weeks before we
got shipped out. She disappeared, and I
thought, "Well, that's the end of my dog." About three weeks later, she came back, all bedraggled and
pregnant. So we delivered five or six
puppies in Manila, and we gave them to various people. I know this is hard to believe, but it's the
truth, as best I remember. Now it was
time to go home, and I get down to the boat with the dog, and, "You can't take
the dog on the boat." That's what they
told me. I said, "Well, I'm not going
home." So my lieutenant, who was a
very, very nice man, I don't recall his name, he said, "Look, put the dog in a
barracks bag." She was very well
trained. I mean, if I told her to sit
in the corner, she'd sit in the corner. [The lieutenant said,] "Walk on the boat with her. What are they going to do to her?" So I did that. I stuffed her in a barracks bag, swung her over my shoulder, and
I walked on the ship with her. Now, as
we got out to the ocean, and I 'fessed up, "Here's the dog." Well, you know, they were very angry, but
they allowed me to keep the dog. … We
got to San Francisco, and I had a special, little place where I kept Aparri, and
we all got there safely. … The first
day I was in San Francisco, we were at Camp Stoneman. We were going by train back to New Jersey and to be
discharged. They told me that under no
circumstances could I take the dog on the troop train with me, because there
was no room for her, [and] there were no baggage cars. It was out of the question. … I called up my parents [and] told them I
had a dog. I got a pass, and I went to
the carpenter's shop, and they made me a crate with a trapdoor. I bought food and some water, and I sent her
home Railway Express.
SH: No kidding?
JL: I did. Remember Railway Express? I sent her home railway express, and the
dog, Aparri, got home before I did. She
got home before I did, and they took care of her. My parents and my sister and my aunt took care of her until I got
home.
RP: When did you get home?
JL: I got home on February 21
or 22 of 1946.
SH: Really? That is a super story.
JL: Oh, yeah. I mean, they'd tell you about Aparri. My wife knew her.
SH: Really?
JL: We were married, [and]
Aparri was still alive.
SH: Let's back up a little
bit. When you were on Luzon and heading
towards Manila, what was it like? Tell
us about what your jobs were and what a typical day was like.
JL: I don't recall too much
about it, to be very honest with you. We had very little resistance, as we advanced towards Manila, and don't
forget, I was in the artillery, so I was not in the infantry, and we would just
advance. We used to have to spot the
guns each day, if they were going to be used, and targets, but artillery was
very minimally used in the jungle …
SH: How did you get the
artillery through the jungle?
JL: Well, there were roads, you
know. It wasn't complete jungle. There were roads, and we didn't have the big
artillery that they had in Europe. I
think this was 75-mm or 155s, I don't recall. … It was pretty boring actually. … We used to eat coconuts, drink coconut juice, eat bananas, and we got
to Manila. It took us about a month, I
think.
SH: How did you find Manila?
JL: Well, Manila was a, you
know, very large city. We of the 37th
Division were one of the first into Manila. I saw General MacArthur there.
SH: Did you?
JL: Well, I got a little ...
SH: Well, tell us about that.
JL: We were crossing the Pasig
River, which was the river outside of Manila, and he was crossing it also,
about half a mile down the river from us, and so I said, "They have MacArthur
there," because they had all the flags and everything. A couple of shells landed in the water, and
his boat turned around and went right back. That was my only glimpse of General MacArthur. But we had some, you know, pretty rough combat in Manila.
SH: Was it still heavily
defended at that point?
JL: Yeah, Manila was two
cities. They had the old, walled city
of Intramuros, which was the original Manila. That's where the Japanese were holed up. That was where their final resistance was. So there was pretty bitter fighting in
Manila.
SH: What did you do as an
artilleryman?
JL: We would bomb them, you
know, fire on them, and we had some scrapes, but, again, we were, I'd say, one
step removed from hand-to-hand combat. We were there [and] shot our guns, shot our rifles. We had men wounded and killed, like I got a
very slight wound. I had a very
interesting [experience]. I had a very
slight shrapnel wound on my right wrist, and it was so slight, it was just like
a little cut, that they sent me to the Filipino doctor, because we had so many
casualties that our medics were too [busy to care for minor wounds]. So I went to this Filipino doctor, and he
bandaged it up for me. … I became very
friendly with him after the war, and I used to visit him and his family.
