Earl Evans
WWII Veteran and Local Business Man
Growing up with hardship hasn’t deterred Earl Evans from achieving his
goals. Losing his parents at an early age, growing up without his siblings,
and surviving the Depression made him understand the value of hard work
and service. Serving in the army was an exciting adventure for Earl, and
it allowed him to come into contact with interesting people, such as President
Roosevelt. Although he didn’t get to fight, he was able to put his baking
skills to the test and cook for his entire unit. After retiring from the
baking industry, he opened his own successful Pittsburg business and continued
to provide for his family while contributing to Pittsburg’s economy.
I was born [in] 1924 on the farm north of Oswego, Kansas. It’s southeast Kansas right here, just not too far from Pittsburg. My mother and father both died when I was a year old. My mother died with childbirth, and my father died with pneumonia; and I’m sure he went out on a big walk. Relatives told me they found him. By then it was wintertime, and that’s what happened to him. I never lived a day with my brothers or my sisters, and they all went separate ways. Two brothers went with uncles that had big farms near Oswego, another brother went to Coffeyville, and my sisters went to Parsons. I was [lived] with my grandpa. Later, I was gave away to a farm family, and I worked on this farm; and like I always said, I had to hoe cockaburrs or I didn’t get to eat supper that night. We growed a lot of corn. We had wheat, of course, oats [and] we raised our own seed for the cattle and like that. When I lived on the farm there, there was about three of us young guys. I think two of them was relation to Nick--that was the guy who I lived on the farm with, Nick Jones. But uh, yeah, they were nephews and I was no blood relation; but I knew them all. I can remember those guys how they would fudge on the work, y’know. Then old Earl had to come along and do their work; but we had cows to milk and cows to get in. We had a lot of hogs. We sold the hogs out, I don’t think we did much killing on the farm there. But, uh, they were tough years, back those days.
The first fish I caught I was a little guy, and I was so excited. I couldn’t get it off the hook so I run with pole, line, hook, fish all the way back to the house which is about a mile. The lady of the house she thought that was funniest thing she ever heard of. The lady of the house would always keep me in [on] a Tuesday for her wash day ‘cause the wash machine was hand operated. I didn’t mind doing it. She always kept me in, and I’d stay in and do the washing for her on this old fashioned tub. The missus was always a good cook. It seems like we always had something to eat out there. Later, [though], in Parsons, [we] got off the farm. If we had a couple of potatoes we could boil [them], and put a little salt and pepper on them. That was dinner. I lived with them till I was about fifteen; and then I run away, and I got me a job in a grocery store, and then I got a job in a bakery.
I finally bought myself a bicycle, I can’t tell you how young I was, but I got one. I paid about two dollars and fifty cents for it, and it was the most beat up bicycle that you ever can imagine. But anyway, I got me a paper route off of that deal ‘cause I had a bicycle. It was [an] all evening paper, the Parson Sun I delivered. I got so I know three or four of their routes, that way I’d keep busy. [I’d] get there; and if someone didn’t show up, why I could go throw that route.
[In high school] we played football, softball, [and] I used to play a little tennis in my day. I never was good enough to be on ‘ole number one, but I could name some names that turned out to be great—like Dale Hall, he was an All-American [football player]. Back those days ‘course, we probably had three, maybe four movie theatres; that was your entertainment, see. [It was] a nickel to a dime for the ‘ole Ritz and the Cater theatre. [We’d] probably see a double header--two movies. [It was usually a] comic and a newsreel.
I went ahead and graduated from high school in Parsons; and then right after that I waited ‘cause I was too young to get in the army, but I volunteered. The lady that took care of the draft board lived next door to me, [and] she kept me informed.
[I] finally got to go in, uh, March of ’43, and I was in a little over
four years in the army. I was all over, all over the United States, and
camps, and places. I was on Okinawa, and I spent about ten months at Okinawa.
I was on Okinawa when they dropped the bomb and that finished the war.
[If they hadn’t], we would have invaded Japan; and [with] a group like
ours, in time, that’s what we would have end up doing.
We made maybe thirty dollars a month something like that. We already got
our food, board, room, and all that [plus] clothes, so we wasn’t buyin’
any of that! When I was twenty years old, I got married and went overseas.
That made an allotment for my wife, and so I sent her home money. The
government matched, I couldn’t tell you now what the percentages was or
how much she got, but a hundred dollars was a big deal back then.
[Okinawa] was great, except we had typhoons while I was there. Winds would come as strong as 190 miles per hour see, and bend them old trees. We’d find a place to lay. That part was real exciting, I’d tell you that for sure. Our food was like, uh, sea rations they called it. In barrels, and they’d heat the barrels and put the cans in there and dip it out.
What we call the “gooks”--they were the natives of Okinawa. I think they were actually Chinese in the back heritage now, I’m not positive about that. They lived different. They lived in their groups, you know. They farmed, and they hoed, and they worked together. They didn’t have any cars or anything. They walked to whatever they had to do. I think they preferred us over the ‘Japs’ [though], ‘cause those Japanese took them in as their slaves.
