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UNITED STATES ARMY RECRUITING SERVICE

June 1, 1942 —-KOIN 10:45 P.M.

SOLDIERS OF THE AIR

ANNCR: KOIN presents------------------------------Soldiers of the Airi '

MUSIC: THEJIE "SECOND CONNECTICUT REGIMENT” (475) UP AND FADE TO BACKGROUND ANNCR: Now’s your chance to fight, you older men« If you're under forty-five Uncle Sam wants you! Maybe he doesn't want to let you pilot a bomber or a pursuit plane, but if you're trained he's more than willing to give you a shot at piloting a bull-dozer. Maybe you're a construction foreman,—a bridge builder,—a water supply expert, --or even a blacksmith. If so, Uncle Sam wants you for the United States Army Corps of Engineers. No, you don't have to look like one of these up-standing young soldiers. Uncle Sam doesn't care so much about the hair on your head as the courage in your heart. If you are in top physical form, and trained, you can fight with the Engineers— far to the front of the army's advance, demolishing obstacles, bridging streams, camoflauging gun emplacements,—and when the going is tough you can, as an Engineer, turn fighter and,--but why not hear about the Corps of Engineers from Sergeant Bill Harris of the Army Recruiting Service. Right now he's greeting Jack Dodge, a construction foreman and his son Ted. (FADING) It looks as if Ted were mighty pleased about something-------------

BILL: How do you do, sir. Is there something I can do for you.

JACK: Why, yes. I want to enlist in the army.

TED: (EXCITEDLY) Me tooi

JACK: (INDULGENTLY) All right, Shadow. You too.

BILL: . Well, that's fine. Let's take one at a time*

TED: (GRIEVED) But we wanted to enlist at the same time,—me and dad.

BILL: Like father, like son, eh?

JACK: (HUMBLY) Like son, like father would be more to the point, I guess.

It was Ted' here and his mother that got me in the notion of enlisting.

TED: (LAUGHING) We didn't have to try very hard. We just shoved him

over gentle,— with a—a—

JACK: Go on I Say iti With a bulldozer.

BILL: Gentle with a- bull dozeri

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TED: Don't you pay any attention to dad, Sergeant Harris. He doesn't

mean that. That's just an old expression in our family. You see we follow the construction game----

JACK: ('IEANINGLY) We?

TED: Aw well, then, --you and torn» (PAUSE) Gosh, Sergeant Harris, you

ought to see my mother shove a truck around 1 BILL; (CHUCKLING) Gentle—with a bull-dozer.

TED: She can drive a bull-dozer too! And you ought to see her on the

business end of a steam-shovel!

BILL: Maybe we'd better enlist her too. She sounds as if she'd be all

right for the Army Engineers!

JACK: (QUICKLY) Oh no, you don't! It's all right, maybe, for Ethel to

run my business, but the army! I'll be darned if I'm going to have her run

BILL: I beg your pardon—I didn't mean—

TED: It's o-kay, Sergeant Harris. Dad ' s just a little touchy on--

JACK: (EARNESTLY) Ethel's fine, Sergeant . She's one in a million. But

dog gone it, she's always right. No fooling,—she's always right. Even in little things. Like the other day ’when we save those soldiers rising right up out of the ground and marching off into the grass--

TED: (EXCITEDLY) Say, you ought to have seen them! It was like magic,

and Mom said—

JACK: (INTERRUPTING) Horn— Ethel, said the right thing,—(without bitter-

ness) She would, dog gone it!

BILL: What soldiers? Which grass? And what did she say?

TED: Yeh. Hurry up, Dad. We got some■enlisting to do!

JACK: She said----(INTERRUPTING HIMSELF) What she said out there at the

post doesn't mean much unless you know how we happened to be there when the soldiers staged that review for the colonel.

BILL: Look, mister—wc seem to be getting quite a ways from enlistment—

bull-dozers, colonels, steamshovcls— soldiers in the grass—

TED: Soldiers out of the ground!

BILL: (.LAUGHING) You dig them up with a steam-shovel, I suppose!

JACK: Well, it sort of looked like that, Sunday afternoon out at the post.

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TED: Wc were working,—-building a road,— a street, at the post,--

tossing dirt out of the way—

BILL: Gentle, with a bull dozer.

JACK: Yeh, Trying to clear a space so's the trucks could get through

to join in the review for the colonel. Say, you wouldn't believe how those soldiers liked the colonel.

BILL: (SOFTLY) Yes, I wouldl Our commanding officer is like that.

