Eyewitness to J. Edgar Hoover's Fbi: A Memoir of What and Who Made It Possible for Me to Be There and Stay for Thirty Years

By Richard C. Coffman

The book is a memoir of youth experiences and acquaintances that made it possible to become a Special Agent of the FBI. The book includes accounts of my training and experiences in the Bureau from 1950-80. Described are significant personages that were fundamental to develop the maturity and philosophy necessary to pursue successfully my career. There is an in depth description of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and his Associate Director Clyde Tolson and the FBI they created. The memoir closes with my assessment of the national interests of the USA.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jun 9, 2014
• ISBN: 9781493178957

Richard C. Coffman

I was a Special Agent of the FBI for thirty years, and am now retired. I have lead a most interesting life, touched upon a few fascinating historical events and have known several significant individuals who made it possible for me to have had a successful career in the FBI, and to have led a most interesting, fortunate personal life. I have out-lived all of my family except for a son, daughter, two grand daughters and a sister-in-law. A few years ago I discovered a diary kept by my terminally ill mother which covered my first fours years and her last four years. In discussing this material with a journalist friend, I was encouraged to 'do something with it'. Further encouragement and interest by a birthplace historical society and museum, and my children, led to my further research and interest to 'do something'. As WW II began to wind down, I was selected to learn spoken Japanese and assigned to Army Counter-Intelligence Corps and sent to assist General MacArthur occupy Japan. Later after commissioned as an FBI Agent, I worked in Boston and nearly a quarter of a century in Washington, D.C. and twenty years in Utah. During this time my late wife a pilot, and I raced sports cars, flew aircraft, made a movie for the FBI, raised two kids and helped to put on Air Shows in Utah. Finally, being slow learners, we looked for more hills to climb and retired to our chosen Miles City, MT., where there are few hills, but a Big Sky. I have an ex-FBI son in Santa Barbara, CA, a grand daughter who is a marine research scientist at UCLA, a daughter who is a computer guru for the Veterans Administration in Washington, D.C. and a grand daughter who is a women fashion designer in New York City. I am now a widower, and am living with a blind Maltese dog who probably knows as much as I do about what is ahead of us.

Book preview

Copyright © 2014 by Richard C. Coffman.

Library of Congress Control Number:      2014903847

ISBN:                  Hardcover                        978-1-4931-7894-0

                            Softcover                          978-1-4931-7893-3

                            eBook                               978-1-4931-7895-7

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 05/09/2014

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris LLC

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

541896

To Jeanne—for Time and Eternity.

CONTENTS

Introduction

Prologue

Chapter 1: The Diary

Chapter 2: Winifred

Chapter 3: The Baby Book

Chapter 4: The Diary Continues Albuquerque, New Mexico

Chapter 5: Sanitarium Life and Letters

Chapter 6: Hope

Chapter 7: Hope is an Island

Chapter 8: The Visits

Chapter 9: Lonesome Is My Companion

Chapter 10: The Operation

Chapter 11: The Living

Chapter 12: Grace’s Diary

Chapter 13: A Guardian Angel on My Shoulder

Chapter 14: The Son Also Rises

Chapter 15: School Days

Chapter 16: Dad and Mildred

Chapter 17: Dad

Chapter 18: Return to the Farm/Ranch

Chapter 19: Ione

Chapter 20: Uncle Tam

Chapter 21: High School

Chapter 22: Margery

Chapter 23: Thelma

Chapter 24: Cottey College

Chapter 25: Jeanne

Chapter 26: Counter Intelligence Corps

Chapter 27: Japan

Chapter 28: USA/Montana/Missouri

Chapter 29: The Wedding and University Life

Chapter 30: The FBI

Chapter 31: Boston

Chapter 32: Washington, D.C.

Chapter 33: And Then We Were Four

Chapter 34: Broomstick One—5631Z

Chapter 35: Surveillance Squad

Chapter 36: The Movie

Chapter 37: JFK

Chapter 38: Duty Agent

Chapter 39: Joe

Chapter 40: ‘The New Left’