SH: Were they here in New
Jersey?
JL: No, no, in Manila. I was stationed in Manila after the war, and
I visited him and his family.
SH: Tell me what you saw of
Filipinos and how they were living.
JL: Lovely people. I love them.
SH: What kind of devastation did
you see?
JL: A lot of devastation. The city was pretty well bombed-out. There was a lot of poverty.
SH: Where were the civilians, as
you were advancing? Did you see them as
you went?
JL: Oh, yeah. We saw them as we went through the different
villages. Oh, sure. But, as I said, there was very little
combat. In my recollection, there was
very little combat between landing on Lingayen Gulf and getting to Manila. Ninety percent of our combat was in Manila.
SH: Did any of your people
interact with them? Was there anyway
that you could aid them?
JL: Oh, yeah. Well, we did. We gave them food, gave them medicine, gave them cigarettes. I remember that very distinctly. They were wonderful people.
SH: Were you told not to
fraternize with them?
JL: No. I don't believe we were told one way or the
other. In Manila, we fraternized quite
a bit, as a matter-of-fact. After the
war ended, we used to have dances with them. Of course, they were all chaperoned.
SH: Tell us about that.
JL: It took about a month [to
get to Manila].
RP: How long did it take to
secure Manila?
JL: That was in February, and we
were in Manila for a while. Then we,
after the fighting was over in Manila, we left Manila. We went to Baguio, which is the summer
capital of Manila, and we captured Baguio. We went up there, yeah. When the
war ended, I was in Baguio. When the
war ended, [I have a] very interesting story. I don't know if I'm being too long winded or not. You're going to edit this, are you not? I was sitting in a foxhole in Baguio, doing
sentry duty. This must have been in
August, and I was sitting there. … We
had a series of communications between the various posts, where you would tap
your fingernail on the phone to get somebody's attention. You didn't want to speak out. The phone taps, and I picked it up and I
forget the exact conversation, but somebody said to me, "Did you hear? They just dropped the bomb on Japan which is
the equivalent of 10,000 tons of TNT." That was the atom bomb. I
remember that very well, when I found out about that. That was when they bombed Hiroshima.
SH: You had already taken and
secured Baguio.
JL: We were on sentry duty, but
we were still fighting.
SH: Tell us what happened after
that.
JL: The end of the war was just
a few days later, after … they dropped the second atom bomb on Nagasaki. I guess, it was a couple of weeks later.
SH: Were you still fighting in
Baguio?
JL: We were still in Baguio,
scattered fighting, and as a matter-of-fact, I believe we had a little combat
after the war was over, because there were scattered pockets of Japanese who
hadn't received word.
SH: How did they get the
word?
JL: We dropped leaflets, I
think, radio, because some of them were cut off from any communications. So we dropped leaflets when the war was over
and brought their officers in. I have a
picture at home someplace of a Japanese colonel or general surrendering.
SH: Really?
JL: Yeah, I have it someplace.
SH: Were you there for the
photograph?
JL: Yeah, I took the photograph.
SH: Really? Tell us that story.
JL: I don't remember. All I remember is I took the pictures.
SH: There was still fighting
even after you knew the surrender had taken place. Were you still as careful?
JL: I believe so. It didn't last very long, maybe a week.
SH: How did they surrender? There has been talk about how unwilling they
were to even surrender after the surrender.
JL: I don't recall that they
were unwilling where we were.
SH: What did you do with the
prisoners?
JL: They put them in stockades,
in prisoner of war camps, and eventually shipped them home to Japan. As a matter-of-fact, I remember vaguely
being on guard duty at some of these stockades, after the war was over,
guarding some of the prisoners. They
were pretty docile. They didn't give us
any trouble.
SH: How did the Filipino people
treat them?
JL: I don't think they had too
much of an interaction with them.
SH: Were the Filipinos there
working?
JL: I have no knowledge of that.
SH: Did you ever come into any
contact with any of the other services?
JL: Other divisions.
SH: What about the Navy or
Marines?
JL: No, we had the Marines, and,
of course, while we were on the ship, we came in contact with the Navy.
SH: Was your troopship
Navy-manned?
JL: They were all Navy men,
yes.
