Jack rarely threw away anything, nothing in the way of paperwork. It was only a few years before his passing that he found all his canceled checks, every one, saved from the very first time he was able to have a checking account to use instead of cash. They were in the attic. He must have looked through them and recalled all the purchases he made, many of them, like the checks, still either in use or in storage in the attic, "just in case." He finally disposed of the checks.
Other more important documents were stored in his safe in the house. Deeds to the house and commercial properties, birth certificates, and this one that was so important to him, his honorable discharge from the Army.
Yes, I keep it. Like father, like daughter.
Thirty-Seven Months
Newlyweds Jack and Alice (Streeter) Kellar faced World War II together during Jack’s service in the U.S. Army Air Corps from 1942 to war's end in 1945. "Thirty-Seven Months" recounts their wartime experiences as drawn from their letters, photos, a journal, and voice-recorded reminiscences.
Sunday, May 19, 2019
Saturday, September 22, 2018
40 Then and Later
Jack and Alice, 1990s |
Jack's home town, Santa Rosa, California
In
Santa Rosa, at the airport, where the Sonoma County Airport is now, that was
our training base. Suppose that Red Pelizzari from Michigan came to Santa Rosa,
and he said to somebody, “Where were the barracks that we stayed in here when
we were training, when we had the P-39s here?” There are no barracks left
there, or anything. There’s all
buildings built around there, big buildings. I know where they were, down in the eucalyptus grove. The
eucalyptus grove’s even gone now. So if Red Pelizzari came out there, I could
tell him where things were, but anybody else, how would they know? They’d say, “Yeah, there were some old tar
paper buildings over there.” That’s what they were; they put tarpaper on the
outside, anything at all at that time, to get some housing. Oh, they tore most
of them down. There’s probably little remnants of them that there are left yet.[1]
Beauvechain, Belgium
Beauvechain, Belgium
In 1995 Jack recognized nothing of the airbase where he spent months near Beauvechain, Belgium. |
[In 1968] we saw the pig farmer in the little town there. Our airfield was just a strip of farmland cut out with wire matting put down, and when we went back, why, here it’s a farm. The sheep are out on the hills and the man was tending his pigs with a coat and tie on. Everything changes so much, and it’s been pretty near fifty years.[2]
Staplehurst Advanced Landing Ground, tents in the apple orchard, 1944 |
Staplehurst Advanced Landing Ground Memorial on the site of the airfield, now Chickenden Farm, 2010 |
The Staplehurst monument inscription. Photos courtesy of Alan Wright, County Kent, England. |
And the People
Jack forged a bond with the Hendrickx-Leemput family during his stay at their home in Belgium. It survived the years through letters (translated by family members) and Jack and Alice's occasional visits.
Lique (plaid blouse) and family, 1945 |
Lique and Jack, 1995 |
Jack and Derrick were already married in wartime. When they sent their P-51s aloft, their wives' names soared above enemy and friendly lands.
Jack and "Alice" |
Derrick and "Camille" |
An easy camaraderie developed among the three P-51 crew chiefs from Sonoma County, California. Their friendship, forged during shared wartime experiences, persisted during easier times, with their wives and children, right up to the end. They called each other “Sarge.”
Kellar, Derrick, Winkler, Germany 1945 |
Jack and Alice Kellar, Jean and Wally Winkler, Camille and Erwin Derrick, 6 June 2000 |
In Memory
Jack J. Kellar (1921-2006) and Alice M. (Streeter) Kellar (1921-2004)
Jack and Alice, first photo, 1938 |
Jack and Alice, a last photo, 2003 |
[1] Jack J. Kellar, interview about his first years after
high school by Judy Kellar Fox, 12 April 1993; cassette tape recording and
transcription held by the author. Lightly edited excerpt.
[2] Ibid.
Friday, September 14, 2018
39 A Thanksgiving Return
Jack, trimmed-down |
Army rations
had an effect on Jack’s appearance. After only three months he noticed, “My clothes are
fitting a little looser than they did when I left the states.”[1] Fourteen months later he remarked, “I
weigh about 168 lbs now.”[2] And he was plenty tired of wearing his uniform. “Honey you
mentioned about clothes for when I get home. I have had to go around for so
long with a hat on & my jacket buttoned up and I’m sure tired of it. I just
want to get some clothes on that I feel comfortable in and wear them the way I
please.”[3]
Jack at enlistment |
Jack was aware
of other changes, too, less visible, and potentially more important.
“This
laying around and not doing anything is really getting on all of the fellows
nerves. We sure aren’t what we were a couple of years ago. Some of us were
talking the other day about when we get home. I wonder just what things will be
like. I know we have changed. We don’t notice it among ourselves but I know
people at home will notice them. I sure hope there won’t be too big a change.
Only one thing I’m sure & positive of honey is our love for one another. No
body or nothing can ever change that. Our love will go on forever.”[4]
In late October
final preparations to return home finally were afoot. Jack wrote to Alice from
Camp Top Hat, a repatriation tent camp near the port city of Antwerp, Belgium.
So close now!
