12 Nov 2022 Garand Picture of the Day - Tarawa

[eb in oregon]

That would have been mind numbing...

My dad spent 18 months on Guam with the AAF and he said it was the absolute worst time of his life. Though he did have a couple of funny stories.

One was that he'd gone to the base theatre to watch the free movie, some monster movie. He was broke and everyone else was out drinking or on duty. After the movie (which he said was rather creepy) he returned to his hootch and went to bed. As he lies there in the dark he hears the screen door hinges screech. He looked to the door, and saw nothing in the dim light. He rolls over and after a moment he hears "thump, thump, thump," as if someone is slowly walking. He rolls back to the door, and sees nothing. Now there were still Japanese soldiers on the island hiding in the jungle, so he looks real careful. And sees nothing. He rolls back over only to hear "thump, thump, thump" again. He jumped out of his bunk, grabbed his 1911A1 (I still have it) and a flashlight and scanned the hootch. Nothing. He looks at the floor just in front of his feet and there is the biggest toad he's ever seen. He said "After I got a grip I went back to bed. And let the toad live."