Legacy Series Episode 6 - The Road Back

0:13

As a young fella, you’re twenty or twenty-one years old.

0:18

You’ve just left your mother, who told you what to do: wipe your nose or whatever else.

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Then you got told where to go and to wipe your nose by these corporals, sergeants, and so on.

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You’re in the Army: you’re told what to do, all the time, everywhere.

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The war ended.

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Now, you’re not going to be told what to do.

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Now what?

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What happens now?

2:02

I’m very upset—because I thought my number

2:06

was due—because somebody else’s number came up, and I had a lower number.

2:12

So I went to the sergeant, and I said, “They didn’t call my number.”

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He says, “So what?” or whatever he said.

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And I said, “Well, can you tell me?”

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He said, “What’s your number?”

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“R266054.”

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He pulls the paper and says, “It’s not on here!”

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I said “Well, when am I going?”

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“Haven’t any idea.

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We’ll call you.”

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That was it: nobody knew when you were going.

2:40

So when I did hear, I was told that I would more than likely not go home till Spring.

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So I spent the good part of a year on the Continent,

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working at headquarters and waiting to go home.

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Which was, you know . . . the war was over; I had no patience.

3:00

None of us had patience.

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You know, the question was: well, what do we do now?

3:08

The station commander wanted to keep control over us (laughs), in case we didn’t go too

3:15

wild and so on from partying a bit.

3:18

So he organized sport days.

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That kept us busy and occupied and so on—smart move.

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After the war was over in Europe, they had thousands of us in England

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that they didn’t know what to do with; so they had holding units.

3:40

I was there about two weeks or so.

3:43

I was told that I was now the new stage electrician for a RCAF show that was

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travelling in Europe, and everything else.

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I had the best six months of my Air Force career right there.

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We felt important, you know.

4:06

Everybody knew there was a show in town, and they were going to play a performance—tonight.

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It was a variety show.

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We did sort of the opening number.

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We did a tap routine: one where we dressed up like cowboys, cowgirls.

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We did different types of dancing.

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This was our opening number, and we had these jackets on that shone in the dark.

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It was black—see, the first show was blackouts, but we were all-clear.

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So we had this costume on, and this jacket.

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And somebody yelled, “All-clear!”

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And the curtain opens, and we were just in these teddies and black stockings.

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Well, the whistles and the hoots and the hollers were so loud that we couldn’t hear the music.

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So they changed the costumes.

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I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

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It was the best time there was, and we were treated so well, you know.

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You hear of girls joining up into the Armed Forces: their parents wouldn’t let them go,

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because they figured there was a lot of hanky-panky or whatever that was going on—

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nothing like that at all.

5:26

Where are the props?

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No propellers.

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It’s a jet fighter.

5:30

Hmm.

5:32

I knew we were testing them at the end of the war…No propellers.

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What will they think of next?

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No pilots.

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That will be the day.

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Good to be back home, Johnny?

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It's easy, I’ll tell ya that.

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It took awhile.

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Waiting and waiting.

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And then more waiting.

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A lot of blanket drills in between.

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Blanket drills?

5:55

Naps, Andy.

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Naps.

5:58

If they didn’t discharge me when they did, I was going to snatch up my old Lanc and fly

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back to Canada on my own.

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Couldn’t wait to get home, eh?

6:05

No!

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Could you?!

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I couldn’t wait to see my girl and my ma my pa, brothers, sisters… but…

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But what?

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But I think, I’m going to miss…

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Miss your old crew, right?

6:22

Yeah, them for sure, but

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there’s something about the fighting.

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About cheating death.

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The rush of it all.

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I’m going to miss that.

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But now you have your whole life ahead of you?

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That’s what I’m scared of Andy.

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That seems a lot scarier than what I’m leaving behind.

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Wonder why that is?

7:09

We were glad to be home.

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The next morning, we arrived at Central Station in Montreal, and my whole family was there:

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my mother, my father, my sisters.

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I was coming home.

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My God, what a joy!

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It was a moment that we’ll never forget!

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It was nice to get home.

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It was kind of a let-down, though, because the excitement was over.

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The war is over (laughs).

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When we landed in Canada, they had a big band playing and all that, and we all got off.

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The people were all there at Nova Scotia.

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and... ah... There was a train on the tracks right there, and so, one of the guys that looks after each

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cabin—or whatever you want to call it— there’d be about

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twenty guys on that one section.