SH: Was it a merchant marine
ship?
JL: No, it was Navy.
SH: Had you any contact with USO
shows, or the Red Cross, or anything like that?
JL: I remember vaguely a USO
show in Manila. We never had any on the
frontlines, when we were in combat … I
know we had none. I recall a few more
in Manila, (Joey Brown?). Remember him? He was there, but not while we were in
combat.
SH: What did soldiers think
about MacArthur?
JL: He was not well thought of,
whether rightfully or wrongfully, I couldn't say, but he was not well thought
of. They used to call him "Dugout
Doug."
SH: Do you remember where you
were when you knew that FDR had died?
JL: Yes, I do.
SH: Can you tell us a little bit
about that?
JL: I certainly can. FDR died on April 9, and we were, let's see,
he died in April of '45, right? Okay,
we were still in the jungles, I think, Luzon Island, and my division was an
Ohio National Guard Division, originally, and most of the men in this division
were from Ohio, except for us, who were replacements, and were very
conservative in their political thinking. … I recall when FDR died, as much as I hate to say it, there were
celebrations, not everybody, but many of them celebrated.
SH: What was the thinking about
how Truman would be able to handle the presidency?
JL: I remember a letter I wrote
home to my parents, and I said that, "I really feel for the future of the world
with Truman as president," and I was very wrong. I was proven wrong, but we didn't have too much confidence in
Truman. … He rose to the occasion.
SH: Tell me about how victory in
Europe was relayed to you in the jungles. Were there any celebrations, or was there relief?
JL: We felt that was pretty much
the beginning of the end.
SH: Really?
JL: When V-E Day [occurred],
yeah, we thought that was pretty much [the end].
SH: Why did you think it was the
end? Did you think there would be more
men and materiel for you?
JL: Oh, sure, sure. Some of them did actually get transferred
from Europe to Asia, [but] not too many, because the war was [continued for]
only a few months afterwards. We knew
it was over, that it was going to be over, we were going to win the war. Our main objective, at that time, was in
protecting ourselves.
SH: When did you really have
that sense that you were going to win?
JL: I think always. I don't think there was any question.
SH: Do you have any questions
before we go on?
RP: Did everybody have the same
beliefs, that the US was always going to win?
JL: I think so.
RP: Why?
JL: Why? We had the preponderance of materiel. We were winning the battles, Saipan, Tarawa,
all these, and we were right on the edge. Of course, we also knew that we would suffer a lot of casualties,
because we had been briefed, or our officers had been briefed, on the invasion
of Japan.
SH: When did you realize that
even though the war was over in Europe that you were still focusing on the
invasion of Japan?
JL: … We were briefed on
that. We were supposed to invade Japan,
I believe, in the late fall of 1945, and we were briefed on it. We knew it was going to happen, and we knew
that our division was going to be one of the divisions going in someplace. So we were not at all unhappy when they
dropped the bomb, even though in retrospect, it might have been the wrong thing
to do.
SH: How often did you receive
replacements in your division? You were
a replacement. How often did you have
to replace men? Was it continuously
happening?
JL: I believe when I became a
replacement that pretty well stopped. We got some more, but, you know, they had done the bulk of the fighting
before I got there, and in Manila, we suffered casualties, a lot of casualties,
and we got replacements there. But by
then, the war was approaching its end.
SH: You talked about being part
of the Ohio National Guard.
JL: Yes.
SH: Compare your training to the
training these men had. Could you see a
difference?
JL: Well, they were older than I
was, because they had been in the Guard before the war, and so they must have
been, you know, here I was twenty-one, and they must have been twenty-four, twenty-five,
twenty-six, and they had been through a lot of combat before I got to
them. So they kind of looked down on
replacements, for instance.
SH: Did they?
JL: You know, they had been
through a lot, and they kind of looked down [on us], not that they treated us
badly.
SH: How many replacements were
there within your immediate unit?
JL: I would say a lot. A lot of us were replacements. There were not so many of the original 37th
Division. A lot of men got wounded,
killed, or some had been sent home.
SH: Did you ever think of
volunteering or asking to be sent to OCS?
JL: I believe I applied for OCS,
when I was in the States. I was not
accepted. I never pursued it very much.