Chapter 41: Photography

Chapter 42: Snow Showers With Occasional Raspberries

Chapter 43: Death of J. Edgar Hoover

Chapter 44: The New FBI and Salt Lake City

Chapter 45: Mrs. X

Chapter 46: Sources of Information and Intelligence

Chapter 47: Broomstick II—4216T

Chapter 48: Wendover Utah/Nevada—Home of the Enola Gay

Chapter 49: Confederate Air Force—Air Shows

Chapter 50: The Last Surveillances

Chapter 51: The Last Hurrah

Chapter 52: Civilian Again

Chapter 53: Hawaii Again

Chapter 54: From Utah to Montana

Chapter 55: Jeanne

Epilogue: The Sum of All Parts

007_a_zzz.jpg

Jean Trzcinski Coffman,—1996

INTRODUCTION

A few years ago, I discovered among my deceased father’s long stored effects three items, a diary composed by my mother, Winifred, started at the time of my birth, a Baby Book and the brief incomplete diary written by my paternal Aunt Grace (Callaway) Coffman. My mother’s diary concluded a few hours before her death at age thirty-four; My Aunt’s work was without specific dates. A museum located in the Missouri County in which I had spent the early portion of my life desired to publish an anthology of families who had lived in that County. They wanted me to contribute information relating to the members of my kin who had lived in this area. With the exception of my children, who had never lived in this area and my wife who had only gone to college in the area, all of my relatives to my knowledge were long deceased. It was obviously time to dig into old storage boxes and perhaps even do a bit of genealogy.

Finding and reading my mother’s diary was riveting and even awakened a few dim memories. It only covered the last four years of her life and most of the first four of mine. The tone and deteriorating style was poignantly compelling. I edited it into twenty pages or so and sent a copy to a journalist friend who was a successful columnist and author of several books and who lived in this county, and asked her if she thought anything of this nature was suitable for the anthology.

She immediately advised me it should be published, suggesting it be expanded either as part of an autobiography or even a novel. Expanding my twenty pages of edited material did not seem feasible for publication, and the idea of an autobiography did not appeal to me. I did not think I had a novel in me, and besides this was my mother. I consulted with my daughter. My successful, but geographically distant, lovely daughter, is a Baby Boomer whose idea of history is what you had for breakfast when it is time for lunch. Her older, also Baby Boomer brother, also distant from both of us, might not have been that time specific. I could see I was on my own.

My experiences in the military, college and in the FBI had involved quite a bit of writing dedicated to reportage, explanation and analysis of specific topics. Lastly, I could not completely disregard the complimentary responses that I had received from sundry ‘love-letters’ I had admitted to have composed.

I submitted a few paragraphs and a couple of photographs for the anthology the museum had requested; they were included in the published reference book. My late wife liked the material I had written and I must admit I felt it was OK too. This did not do a thing for my mother’s diary. I liked the work I had done, so to keep the ideas alive, I kept pecking away at it without a real direction as to where I wanted to go. However, the present always interrupts the past—that is how the present keeps from becoming the past! My wife became ill and in a few years passed away. I had to learn to cook again, and began developing an increasing appreciation of the past while trying to learn to live with the present, while trying not to think too much about the future.

To assuage grief and seek some new horizons, I enrolled in some local college writing classes, and joined a writer’s group. I read them a few passages of what I had written, and some of them were tearfully enthusiastic. I found that a memoir was more of a direction that I wished to pursue.

I fully realized that I have led an extremely fortunate and certainly satisfying life. Somehow I had made the right decisions most of the time when it counted, and had not fallen into any insurmountable chasms along the way. My mother had sacrificed her life that I might be healthy. My early schooling had been certainly interesting and largely enjoyable while learning the ‘nuts and bolts’ of what I would need to grow up. Along the way, I encountered several fascinating people that had opened up all sorts of possibilities and got me to thinking about what grown-up life was going to be like. From my father I learned the importance of observation, integrity and honor, and loyalty when deserved. He told me that often just keeping your mouth shut and listening worked wonders; however, you had to work hard at it. And, being something of a pessimist, he often liked to explain to me that water flowed down hill, and that people and events likewise tended to follow the ‘line of least resistance’. This latter characteristic gave him the ability, in the long term, to make some amazingly accurate futuristic predictions. From my Uncle Tam I learned that the real world had me surrounded, and that the study and understanding of people I encountered could make it just possible to cope with my surroundings. He also insisted that no matter how much thunder and lightning, or how low and how dark the clouds, I must remember that the rain always stopped. My Aunt Grace insisted I learn to observe basic hygiene, She showed me that your mind was your strongest and most sensitive muscle. She also stated that compassion should be a goal in life, but that the road there could be a lonely one. There was my ex-teacher Step-Mother Mildred who spun the virtual globe of the world before me, and dared me to close my eyes and stop its spinning with my finger; she then conceded it would be OK, when I opened my eyes, if I moved my finger some, provided I laughed now and then. She also showed me it was all right to have an attitude, provided you did not hit people over the head with it.