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We all had a single seat; when we went overseas, there would be three guys in that seat.

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And we had no papers, here we got, “Where are you from?

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Toronto?

8:16

Here’s the Toronto paper.”

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And so they'd say

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And when it came time for us to sleep at night, those things made into a bed

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for us, so we could sleep.

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He would say, “Go down to the end of the room and have a smoke, and you can get a beer

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down there, and I’ll make up your beds.”

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And I said, “Well, we can make our beds.”

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“No, no, that’s my job.”

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He was an elderly man.

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So he made the beds.

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He says, “I want you to leave your shoes out here, so I can shine them for you.”

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I said, “Are you joking?

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Nobody ever shines—” “I want you to do that.

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He says, Look at me, I never went to the war.

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I want to do something for you guys.”

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I could cry when I hear things like that.

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Anyways, we would go to a special cabin, or train, to eat.

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That never happened before.

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They’d say, “What do you want?

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Three, four eggs? Six eggs?

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How many do you want?

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How do you want them cooked?”

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You know, the cook would say, “He wants them this way: just slightly over.

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OK.

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How about the bacon?

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How many bacon do you want?

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Do you like it this way or that way?“

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And toast!

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Ohhh, he knows how to make— And you know, it’d be running down your cheeks.

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You’d say, “My God!”

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You know?

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But that was “The war was over.”

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We were home.

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We were saying, “Geez, we never had milk, we never had butter;

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never had jam or anything like that.”

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So landing home was just— It was home, we knew it.

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Getting home was kind of interesting, because I had phoned Mum from Ottawa.

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I said, “I think I can probably make the Owen Sound, the Alfred train,” that goes

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up from Toronto.

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When it was due to arrive, the whole village was out to greet me.

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And of course, somehow, I couldn’t make that train, and I didn’t phone.

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But I hitchhiked up from Toronto.

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It was the day after when I got up there.

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And our place had a long lane—a country lane, you know.

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He drove me up the lane, and stopped and I got out.

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And Mom was there on the porch, ready for me.

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It was great.

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Settling into home life?

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Getting back to the old routine?

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Everyone’s been great.

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When I first got home there were lots of pats on the back, you know.

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A parade for all of us who fought.

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Free drinks. That sort of thing.

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But, life goes on.

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Some of the vets I met, they have their whole life mapped out for them.

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All types of government assistance to help them out.

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But to tell you the truth Andy,

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I’m kinda in the soup.

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Like I’m flying through a dense fog all the time.

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I’m jumpy when it comes to loud noises.

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On edge all the time.

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I don’t sleep well…

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I wish I were over there.

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So I wouldn't have to think about it all the time…

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I just want to fly missions.

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That’s what I’m good at.

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Flying missions.

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That’s what I do.

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Did. Johnny

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That’s what you did.

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You know, you might have what they call PTSD.

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PT what?!

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Post-traumatic stress disorder.

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Those are some fancy five-dollar words you’re spitting out there Andy.

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In English?

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PTSD is a mental disorder some veterans get from fighting in wars.

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No.

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(laughs)

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No!

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I’m not a nut case!

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That's not what I'm saying.

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It can be controlled.

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Enough!

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We’re done talking about it.

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I’ll be…I’m fine.

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And you don’t tell anyone.

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You hear me!

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I went to law school, I stayed for awhile, but I could see

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after, I couldn’t settle down.

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I guess my mind was someplace else.

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So I left there, and I started to work.

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Finally, I worked for Blue Cross.

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That eventually became OHIP.

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So I spent my working days with OHIP.

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I went right back to university.

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You know, the army supported my wife and me ‘til I graduated.

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I walked into the Bell office in Montreal—a big recruiting office, right inside the door.

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And I went over to the little girl and said, “I was thinking of applying for a position.”

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She said “What are your qualifications?”

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Well, I said just the right words: “I just got my diploma from McGill,

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and before that I was in the Air Force, in radar.”

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She said, Is that anything to do with wireless?”

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I said, “It’s completely wireless!”

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She says “Well. We’re looking for people

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with a university degree who have experience in wireless!

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Would you wait a minute?”

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So she went and got her boss, and he took me up to the big boss of the department they

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wanted me to go into.

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He said, “Could you start tomorrow?”

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“Well maybe. I could start next week!”

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And so I started the following Monday.

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And thirty-six years later: “Thank you, radar; you got me in the door.”