SH: Tell us what it was like to
be part of the occupation forces in Manila, what a typical day was like.
JL: Yeah, I was there from the
end of the war until February of the following year, when I was sent home. So I was there for, I guess, about six
months. … The reason we were there so
long is because they didn't have enough transportation to get everybody
home. So the men with the most points,
they had a point system, were sent home first, and you took your turn. So I was there for about six months, and I
used to visit my friends at the hospital quite a bit, this doctor I met, and I
was there quite often with them and his friends. The rest of it, we used to go into town, and they used to have
dances for us with the Filipino girls, who were very, very well chaperoned. You have no idea. [laughter]
SH: Tell us what it was like.
JL: Oh, it was like living in
the nineteenth century. I mean, these
were the upper class of Manila, and they all had a lot of Spanish blood and
they had Spanish customs. … We used to
go to these dances, and they used to come with their, I think you call them, (duenas?), or chaperones. We would dance with them, but … we never
took them home or anything.
SH: What else did you do?
JL: I don't recall much
else. I mean, we used to go into
town. They had USOs there, and we'd
walk around and we'd buy things, and, as I say, I was very active with my
friend the doctor.
SH: What was your official
military duty, at that point?
JL: We just sat on our butts.
SH: You didn't have to get
things ready to go home.
JL: We did absolutely nothing,
absolutely nothing. I remember being
assigned to the office a couple of times to file papers, and things like that,
but it was just busy-work to keep us occupied until [we went home]. If they had had enough ships, we all would
have gone out right away.
SH: What about coming back to
school? When did you start formalizing
those kinds of plans?
JL: Well, I got back in February
of [1946], and I came back the next semester.
SH: So you came back in the fall
then.
JL: I came back …
SH: In the fall of '46.
JL: No, no, I came back in
February. I must have gone to summer
school. I went to summer school, and
then I had one more year and then I graduated.
SH: So you went at an
accelerated rate.
JL: … When I was in
Bougainville, I think it was in Bougainville, we got a lot of free time. I took some correspondence courses, and I
got credit for them when I came back to Rutgers. So that kind of eliminated almost a full semester, so I was able
to accelerate my graduation.
SH: Did you ever run into any
other Rutgers men when you were in the Philippines?
JL: Of course, I ran into Stan
Klion.
SH: Did you really?
JL: Of course.
SH: Well, tell us about
that.
JL: Stan Klion was a colonel …
SH: I want to hear your story.
JL: Well, Stan Klion was a
colonel in the, I believe, in the Finance Corps, and he was stationed in Manila
after the war. I went to a Rutgers
meeting there, a Rutgers meeting …
SH: Really? Well, tell us about that.
JL: They had a …
SH: How did you find out about
it?
JL: It was in the paper, the Daily Pacific, which was the equivalent
of the Stars and Stripes, and there
was a big notice about the Rutgers meeting, and naturally I went. … I saw several people there that I knew
from college, but I bumped into Stan Klion, who was a fraternity brother of
mine. He was older than I was, and I
met Stan. Of course, I didn't know
Buddy [Barton Klion], at that time.
SH: Who else do you recall
meeting?
JL: I don't recall. Nobody in particular, but I do remember Stan
Klion was there.
SH: What did you do at the
Rutgers gathering in Manila?
JL: Well, I'll tell you what we
did. … I know what I did with Stan
Klion. We talked about our house that
burned down, where three people were killed. ...
SH: Could you tell us what
happened?
JL: We had a fraternity house on
River Road, I think, and they had a fire. … It was after a party and … two girls and a boy were killed, I'm not
sure, and Buddy was in the school at that time. It was in the Daily Pacific,
so Stan Klion and I talked about that.
SH: It's amazing that you would
get together.
JL: Yeah, it was funny. … Then I met another friend of mine there,
Abner Golieb [RC '46]. We're trying to
get him to come down and give you an interview. I didn't meet him, but I [realized], actually, that after the
war, that we had passed on the way. We
were at the same place at the same time, but we didn't know it at that
time.
SH: I've actually seen a
photograph of one Rutgers gathering in Manila, and I just wondered if you were
a part of that group.
JL: I have never seen that. I have no idea.
SH: Oh, I'll see if I could find
it. Was there more than one Rutgers
meeting?
