By Linda Ibbitson Hurd
Special to the Express
My Uncle Sandy was my mother’s step-brother and served in the Air Force during WWII as a U.S. Army pilot first lieutenant.
His full name was Sandy Royal Austin. In 1944 on July 22 while flying a B-17G over the Ploiesti oil fields in Romania, his plane had engine trouble and dropped out of formation before being shot down by enemy fighters. All on board bailed out right before the plane exploded; it was a parachute landing and the men were taken prisoners. The POWs were held in a schoolhouse in Bucharest, Romania until Rumanians surrendered to Russians Aug. 23, 1944. Sandy was among the 1,150 POWs flown out on B-17s early in September 1944 to return home.
Sandy somehow rescued his parachute for his bride-to-be so she could make her wedding dress out of it, as fabric at that time was scarce. After the War, Sandy and his wife Jean moved to Alaska and then they moved to Dover Foxcroft Maine with their three children. Their son Dale was my age and their two daughters, Diane and Janet were about the same ages as my younger siblings.
In the Summer of 1961 when I was 14, Sandy and Jean invited our family to spend Fourth of July with them in Maine. My mom’s father and stepmother, who was Uncle Sandy’s mother, lived twenty minutes away from Sandy and Jean. Since we had not seen any of them for several years and Dad had the week off, he and Mom decided to go.
The Fourth of July was on a Tuesday that year; we left for Maine on Monday and pulled into their driveway four hours later. Every building and house we passed was decorated with flags and patriotic bunting, including theirs.
Their spacious yellow and white Victorian house was set back from the street with a flagpole beside it flying the American flag, the POW flag and an Air Force flag. There was a big olive drab colored tent on one side of the expansive lawn. We found out that it was for us kids if we wanted to sleep outside instead of upstairs in the house.
We were warmly greeted with hugs that were returned and all the usual comments of how big or tall some of us had grown in both families. My sister Penny and I remembered Aunt Jean, Uncle Sandy and Grandma and Grandpa Austin and although our brother Dave and sister Barb were too young to remember them, it didn’t take long for them to warm up to Grandpa Austin, who was a kind, loving man.
The first night’s supper was lobster for the adults and burgers or hot dogs for us kids. The younger kids were a little shy with one another but by the end of the meal they were running around laughing and playing. My cousin Dale was now taller than me with a reddish cast to his light hair and a few freckles across his face that brought out the blue in his eyes. He was a bit less standoffish than he used to be.
After supper all of us kids played outdoor games that even the little ones could play; from Hide and Seek, Simon Says, Blind Man’s Bluff and more. Our parents and grandparents watched from across the yard as they reminisced, caught up on family news and had many laughs under a beautiful full moon until bedtime. I slept in the tent that night with the other kids, except for Barb and Janet, the two youngest, who wanted to be with their mothers.
Fourth of July dawned bright and beautiful. Mom and Aunt Jean told all of us to get dressed and to be at the breakfast table if we wanted to eat before the parade started. Dover Foxcroft was a small town that reminded me of Hanson.
People were friendly and you couldn’t get away with much as everyone knew who you were. All along the sidewalk that went through the main part of town, people were sitting or standing as Clowns entertained and interacted with the crowd. My cousin and I watched our younger siblings having a good time, and our Dads and Grandpa as the Antique cars passed by sounding their horns.
Grandma Austin was on a float that went by with other ladies and all their delicious looking homemade pies. Our moms liked the Float from J.J.Newberry’s and the one from the Textile Plant. I loved everything about the parade, especially the patriotism, the tradition and the meaning of it.
Off to the lake
When the parade was over, we spent the rest of the day at beautiful, scenic, Sebec Lake. Uncle Sandy had a roof rack on his truck to secure his canoe. He also hitched his boat and trailer onto the back of the truck. He had his fishing gear, plenty of beach toys, chairs, food and Grandpa Austin and Dad in the front seat with him. Grandma Austin and the rest of us rode with Aunt Jean in her station wagon.
When the vehicles were parked and the boat was tied to the dock, we found a beautiful shade tree and put our chairs under it. Uncle Sandy asked who wanted to go for a boat ride and all the younger kids were jumping up and down yelling in unison. We all got in the boat except our grandparents, who wanted to sit in the shade. My brother Dave sat up front with Sandy and Dad; my cousin Dale and I sat way in the back and everyone else was in the middle.
After the boat ride Dale and I challenged our mothers to a race to see who could swim the furthest. My cousin Diane blew her whistle to start the race. We swam out to a boulder and back again, both our mothers keeping up with us. Both Dale and I reduced our pace as we wanted them to win, and they did. Even though they knew what we did, we were proud of them and impressed with what excellent swimmers they still were. There were big hugs all around. The rest of the day the younger kids were jumping off our Dads’ shoulders and being caught by our Moms. Dale and I took turns pulling the kids around on the rubber rafts.
We loved climbing on the rocks and helping the kids to dig holes while Grandpa and our Moms took pictures. Before we knew it, we were packing up to beat the sunset home, as Uncle Sandy put it.
Fireworks were not allowed in Dover Fox-croft, Maine at that time so Uncle Sandy drove home by way of Bangor, Maine, which was closest to his house, so we could see them. Quite a few of their neighbors were there; it was the perfect end to a perfect Fourth of July day.
When we got back to the house, everyone got ready for bed. When Gram and Grandpa Austin left to go home, they invited us all to their house the next day to teach us how to make homemade ice cream the old fashioned way and to see Grandpa’s clock collection from when he was a clock maker, which made us excited and Mom happy. When I was getting ready to go into the tent where Diane, Penny and Dave were, Dale tapped me on the shoulder and wanted me to follow him.
He asked me if I knew what a cherry bomb was and I told him yes, we have them in Hanson, too. He blushed a little and grinned, telling me he has one and wants to set it off on the pond in the center of town as the grand finale of today’s celebration. I looked at him and grinned and said okay and off we went.
The moon lit our way as we walked to a sizable pond surrounded by a metal split rail fence. Swimming wasn’t allowed and there were benches to sit on and shade trees all around. We walked towards a hollow tree and he pulled a box out of it that contained a board with the cherry bomb wired to it. He flattened the box and threw it in the water. I could see the street and the town beyond the benches and was glad there were no lights on. He picked up a long stick, put it down on the ground beside him, took out his matches, set the board on the edge of the water, lit the cherry bomb, pushed it gently with the stick until a breeze sent it out onto the pond, grabbed my hand and we started running until it was safe to stop. We stood in the silence until the explosion shook the night and sent us running again.
Lights began to come on as we ran through the woods and we heard a siren. We kept running until we reached his yard. We practically leaped into the tent, relieved the kids were asleep and that all the lights in the house were off. It was so hard to keep from laughing, we kept putting our hands over our mouths. He finally raised his hand to mine, shook it and whispered, thanks. We finally settled down and went to sleep.
During the remainder of the time I was there, to our relief, nothing came of it. In 1966 The Child Safety Act came into being and they were banned. The more I grew up and the more I learned about these particular explosives and how many people had been harmed, the more I realized how foolish we had been and how very fortunate we were that nothing happened.