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I taught Morse code to the Scouts, at a time when women were not allowed into the Scout

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troops at all.

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But, because of the necessity of the boys to learn Morse code,

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I was permitted into the troop.

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Got home, went into the university, and graduated as a civil engineer.

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And then right straight into work.

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I had been thinking of going to visit CIDA, and ask if they had something that I could do.

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The very day that I was planning to see them, I got a call

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from this general, saying, “How would you like to go to Burma?”

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I thought about it a long time—one second—and I said, “Yes!”

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I went to de Havilland—in 1953, I think it was.

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And I was there until I went

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to join Ken Molson, who was the curator in the National Aviation Museum.

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It was a wonderful time that I first realized that this is what I wanted to do:

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help to preserve airplanes and, in my own time, paint what I was to paint, which was aviation scenes

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of historic events in particular.

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Guess what?

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I’m flying again.

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That’s great.

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Where? With who?

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I’m flying a busher for a hunting and fishing lodge.

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That’s sounds about right.

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Yeah.

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I’m taking rich muckety mucks up North so they can bag a bear, or a moose, and put its

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stuffed head on their mantelpiece.

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And then brag about it over whiskey and cigars.

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Sounds gross.

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Which part?

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The stuffed animal heads part.

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Who are we to judge.

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I’m just glad I found something.

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So many of them who were over there haven’t.

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Some of them were real war heroes.

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Chest full of medals.

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Now forgotten.

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When the war started, I was just a kid in

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the ninth grade.

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When the war ended, I was a lieutenant in the Air Force.

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A full grown man, even if I was only twenty years old.

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When I looked around me, I thought I was pretty smart—and pretty lucky.

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I had seen London, and Paris, and Algiers and things like that,

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I was pretty full of myself when came back.

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It wasn’t hard to get me to talk about what I’d seen.

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I don’t like talking about the war as such—the killing and so on, that went on.

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That was our job: we did it, and there was no question.

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We couldn’t argue about it; we just did it.

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But the other part—the playing part—was great.

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And I told everybody about that.

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But I think, as time goes on, people will forget.

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I think after the war was over—the First World War was over,

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say in the twenties—people forgot that.

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Like we have a tendency to forget our last war here.

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The other thing is that things are moving much faster now than they were

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twenty years ago, or forty years ago.

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People are much busier doing other things.

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Well, it’s been said, and it’s true: “History is thirty seconds ago!”

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I want people to always remember the historical aspect of what they do,

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and what other people do.

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It’s important to preserve.

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When you think of it, the German people are human, too.

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And it wasn’t the German people who started the war.

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It was their leaders, who felt they could

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have more land or create a greater presence in the world.

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But you meet German people now, and they’re just the same as you and I.them

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I work with them at the senior’s centre.

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They’re great.

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Now that you’re back and working, what do you miss the most about the war?

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I miss my crew.

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The rest is fading.

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But my crew, we had some good times!

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Close shaves too.

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We try to keep in touch, but I live up North and they’re all over the country…

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it’s not the same.

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Probably will never be?

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No, probably won’t.

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Best to put that road behind us now and move on.

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It was something though.

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Something worth repeating?

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That’s not up to me Andy.

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But who better to tell others why we shouldn’t have wars, than veterans.

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You think anyone will listen?

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War doesn’t really solve anything in the final analysis.

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It’s just a lot of people have their lives ruined, and are killed and maimed. and I. . .

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I think there should be more emphasis on peace.

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The whole philosophy should be that war is bad.

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There’s no doubt that our war had to be fought, because Hitler and Mussolini were

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going to take over the world—and they nearly did.

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But there is a point where you should be able to stop that ahead of time.

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I don’t know what it is.

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Well, love each other, I think love each other, I think I would say

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because that solves everything.

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Love saves everything.

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But that’s practically impossible; so I don’t think that’s going to happen.

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I realize that we have differences, but if we can only

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look at the other person’s point of view,

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maybe we would avoid a lot of conflict and heartache.

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It’s very difficult to constantly feel you are the only one who knows what’s right.

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Just realize: listen to them, and then judge whether you are right, or whether the other

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person might have a tiny bit of knowledge, too.

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It would be nice to see the world become peaceful, and everybody started getting along with one

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another, instead of having to fight with one another.

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Fight for peace.

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I think that’s the only thing.

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I think war is a terrible thing.