JL: I only recall that one
time. For most of the time, we'd just
sit in our barracks, our tents, and play cards, or whatever.
SH: I wondered if after having
gotten together the one time if you tried to do it again.
JL: No. Well, Stan was a colonel. I was an enlisted man, and, you know, we
really didn't travel in the same circles. But, no, I saw him there.
SH: You said you didn't do much
in the occupational duty.
JL: Pretty much. Actually, it wasn't an occupation duty,
because this was a friendly country. …
We really didn't have an occupation duty.
SH: Were you doing anything to
help the Filipino people rebuild?
JL: Not at that time. It was much too early in the game to do
that.
SH: What about black marketing?
JL: Yeah, there was black
marketing.
SH: Were you aware of it?
JL: I was aware of it. I didn't get involved in it. They used to have a big, big, big black
market, [and] I'm not talking about food. I'm talking about, I remember on Rizal Avenue, which was the main street
in Manila, there were miles and miles of vehicles stored, brand new, never
used, trucks, command cars, jeeps, all sorts of vehicles. There must have been thousands of them. That all kind of dwindled down after a
while. I think they were being sold on
the black market, but it was just rumor. We never got involved in it, but, yeah, there was a big black market.
SH: Did anybody sell their
cigarettes or their booze?
JL: Sure. I used to give mine away, because, at that
time, I didn't smoke. I used to give
mine away.
SH: Did you ever think you were
going to go home tomorrow and they'd say, "Nope, not enough room?"
JL: It was a very stressful type
of thing, because there were always big headlines in the paper about this. … Of course, I had the dog and I was worried
about whether I was going to be able to take her home with me, and it was a very
stressful time for us, if I recall … There were a lot of demonstrations, "Get more ships out," blah, blah,
you know, "Get us out of here."
SH: How did soldiers
demonstrate?
JL: Well, I don't recall if we
demonstrated, but we would march up and down the street, perhaps, with
signs. We couldn't do much of anything,
because we were subject to [punishment], not like the demonstrations that you
recall.
SH: Did you participate in some
of these?
JL: I don't recall. I know I was very anxious to get home,
because I wanted to go back to school. As a matter-of-fact, I had the opportunity to go into Japan on
occupation duty. I would have had to
sign up for a year, but I turned it down, because I wanted to go home.
SH: Did they try to get you to
stay in?
JL: Well, not really, not while
we were there. When we were discharged,
they tried to get us to stay in.
SH: Did they?
JL: Well, they asked you to sign
up for the enlisted Reserve, which none of us did. I didn't sign up. It
would have wound up a career, if I did.
SH: What about the GI Bill? When were you first aware of that and the
fact that you'd be eligible for it?
JL: I guess, after I got home …
SH: What do you remember about
your troopship ride back to the States?
JL: The United States? Well, I remember there was a lot of gambling
going on. Everybody had a lot of pay,
because we hadn't been paid in months. We all had a lot of money, like paper money. There was a lot of gambling. That's what I remember. Of
course, I had the dog, so I had special quarters.
SH: Oh, they gave you special
quarters.
JL: Oh, yes. They gave me an area on the ship about as
large as this room, which was off limits to everybody else, and I used to stay
up there with my dog. … My friends
would come up and visit me and we'd sunbathe, and it was like a cruise. We played cards …
SH: Did you know of any other
dogs that were brought back?
JL: I think there was one other
on the boat with me.
SH: Really?
JL: I don't know what happened
to them, but there was one other dog on the boat. In Europe, from what I understand, they had a program where you
could bring your pets back with you. In
the Pacific, they had nothing like that.
SH: I wondered about
quarantines. Did they ever talk about
that?
JL: Oh, yes. My dog was supposed to be in quarantine for
two weeks, and I signed a paper telling them that I would agree to leave her in
quarantine. … As we approached the
United States, my captain came up to me [and] he said, "Listen, Levin, if you
leave that dog in quarantine, you're never going to see her again." He said, "If I were you, I'd smuggle her off
the boat," which is what I did. That's
when I took her down to the shop and had her shipped home. So I never went through with the
quarantine. As soon as I got off the
boat, I called my parents up, "Here I am, dog, okay." Either that day or the next day, I went down to this shop, the
carpenter shop, and they made a crate for her, and I shipped her home.