JACK: It was Sunday and none of our crew wanted to work, so Ethel and

Ted and I decided to do the job ourselves. I was running the shovel end Ted and Ethel were hauling the dirt away in two trucks. And it was ruining— end every five seconds some of these soldiers (FADING) come tearing out to tell us to hurry-----

SOUND: STKJI SHOVEL (or tractor SQ 98) UP TO -□STILISH SOUND THEN DOVilN

TO BG

JACK: (ABOVE SHOVEL _.ND AT DISTANCE) Bring her in a little closer,

Ethel 1

SOUND: TRUCK MOTOR UP THEN OUT (SQ 127)

ETIIEL: (ABOVE SHOVEL) It's sure slick,— no traction at all. Wish it

would let up before the review for the colonel I

SOUND: SHOVEL UP, THEN DQVjN TO BG

JaCK: (_iS ABOVE) If we don't get this heap of dirt out of the way there

won't be any review, at least that's what these soldiers------Hey,

you, soldier, watch out for that shovel I

SOLDIER: (AT DISTANCE aND ABOVE SHOVEL) You watch out for it I And hurry up, will you? (FADING IN CLOSER AND IN MORE CONVERSATIONAL TONE) lie got to bring the trucks through this way— in ten minutes.

ETHEL: Wat's the idee, of staging a review today? Couldn't you wait until the weather------------

SOLDIER: (CONVERSTIONALLY) The army don't wait on weather, Iodyl Besides, the Colonel is leaving and we want him to know-------------Aw, he's

a good egg and we like himl Vie aren't putting on a review because he asked us to. We're doing it because we want to. (PAUSE)

The colonel's .going into foreign service, and that's what we'd like to be doing.

ETHEL: That's what my son, Ted, would like,— foreign service,--- with

the Army Engineers.

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SOLDIER: That your son running the shovel?

ETHEL: (LAUblUNG) No, that's my husband. I'd like to see him sign up

too, but I guess he's too old.

SOLDIER: Well, he sure looks young enough.

JACK: (AT DISTANCE) I heard you, soldieri I'm forty-three 1

SOLDIER: (Proudly) We take men up to forty-five now------

ETHEL: We?

SOLDIER: Sure, vre, us,-- Uncle Sam, -- The Army Corps of Engineers. (PAUSE) See these little gadgets on my lapels,— the little castles? That moans Army Engineers.

ETHEL: So, you belong to the engineers?

SOLDIER: Sure, (LAUGHING) me and the colonoil You know, when it comes to building roads or bridges, or knocking down fortifications, or oven slinging paint to camouflaugc gun emplacements,— why, then, it's me and the colonel and all the other guys J That's the reason we like him,— the colonel,-- he's like us— knows how to uso the business end of a pick as well as I do, and ho-------------- Aw goc, I'm

talking too much! (SHOUTING) Get that shovel going, buddy, we got to got a road cleared to lot the men and equipment throughl JACK: (AT DISTANCE) O-kay, soldier 1 Bring on your trucks 1 We'll havo

a passage for you I

SOUND: SHOVEL OR TRACTOR UP AND SUSTAINED, THEN FADE UNDER TIUSIC

MUSIC; (AT DISTANCE) MILITARY MARCH UP aND HOLD

JACK: (OFF HIKE) Better knock off now, Ethel. Sounds like the parade

is on.

ETHEL: (VOICE RAISED A LITTLE) Yes, they've got the last truck through.

TED: (FADING IN EXCITEDLY) Hey, MomI Hoy, dadl I've dumped my load.

Can't we go over and watch the doings— I want to soe 'em march.

JACK: (FADING ON HIKE) Why, yes, I suppose so--

ETHEL: Como on, Jack. Let's watch too.

TED: I'm going on ahead. Right over there on that knoll. I can soo

from there 1

ETHEL: All right. Take a good look, son. That's the outfit you want to join,— the engineers.

TED: (FnDING) Come on as quick as you can I

JACK: Well, Ethel, we've done -it again,—just like you said we could.

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ETHEL: (LAUGHING DEPRECaTIUGLY) Sure, but— (PAUSE) Jack,— I wish you wouldn’t say it like that,.

JACK: Come on, let's go over— (PAUSE) Like what?

ETHEL: Oh,I don't know. Only somehow-- when we've done a job— a good job and you don't seem to get any satisfaction out of it— Well -- well,— it gets me. That's all.

JACK: Yeh* Me too. (PAUSE) Say, look how that gun shed is camouflaged* Can't hardly see it at all.

MUSIC: UP LOUDER BUT NOT ON MIKE

ETHEL: Yeh. These engineers are clever. (FAUSE) Jack—

JACK: Music's getting louder. We must be getting close to the parade grounds.

ETHEL: Jack— (HESITATINGLY) Jack, you don't like me in the business, do you?

JACK: (LAUGHING BITTERLY) Well, you don't like me in it either, so what?

ETHEL: I don't know what, only— there ought to be some way—

JACK-: Forget it. We're in this together and we've got to see it through. Life's that way. You get into something that looks easy, and then you discover it's bigger'n you are.

