Los Gatos Weekly-Times

Photograph from the John S. Baggerly collection

Native youngsters sell watermelons to passengers along the Trans-Iranian Railroad. Temperatures in the 120s accounted for brisk sales.

Picture from the Past

John S. Baggerly

'Typewriter' soldier enjoys scenic tour of duty in WWII

In keeping with the spirit of Memorial Day, last week I recounted my World War II experiences.

Before flying overseas we were at Miami Beach's Floridian Hotel and taking a motorboat ride on Biscayne Bay to view homes of the super-rich, including the home of gangster Al Capone.

Then a trans-Atlantic flight to North Africa, Cairo and on to Iran to where the Yanks made rail and truck shipments of supplies to the beleaguered Russian Army at Stalingrad.

By the Trans-Iranian Railroad, we "typewriter" and "radio" soldiers were dispatched at camps on the desert and in the mountains before the line reached the capital city of Teheran, where dwelled the Shahinshah (king of kings) and his beautiful wife, the sister of Egypt's King Farouk. After the war, the Shah said "I divorce you" three times, and his queen was gone, but not with her dowry of jewels, which he kept.

The Persian Gulf Command included troops from England, Russia and India, with much help from Iranians.

Frank Agar and I were dispatched at Camp Andimesck in the desert and shared an office with the post veterinarian, whose main job was meat inspection. He also vaccinated unwilling dogs. In bull sessions, the vet opined that a woman was at her most beautiful when pregnant.

Our daily camp bulletin printed the previous day's temperature, and l20 was a common figure. The best-read man on the post was the chaplain. He said that Andimesck was not far from where Daniel faced the lions and that the Persian desert was the hottest spot on earth, with temps in the 180s.

Agar did artwork, much of it comic, for the Command newspaper.

Word arrived that there was a 1932 Olympic champ in our outfit. Thus I did a story on draftsman Luigi Beccali, an Italian, who won the 1932 1500-meter title against Kansan Glen Cunningham. Beccali married the daughter of a New York City restaurateur and joined our army. While sailing eastward in the Mediterranean, he got a lump in his throat when he saw the tip of the "boot."

Another interview was with Joe Jackson Jr., who had a comic bicycle act. He opined that pantomime is the oldest form of humor.

Movies and cards occupied evenings. Bridge-playing Al Mebane, a Southerner, could not believe that we yokels had never heard of the Tennessee walking horse, an easy-gaited animal trained for plantation owners to survey their vast lands.

An English doctor who had served in Russia brought his Russian wife and son through our camp en route to England. Engineers built a little auto for the boy.

Camps had football teams accounting for Sunday games. Bridge tournaments were also held.

Before coming home, I spent several months in Teheran and saw the royal gems in piles behind glass in a downtown bank. Auto traffic mixed with camels. Opium was smoked openly in native areas, and boys sold scenic postcards, "French" postcards and photos of the royal family all pressed together in their hot hands.

Our flight home was by plane to Casablanca and then by ship to Newport News, Va. The night before we landed, Walter Winchell said over the radio, "Good evening, Mr. and Mrs. America and all the ships at sea." Hey, that's us.

At Newport News, the ice cream bar was crowded, the beer bar empty.

By train to Camp Beale (near Sacramento) for discharge and final pay and hitchhiking home to Barbara and year-old Jeanne, who looked as though she would be bald for life but wasn't.

The Army had corrected a World War I mistake of paying off and discharging all troops on the Atlantic Coast.

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