SH: Did your family know about
the dog before?
JL: Oh, yes. I had called them. I had written them. I
think we were allowed one phone call, after the war was over, from the
Philippines.
SH: Oh, really?
JL: I believe so, yes, and they
knew that she was with me.
SH: Did your parents save any of
the letters you wrote them?
JL: I have them at home. … I have some of them at home. My mother saved a lot of stuff.
SH: Good for her. What was the train ride like across the
country?
JL: It was very boring. Again, we had to sit up the whole time, no
sleeping cars. We slept on the
seat. We played cards all the way
across. For five days, we played
nothing but cards. It was hot and
boring. That's all I can remember.
SH: Where did you go when you
got back?
JL: Well, we went to Fort Dix …
SH: Fort Dix first?
JL: … So that we could be
discharged. I was there for three days,
I think, or four days.
SH: Then you just came up to
Newark.
JL: Well, my father picked me up
at Fort Dix.
SH: Oh, did he?
JL: Yes.
SH: That's good. Tell us about your reunion. What was it like to come home?
JL: Well, it was in the winter,
and I was very anxious to get home, because other than just wanting to get
home, it was my parent's twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, and I just made it
back the day of, or the day before. They had a big party, of course, the next night. It was their twenty-fifth wedding
anniversary, so I got home for that. …
It was strange, of course. The weather
was cold. I hadn't been in a cold
climate for a couple of years, and a lot of my friends were coming home at the
same time, or were home already, and I was getting ready to go back to
Rutgers.
SH: What were your parents
involved in, as far as the war effort?
JL: My parents? My father was an ambulance driver, in case
they had bombings. He did a lot of
that. I don't know that my mother did
anything. I don't recall whether she
was involved in the war effort or not. I think she worked for a little while, but not very much. My father was pretty much involved in veteran's
affairs, because he was a veteran of World War I.
SH: Did he talk at all about how
he was worried about you?
JL: My mother was the worrier in
our family, as most mothers are.
SH: Did your sister talk about
what it was like for her? What did she
do while you were gone?
JL: She was in high school.
SH: She would have just been
graduated.
JL: She was in high school, and
she went pretty much about her life. Of
course, they had rations, you know, rationing of a box of sugar and coffee and
gasoline, and, you know, things like that. I don't think they suffered any great deprivations.
SH: How did the war affect your
father's work?
JL: I believe that what happened
was about a year before the war ended, they set up building programs, so my uncles
and my father were very busy building apartments. This was supposed to be for war veterans and factory
workers. At the time, only they were
qualified. So they were pretty busy.
SH: I wondered if that had
impacted their business.
JL: No, they were pretty busy.
SH: Did you think of going right
to work, or did you always know you'd go back to school?
JL: Oh, no, I was going to go
back to school.
SH: Did you change your major at
all, when you came back?
JL: No.
SH: Talk a little bit about what
it was like to come back to Rutgers as a veteran.
JL: Well, it was bittersweet,
because I had lost some friends during the war. My roommate had been killed. My very best friends had been killed during the war.
SH: From Hillside or from Rutgers?
JL: No, no, they were from
Rutgers. My roommate at Rutgers, and
they were from my fraternity. … It was
different, because we weren't kids anymore. We were men. We couldn't put up
with any of this nonsense about hazing, and this and that. That was very juvenile for us. That's when all the hazing and all that
stuff went out, because the veterans wouldn't stand for that stuff. So it was a different world, where everybody
was more serious.
SH: You talked about your
fraternity house burning down.
JL: It burned down while I was
overseas, and, I believe, don't tell Buddy I told you, they were put on
probation for a year. So when we came
back from service, we didn't really have a fraternity. I lived in Ford Hall.
SH: You said you lived in
Highland Park.
JL: … I think I lived in Ford
Hall when I first came back, during the summer, summer session, and then four
or five of us took a room in a boardinghouse on Adelaide Avenue [in Highland
Park]. We lived on Adelaide Avenue, and
that's where I lived before I graduated.
SH: Did you?
JL: Yes.
SH: Who were your roommates at
Adelaide Avenue?