ETHEL: Here, let's wait hero, I think they come up over that rise and march down across hero. (PAUSE) Yes,4somethings are bigger than we are, but some things — Well, some things are so big and so wonderful you don't mind being lost in thorn.

JACK: (BITTERLY) Like what,-- marriage, or the construction business?

ETHEL: Look, they're all marching down below that little hill and— my goodness, there are hundreds of themi

JACK: Suckers 1 Parading around here in the rain when they don't have to!

ETHEL: (CHUCKLING) I suppose you hud to come out here and work in the rain?

JACK; I guess you're right. It's what we feel inside makes us do things.

ETHEL: Olive drab uniforms, brown shoes, greenish gray rain coats-- Why Jack, they're like a walking forest— a mountain moving forward in the rain!

JACK: (jsAUGHING NATURALLY) Well, they say the engineers can move

mountains or knock down forest—

ETHEL: Look over there. That must be the colonel

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,— the one with all those officers around him. And there's the flag-- No, they're casing it until the rain stops.

MUSIC: UP AND IN CLOSER MILITARY ?(ARCH

TED: (FADING I1t) Gosh, isn't it exciting, Mom?

ETHEL: It's wonderful, son. I'll be proud when you can march with them.

TED: Can't I cnlistAMom? Why can't I?

ETHEL: (A LITTLE WEARILY) Ask your father, Ted. He thinks I nocd men

in this business.

TED: Hoy, Dad,-- can I— Well, what on earth's the matter with you?

You look like---

JACK: A construction engineer, I hope.

TED: O-kay, o-kay. I just thought—

ETHEL: THE colonel has taken his place, sec? And there comes the band up over that rise.

MUSIC: MILITARY QjARCH LOUDER

TED: Yoh. Funny Row their heads come first. (PAUSE) Gosh, they look

serious I

JACK: Fighting is serious business, son.

ETHEL: And tho engineers arc soldiers and they fight too. Don't forgot that.

MUSIC:__UP LOUDER THEN FADE TO DISTANCE UNDERTALK AS IF PASSING AND HOLD

AS BACKGROUND

JACK: There comes the first ones,-tho first company, I guess.

ETHEL: Right up out of tho earth! Why, it's uncanny!

TED: (AWED) Gosh! Look, -- like green ghosts rising out of the grass

ETHEL: Why, that khaki and brownish green makes them a part of the earth!

JACK: It sure does. And look at those feet,-- hundreds of them moving

together,— but not a sound on this wet grass!

ETHEL: Like a many-footed monster, born-of the earth and moving across it.

JACK: Yeh, and sinking down into it again. A lot of those fellows will

die in that brown-green uniform'.

ETHEL: (DEEPLY MOVED) -Yes,-- they'll die in it, and gladly,— for it's

part of something so big and so grand, something so universal, that

■ mon move together as one man.to. live for'it or to die for it. I think that's what they're trying to tell tho Coionol.

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JACK: You mean-—freedom?

ETHEL: I mean all the things that flag stands for. See, they're unfurling it now. (PAUSE) When all the green-brown mon have magically slipped back into the earth they sprang from, the flag will still be waving-- the symbol of all the things free mon love.

JACK: (AFTER BRIEF PAUSE AND WITH DEEP FEELING) Ethel,-- I want to go with them.

ETHEL: (SOFTLY) I knew y^u did! I knew it all the time. That's why I got you out here!

JACK: (RUEFULLY) Shoving again, eh? Gentle,— like a bull-dozer!

ETHEL: Oh Jack, pleasel Don't spoil it. Don't break the spell! Let's live by this green-brown magic until the war is over.

JACK: But our business—

ETHEL: I can run it! I'll get contracts. Why, I'll sign up every—

JACK: Hold on,—■ before you wear that pen out signing contracts, suppose you let me and Ted use it on the dotted line that reads, "Application for Enlistment in the United States ArmyJ"

MUSIC: UP AND OUT

ANNCR: You men up to forty-five, you too can sign on the dotted line that means active service with the army if you are qualified as a demolition expert, a construction foreman, a bridge builder, water supply expert, or as any of the numerous technicians required by the United States Army Engineers. If it's action, real action, you want, enlist now,. The Engineers are fighters as well as builders. Inquire at 323 Main Post Office, or phone Atwater 6171 for particulars. (PAUSE) Listen again next Monday night at ten forty-five over this station when you will again hear

SOUND: TELEPHONE BELL J.ND RECEIVER LIFTED FROM HOOK

BILL: Army Recruiting Service. Sergeant Harris speaking.

ANNCR: Next week KOIN will present another in this series of Soldiers of the Air. Tonight's program was written by Claire Warner Churchill of the Oregon Writers' Project of the Work Projects Administration, Harrison E* Devereaux, State Administrator, and produced by members of the Portland Civic Theatre, The cast included:

MUSIC: THEME UP AND OUT