In between, why I uh, done all kinds of work in the army. I was, when I was on Okinawa, the cook. The baker got sick and they asked for a volunteer; and I come out of the ranks, and I made pies and cakes for the guys. It was a lot of work. At Keelser Field [in] Biloxi, Mississippi, President Roosevelt came through and the whole camp—I don’t know how many thousands of us—paraded for Roosevelt at Keelser Field. He was on his way to Mexico, and I can’t remember--there was some kind of big meeting in Mexico. He was going to meet the foreign powers, you know. Big deal.
I got two discharges in the United States Army. They, uh, they were actually trying to get [soldiers] out of there in ‘47. I was what you called regular army; I still had three years left on my enlistment. I went back and joined the reserves. Luck would have it, I caught a terrific cold and I didn’t have to go to Korea—for the Korean War.
I got out of the army and went back to work for Sally Ann Bakery, [but] didn’t stay too long. I worked for a bakery in Joplin called Markwork, and I worked in the shop. That was good. I guess I was lucky, and the paycheck really didn’t bother me. [It was] just so I made enough to we’ll say, pay the bills. [I then] went to work for Junge Baking Company, and then the AJ Cripe Baking Company, and was there for thirty-one years. I guess [baking] was a great part of my life, ‘cause I really enjoyed the bread business. Whether I was making it, wrapping it, or selling it. I got to do it all. Our shifts back those days were from eight, to twelve, to fifteen hours shifts. We didn’t work by the hour, we worked by the week. We came to work when it started, and we didn’t go home till it was over with. Pittsburg probably had eighty or ninety grocery stores, [so] there was no hour or two of work. I went to work for Town Talk Bakery in ’51, and uh, probably made ninety dollars a week, and when I got up to a hundred, oh boy! This is to feed a family, and uh, you know, it made a big difference. We bought houses, cars, groceries. I bought a Mustang off the showroom [and] paid two thousand-three hundred dollars.
What I really enjoyed doing, back when I was real young, was running the bread wrapper, and uh, which was modern and all that. I got to teach several guys that job. Then, of course, I worked on the ovens for two or three years, and it was always tough work with those old type ovens. We had a peel oven. I don’t think you’ll find very many in the country anymore; but in the old—fifty years ago—every bakery had a peel oven. Frontenac, the Frontenac bakery, had a peel oven. They still have a peel oven, so you can go up there and take a look. It’s a paddle, and you just put a pan of bread at the end of the paddle and shove it in. It’s just a brick oven, [and] you could probably fit forty pans [of bread] in there. That’s where we baked all the sandwich bread. When I started, that’s just about when sliced bread [came about], but see the sliced bread wasn’t popular, and even when I’d run the wrapper we had to save out so many loaves of non-slice bread. There was a lot of people, [who] still wanted to buy it whole, and they sliced it themselves. [Also], hot bread right out of the oven. They liked that! [It was] twelve cents, and now it’s two dollars and fifty cents!
Things have changed, [though]. I came to a sales meeting in Pittsburg one time to Hotel Stilwell, and the buzz around the room was ‘so and so’ is making a hundred dollars. Now, this is right after World War II, so if you made fifty, sixty dollars a week you were doing good. But this guy was making one hundred dollars a week! I think our guarantee was fifty-two dollars and fifty cents. And then it was set on commission. I think that was the time Food Town came in, [so] he probably had a Food Town and Carby on his route, and [that’s how] he sold so much bread.
[My son also] spent twenty-two years in the Navy [and] he loved it. He graduated out of St. Mary’s; and the day he graduated he was already signed up and he went in the Navy. He, uh, was in Vietnam and all that kinda stuff. He’d go in and get the wounded. He was at Suvic Bay. Stationed there, and he’d take all the casualties. He was attached to the marines.
[After retirement], I bought a liquor store. I had that eighteen years, [and] I really enjoyed it. And I didn’t drink my fruit; but, uh, yeah, I enjoyed it. It was interesting. You learn how to buy, ‘course [with] everything there’s really a secret to buying; and uh, the liquor business you had to buy in volume to do any good. You know if you bought one bottle or two, you weren’t gonna do very good. You had to buy it by the cases. I wrote all the checks and cashed all the money. Yeah, that’s one thing about my son was [that he worked] with me; [but] not all the time. I never allowed anyone to handle my banking business.
I belong to the American Legion; I’m a life member. I’ve been a life member of the VFW, for--I’d have to go back and take a look, but it’s probably been thirty [years] or maybe longer. I know [I belonged to] the American Legion at this post in Pittsburg [for] thirty-four years, [and] I belonged to Parsons before that. So, I’ve been a Legion member. I believe in those guys, I think they done good, or I wouldn’t be a member. I even signed my son up as a member in the American Legion.
[The war] changed a lot of guys, everybody fought for the country. What it did to the young men of this country was it took them out of Kansas, and they woke up in California. They didn’t come back to Kansas, or vice-versa. That’s how a lot of them got to West Coast, East Coast, what have you. They would have been getting in that old tractor, [or] right down there followin’ a pair of mules, that’s true.
This interview was conducted by Braden Dunbar on December, 28, 2002.
*[] indicates words not said by Mr. Evans