JL: I lived with Marv
Bierenbaum, who was a fraternity brother. I lived with … Mel Rosenstein, a fraternity brother. Bob Steck was there, and Lenny Feinberg. That's about it, maybe one or two others
that I don't recall.
SH: Who was the cook?
JL: We didn't cook. We went out to eat.
SH: Every night?
JL: Well, we did some
cooking. We just had a room.
SH: Did you get involved with
activities here on campus?
JL: Not too much.
SH: When you were talking about
Rutgers before the war, you didn't tell us anything about NJC.
JL: Well, NJC was NJC. It was a very strictly-run school, and I
remember that if you dated a girl from NJC, on a Saturday night, you had to go
to the early show, because she had to be in her room before the late show was
over. Oh, yeah. … They used to ring a gong on NJC campus,
I'm not sure, I think, at eleven o'clock, and if you were on the corner with an
NJC undergraduate and that gong went off, well, off she would go.
RP: Did they check them in every
night?
JL: You had to check out and
check in, absolutely. I think their
curfew was at ten o'clock on weekdays, and I think they were only permitted
certain weekend passes. You know, it
was pretty strictly run.
SH: What about military balls
and the sophomore ball and different things like that? Did that still go on after the war?
JL: I don't recall. I don't recall every time I went to one.
SH: What was your major?
JL: Political science.
SH: You stayed right with
that. Were you still thinking of going
to law school?
JL: I did go to law school.
SH: I know. I was building the story here.
JL: Yes, I was thinking about
it, yes.
SH: Where did you think you'd
want to go?
JL: I'd applied to NYU and
Cornell Law School. I was accepted at
both, and I wound up at Cornell.
SH: Did you? So you graduated in the spring of '47.
JL: Spring of '47.
-------------------------------------END OF TAPE ONE, SIDE TWO--------------------------------------
SH: This is tape two, side one of an interview
with Mr. Julian Levin. Tell us,
again, about how you went to law school at Cornell.
JL: I applied for law school and
I was accepted at Cornell, and in that fall, I attended Cornell.
SH: What did you do for the
summer in between?
JL: Good question. I don't recall.
SH: Who was your favorite
professor at Rutgers?
JL: I don't think I had
one.
SH: Was there anyone that you
found most distasteful?
JL: No.
SH: Or a subject?
JL: No. I had an accounting professor who I liked,
but I don't remember his name. I had
Professor [Mark] Heald, who taught history. He was pretty good.
SH: I just wondered if there was
one that you really liked.
JL: I had nobody else, nobody
that was outstanding.
SH: Did you and other veterans
serve as mentors to these eighteen-year-olds in your fraternity, or did you
just let them do their thing and you went your own separate ways?
JL: You mean when we were back
at Rutgers? We didn't serve as
mentors. As a matter-of-fact, I
remember having a, not an extreme, but we really didn't, we weren't too nice to
them, in many cases. People like Buddy,
we kind of resented them a little. I
mean, I became friendly with them, obviously, but at that time, there was like
a chasm between the returning veterans and the high school kids, children,
boys, who were coming to school.
SH: What about the veterans
themselves? Did you talk amongst
yourselves about your experiences?
JL: I believe so.
SH: You did?
JL: Yeah. We were two groups, don't forget, when we
came down here, two very distinct groups. There was Buddy's group, and there was my group. … We all belonged to the same fraternity,
but we were different. It took a while
for us to accept one another.
SH: Did the veterans talk about
the war with each other, or did they just put their heads down and go right to
work?
JL: We talked about it with each
other, but we really didn't talk about it with the others. … Yeah, there wasn't much talk about it.
SH: If you were having a
conversation with another veteran about the war when a non-veteran walked in,
would you just stop talking?
JL: Stop, yeah. I mean, we just didn't discuss it with
them. Buddy and I always kid each other
… I was very hostile to him when I came
back. He said, "Very hostile." I'd say, "No." But there was that gap.
SH: What about law school at
Cornell? Was it the same thing, or
were most of the people in your class veterans?
JL: They were veterans, yeah.
SH: How did the professors treat
veterans in their classrooms, both at Rutgers and at Cornell?
JL: I don't recall that they
treated them any differently than they did people. Don't forget, there were people who weren't eligible for service. I don't think they treated them any
differently. They may have a little
more compassion. I remember professors
telling us that, you know, "You have a paper to do, take your time. You were in the war. You're not used to coming to class." But I don't remember anything particularly
different.