The Port of Antwerp |
Hello
mummy,
How
you. We are just laying around here not doing much of anything but we turned in
our money today and we are having our physical inspection in the morning so I
guess it won’t be too long before we board ship. It is sure windy here. I hope
tomorrow is the day. I’ll wire when I get in the states. I love you.[5]
Derrick
had gone home about three weeks before Wink and me. Wink and I went to Antwerp,
Belgium, and boarded the S.S. New York
Victory to return home.
Winkler, Jack, and friend onboard ship |
Can't cross the ocean fast enough |
It
took two weeks, and part of the trip was on rough seas. Entering New York
harbor in the early morning and seeing the fireboats displaying water from big
nozzles was a great sight. Even greater was the Statue of Liberty, and then
fresh milk and doughnuts from the Red Cross.[6]
The promised telegram, identical to the one Jack sent his mother |
After
two or three days at Camp Shanks the trip across the United States in a C-47
airplane was an experience. It seemed that we landed about every hundred miles
to get fuel and food. I don’t know how many days it took us to get out on that
plane. Eventually we arrived in Sacramento, California, where we were taken to
Camp Beale in Marysville for discharge.
We
got in there at night, and they started processing us for release at two
o’clock in the morning. I’ll never forget, one officer came in and said, “How
many of you want to join the reserve?” No hands went up, and he says, “Those of
you who would join the reserve can miss the two-hour meeting that’s going to
take place in the next building.” Some of the hands went up right away. I went in to the two-hour meeting and slept
through the whole thing. I was tired, so I didn’t hear much.[7]
Alice knew
exactly what she wanted to wear when she picked up Jack from Camp Beale. “I want a
black suit with black and white fur trim and a black hat with fur trim.”[8] She made the trip in the 1941 Pontiac, all
clean for Jack’s return. Camp Beale was about one hundred forty miles from
Santa Rosa, a long drive for Alice, especially because she wasn’t feeling well.[9]
Alice was there to meet me on Thanksgiving
Day, November 22nd 1945, just three years and one month since I
enlisted. What a great day to see Alice and be with her again. She picked me up
in the [1941] Pontiac that had the longest hood you ever saw. I’d been riding
in Jeeps with a hood about this long.[10]
The Kellar
family reunited around Jack’s mother’s table. Herald, discharged from the
service a month earlier, brought his wife and the daughter born during his
overseas absence. David brought his family, with three children now. Betty and
her new husband rounded out the group. Jack’s mother prepared turkey, mashed
potatoes, gravy, and stuffing, all the foods Jack had missed so much in the
service. The meal, piping hot on the table, began with grace, “Dear Heavenly
Father, we’d ask thy blessing . . .” Herald was stoic, but Jack shed a few
tears.[11]
Mary Elizabeth and Dave, Idella, Henry Mayfohrt, John, Jack, Eunice, Alice Florence, Herald; Bobby, Davey, Janie |
Jack in his new clothes |
They had plans.
[1] Jack J. Kellar (England), letter to “Dearest Alice”
[Alice (Streeter) Kellar] (Santa Rosa, California), 5 April 1944, excerpt.
[2] Jack J. Kellar (Germany), letter to “Dearest Alice,”
26 July 1945, excerpt.
[3] Jack J. Kellar (Augsburg, Germany), letter to “Hello
darling,” 4 October 1945, excerpt.
[4] Jack J. Kellar (Germany), letter to “Hello darling,”
6 October 1945, excerpt.
[5] Jack J. Kellar (Camp Top Hat, Belgium), letter to
“Dear mummy,” 25 October 1945, excerpt.
[6] Jack J. Kellar, interview about his first years after
high school by Judy Kellar Fox, 12 April 1993; cassette tape recording and
transcription held by the author. Lightly edited excerpt.
[7] Jack J. Kellar, interview about his first years after
high school by Judy Kellar Fox, 12 April 1993; cassette tape recording and
transcription held by the author. Lightly edited excerpt.
[8] Betty (Kellar) Lowdermilk (Goleta, California),
telephone interview by niece Judy Kellar Fox, 16 January 2018.
[9] For the distance, see Google Maps (https://www.google.com/maps
: accessed 11 September 2018), directions for Santa Rosa, California, to Beale
Air Force Base. For Alice’s health, see Mary Idella (Muth) Kellar, “Diaries”
(MS, Santa Rosa, California, 1930–1962), a collection of thirteen one- and
five-year diaries with nearly daily handwritten entries. The diaries passed
from Idella to Jack and then to his daughter Judy. Entry for Tuesday, 20
November 1945: “[Alice] is not feeling so good.”
[10] Jack J. Kellar, interview, 12 April 1993, lightly
edited excerpt.
[11] Mary Idella (Muth) Kellar, “Diaries,” entries for 21
and 22 November 1945. Also, Betty (Kellar) Lowdermilk, interview, 16 January
2018. Also, Jack J. Kellar, interview, 12 April 1993, excerpt.
[12] Jack J. Kellar, interview, 12 April 1993, excerpt
lightly edited.
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