I've come to think of it as a Christmas story, only a story without snowmen, angels, wise men, or Santa Claus. I don't think of it much thru the year, but at Christmas time and around the holidays I find myself remembering the story which has me googling to read the story over again. It's a feel good kinda story, a story of regular people coming together to make it something more. Something I think that Christmas and just what life it's self should be all about.
It was December 17, 1941 and a small group had gathered to wait for them. The 134th infantry were to be arriving by train and would pass thru, or at least that was the rumor that was circulating about. Trains came and they weren't the right trains, and more people gathered til the 4:30 train which was suppose to be the real train carrying the 134th was to arrive. But it didn't have the 134th infantry. Those sons and fathers and brothers and loved ones weren't on the train but were in fact a different group from Kansas. The gathered group loaded them down with their parcels of cookies, magazines, and cigarettes and sent them off as if they were their own.
And an idea was formed by a local woman, Rae Wilson, that the soldiers should be met, the trains should be met. They should be sent off, all of them as if they were family, they were everyone's family. A group was formed and on Christmas day the North Platte Canteen came into being.
As many as 23 trains a day and up to 8,000 military personnel were greeted with steaming hot cups of coffee, baskets of sandwiches, plates of fried chicken, cookies, pies, magazines, cigarettes, playing cards, and a birthday cake or two. Well actually about 20 birthday cakes a day, 600 cakes a month, to be given to any soldier who was lucky enough to have a birthday that day.
As many as 125 communities came together to help staff and supply the canteen daily. Auctions, and raffles, and scrap metal drives were held to help cover expenses. Men's organizations, ladies' groups, church members, businesses all took turns to make sure each train was met every single day for four and a half years before the canteen's closing on April 1, 1946.
I find it remarkable. That a town of 12,000 even thought they could undertake such a project. I find it remarkable that every train was met, day or night. That almost 6 million servicemen and women came thru the canteen. How in the very beginning the transport of the trains was being kept quiet, and only the head of the Union Pacific officials knew of their arrival. They would in turn contact the head canteen workers and the word was spread by the simple phone call, "I've put the coffee on". In a time of poverty, and uncertainty, it does seem as if it was some sort of miracle.
The pessimistic part of me, grumbles that it wouldn't ever happen now. No one would be home, no one would be willing to spend such a big part of their day just meeting a train for 10 minutes, and for total strangers. Everyone would claim to be at work and unable to help, or maybe help out once or twice before moving on and thinking they had done their part. But that is the pessimistic part of me, and the melancholy and romantic part of me hopes that we would. For now though, I just think of it as my favorite Christmas story, which became much more than just a Christmas story for so many.
To read more about the North Platte Canteen: http://npcanteen.net/