SH: When did you meet Mrs.
Levin?
JL: I met Mrs. Levin in 1947,
'48. She was from Elizabeth and I met
her through a series of blind dates, and she was dating somebody else from our
fraternity. That's how I met her.
SH: You met her here on campus.
JL: No, no. Her best friend's brother was a fraternity
brother of mine, Teddy Blau. He was a
fraternity brother and … through the connection, we all got together. … He married one of them. He married Florence, and I married
Muriel. They were from Elizabeth. She had just graduated high school.
SH: Did she go onto college?
JL: She was self-educated. After our children were born and [were]
going to school, she went to night school, and she went to Kean College,
Montclair State, and she got a degree in education.
SH: How long was it from the
time you met Mrs. Levin until you married her?
JL: I believe it was maybe a
year, a year and a half. As I said,
she was dating one of my other friends, before we started dating. That was the best thing that ever happened
to me.
SH: So this was a long commute
from Cornell back to Elizabeth.
JL: I don't think I dated her
when I was at Cornell. I think it was
after Cornell that I started dating her. I didn't date her at Cornell. It
was after I left Cornell that I started dating her.
SH: Where did you practice law,
after you finished your law degree?
JL: I never got a law
degree.
SH: Tell us that story.
JL: I only lasted one year. … Maybe I couldn't study. Maybe I wasn't ready for it, but I lasted
one year at law school, and I left. …
Then I went to work for my father and my uncles.
SH: You're not the first veteran
to tell us that it was just too difficult to come back to civilian …
JL: I regret it to this
day. … My wife always wanted me to go
back after we were married, but I never did.
SH: What did you do for your
father and your uncles?
JL: I worked with the
buildings. They had all these
apartments, [and] I managed them, in Union.
SH: Do you have children?
JL: I have two children. They are both single. My son was married and divorced. My daughter never married.
SH: What is your passion now,
Mr. Levin?
JL: My passion? My wife is my passion. She is. I mean, I can't describe her. If
you lined up 10,000 women, I couldn't have picked a better one.
SH: That's incredible.
JL: No, it's not incredible if
you know my wife.
SH: How do you think the war
impacted the man we're interviewing today?
JL: The what?
SH: How do you think the war
made the man we're interviewing today?
JL: I grew up. I was a kid when I went into the Army and,
when I got out, I was a man. I mean, I
have to say I learned what life is like. I was with people that I had never [had contact with before]. … I came from a middle-class, Jewish
background. Most of my friends were
Jewish. We were very parochial. … When I went into the Army, I was with
people from all over the country, uneducated. I remember when we were at Fort McClellan, we were, there were men from
Tennessee and Kentucky, and I think they'd never seen urinals. So you really became a little more
sophisticated.
SH: Are there any other stories
that you would like to tell us?
JL: I don't think so, except,
you know, I have my dog story. I told
you that.
SH: You said that the dog stayed
with you even after you were married.
JL: Oh, yes, she lived with
us. Muriel knew her.
SH: Do you know what happened to
the pups?
JL: I really don't.
SH: Did you keep in contact with
anybody that you served with overseas?
JL: No, I did not.
SH: Did you join any
organizations?
JL: No, I did not. I never joined any veterans organizations.
SH: You didn't sign up for the
active Reserves. Therefore, you were
protected from Korea. During Korea, did
you, at any time, wish you were back in the military?
JL: Oh, no, never.
SH: Some men we've interviewed
have said that they had one pang of guilt, and then that was it. It went away. What did you think of the Vietnam War?
JL: I was against it from day
one, violently against it.
SH: Have you stayed active
politically?
JL: … I am a political person,
but I'm very left leaning. Some of my
views are rather radical, but, no, the Vietnam War was, to me, a disaster.
SH: All right, well, I thank you
for taking time to do this interview.
JL: You're quite welcome.
SH: Thank you, Rupali.
RP: Thank you.
JL: Rupali, thank you.
---------------------------------------------END OF
INTERVIEW-------------------------------------------
Reviewed by Kathryn Tracy Rizzi 9/10/02
Reviewed by Sandra Stewart Holyoak 9/15/02