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And, as I said, we lost thousands—well, we lost millions altogether during the war.

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It’s terrible, and I would do everything to avoid it.

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Somebody who wants to conquer somebody—you can try to negotiate it, and you can threaten.

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But if they don’t stop, you’ve got to stop it.

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And you should be prepared, and never be not prepared.

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Keep up your Army, your Air Force, your Navy.

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That’s as much as I think I can say.

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You’ve got to be able to fight back.

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You’ve got to be able to fight back.

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I thought, “Well, let’s go back and live happily ever after!”

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I really did.

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When I got home:

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that’s done. I’ve been to a war; it’s terrible.

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Whatever, whatever, whatever, but it’s over!

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But, we’ve had a war ever since.

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I hate it.

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You know Andy experience teaches you a lot of things in life.

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My only hope is that future generations will see what we did in the war,

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the sacrifices, the accomplishments,

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and that they learn something from it.

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Or else, it would be all for not.

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And that would be a shame.

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I believe they will Johnny.

25:19

I have a good feeling about it.

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That’s good.

25:51

What I would say to the veterans that went through World War Two?

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I would say, “You guys are awesome to be able to just drop everything.”

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‘Cause most of these people were high-school students.

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They were nineteen, they were seventeen, when they went off.

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To be able to say goodbye to your family, to be able to pack up and go fight this war

26:10

for your country—I think that’s something that is really cool.

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Because nowadays, a lot of people don’t really stand up for themselves, let alone

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a whole country.

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And for them to be able to do that—and either to survive or die in the battle—

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that is amazing that they have this tale to tell.

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These veterans make the Second World War more authentic, closer to people.

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These pilots have seen a bomb bay door open above them, and risked having thirty bombs

26:46

drop on them, if they didn’t do something.

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They’ve been shot at, and have had to parachute down to survive, when the rest of their crew died.

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What happened during the Second World War is intense.

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And I feel more connected to it now.

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Listening to Mr. Gélineau’s interview, I feel like I know him now.

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Like, I’ve never met the guy before, but I feel as if I know him.

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It’s kind of amazing.

27:18

These guys and girls have some great stories behind them that need to be told,

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need to be put on record.

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And it would be a complete shame if they just got lost.

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I don’t know . . . it’s just something I find fascinating

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just hearing their stories, you know.

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You watch a movie, or read a book, but when you actually hear it from someone who’s

27:40

experienced it, it’s totally different.

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They are only veterans’ stories.

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They’re not some guy who read about these things in a book.

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These people have lived through it.

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It’s real; it’s honest.

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When they speak, you can feel the emotion in their voices, and in their eyes.

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This is their actual lives.

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It’s important for younger generations to never forget what older generations

28:07

did for us, because we wouldn’t be where we are.

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And it’s just important to know that war is really not a good thing.

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And a lot of people died, and I hope it doesn’t happen again.

28:18

Once hearing all the stories from the actual people that lived through it, it hits a lot

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harder, and it makes you care a lot more about what happened.

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As I remember in high school, it was kind of basic: learn the dates, learn the locations, study

28:33

for your exam, and that was pretty much it.

28:36

But to sit there and listen to everything they have to say, you know, you get attached

28:41

to these people—to these, you know, these fighters.

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Even though some of them were just nurses, fighter pilots or just navigators,

28:54

each one of them has played an important role in our history.

28:57

To be able to make an emotional connection with the person, to tell future generations,

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I think that is a really cool thing.

29:05

You know, I’m really thankful that they were there.

29:10

You have two generations facing each other.

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On one side, a generation that lived through bombings and had to go to war.

29:18

On the other side, a generation that’s holding an iPhone and has everything at its fingertips.

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I think we have a lot to learn from these men and women.

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We need to take the time to give them a voice.

29:31

We need to remember them.

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We need to pay attention to what they’re telling us.

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A lot of veterans want to pass on what they know.

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We’re losing more and more of them as time goes on.

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It’s like our last chance to hear them tell their stories.

29:52

Young people need to understand the past

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in order to better understand what’s going on today.

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Just knowing about what these soldiers did— what the war was about, why it happened—

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would help educate the younger generation against having it happen again.

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History is something that should be remembered and never forgotten.

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They were young, as we are young.

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They served, giving freely of themselves.

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To them we pledge, amid the winds of time, to carry their torch and never forget.

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We will remember them.

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We will remember them.