Pool Party!
or
"Dance where?!"
Here is another story about the waste that frequently went on
during the war. It ends with the statement that Dad made in
many of his sories. As told to me (WGI) on 13 January 1996.
I have done some editing and rearranging, to improve the readability
and keep things in sequence. - WGI
WOI: One time I got an order, when I was in Shop 08, to glue
down some masonite in the bottom of a swimming pool. They
were going to drain the swimming pool, and I would have
to glue some masonite to a tile floor that was in the
bottom of the pool.
They were going to hold a *dance* in the swimming pool!
All materials were rationed and you couldn't get anything.
You couldn't get any building materials at all. And here
was hundreds of feet of masonite that they wanted to glue
down for a dance floor. In the bottom of the swimming
pool!
Well, I refused to do it! I just absolutely refused to
do it. I got accused of disobeying orders, and everything
else. I said, "If anybody wants to glue masonite down
in the bottom of that pool, have at it! I'm not going
to do it."
They did it.
[But] they forgot to think of the fact that there would
be no air conditioning down there, the breeze couldn't
get to them. And they about sweltered!
Both: <laughter>
WOI: ...in the bottom of this pool!
WGI: Served them right!
WOI: <laughter> Yeah! Served 'em right! Dancing on this
masonite that was glued to the bottom of the swimming
pool!
Well, it was flop, of course. It didn't pan out.
Come to clean up the damned mess, they called us to clean
up the mess! We scrubbed for a couple of weeks on the
bottom of that pool, getting the glue off of that ceramic
tile that was at the bottom of that pool.
It's a damned wonder we ever won the war!
Copyright (c) 1996 by William G. Innanen. All rights reserved.
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