Crazy little Ione showed me that working with folks was often like a tough steak, just keep chewing because it is the taste and nourishment that counts; besides if it is your pony, just shut up and ride. Sweet Margery presented me with my graduation exam for entry into adulthood; she gave me the ability to appreciate, to recognize and to truly love and to become completely devoted to the most wonderful and most important person I was ever to know, my wife Jeanne. Lastly, Mr. Hoover gave me the opportunity to have and enjoy it all. Along the way, he let me encounter some folks with long memories, folks who did not like me, or my Nation. I learned that if I lifted up their rocks now and again, I could at least make them uncomfortable, and perhaps prevent some of them from escaping into the general population.

The following is a compilation of the above findings and memories. I never kept diaries, Mr. Hoover would not approve for one thing, but in old boxes, I found an amazing amount of old letters, photos, high school stuff, annual yearbooks, and the car and aircraft logbooks. These items provided me with a few dates and jogged some memorable and significant memories. I had always found people, books and things fascinating, so as I poured over these ‘artifacts’, memories came flooding back. I have kept my tale in rough chronological order, but often jump ahead in time when the flow of the narrative relates to a later event. I used dates in time as best I could but usually specifics were not available to me.

I have disguised and changed a few names to protect, or save from embarrassing, folks or their heirs who may still be around and prefer not be remembered in certain escapades that were no doubt, falsely of course, attributed to me. I talk about a couple of my FBI informants but their identities and significant portions of their work are completely submerged. The Statute of Limitations has run anyway. The FBI stuff I speak of is now public information one way or another. I do not speak for the FBI. The FBI I knew, to my knowledge, is not the FBI of today. Today’s FBI is vastly different from the one I served. The current core Special Agents, despite some of their leadership, would most likely meet with Director Hoover’s grudging approval; however, he would be vehemently appalled at the present efforts to politicize again the Bureau as an organization. As my old CIA liaison Buddy used to day, ‘We’ll see’.

I do know this: Mr. Hoover and his number two man, Clyde Tolson, were close associates and friends. In Washington, D.C. (WDC), close friends are very, very rare. Further, close friends in WDC are only in sets of two, never three. My old Boss President Reagan said that if you wanted a friend in WDC, you should get a dog. Truer words never spoken.

I was not a personal acquaintance of Director Hoover. I met with him a few times, and only professionally. However, I had two separate relationships that provided me a great deal of information as to the sort of person he was, and an in-depth insight into his activities and habits.

The first, and which extended over almost a decade, occurred when assigned to the Soviet surveillance squad. Part of the responsibilities of this group was to provide for at least two Agents to break off from the surveillance group and then were assigned to a program code-named, "Hoowatch’. This was a 24-hour shift-work assignment 24/7. A semi-secret program that had originated because of the serious death threats made against Director Hoover by various criminal elements, and a certain foreign intelligence organization of a powerful foreign nation that hoped to revolutionize the US. This assignment meant that FBI Agents were to be within very short moments of the person or specific location of Mr. Hoover should such FBI attention be necessary. This meant Hoover was followed from the Office at the end of his day, to meals, meetings, visits, horse races, (his hobby), and to his residence. The midnight to eight AM; the day shifts took him back to his Office or wherever. It was a semi-official assignment, as Mr. Hoover was not cut-in on the program. It was a dreaded assignment and only experienced Agents were assigned. If Mr. Hoover ‘made the tail’, most likely your next day’s assignment would find you in Miss. Gandy’s office at 10:30 AM, waiting outside Mr. Hoover’s office for a personal interview. Miss Gandy was Director Hoover’s executive Assistant and Personal Secretary. It would have been a logical move to have earlier that morning instructed you wife that while packing your things to be sure and include winter clothing, for you were likely to be soon working Indian cases out of the Butte, MT Office.

Somewhat later, I car-pooled with a senior Bureau Official whose office was about three doors down the pecking order from Director Hoover’s Office. (This Agent known in the car-pool as Mr. B was Special Agent Bernard Suttler. Mr. B had been one of the Agents who accompanied Director Hoover in the 1930s when Hoover had personally arrested Alvin Karpis in Louisiana.) Mr. B’s duties were varied and included that he assure any and all communications that went into and out from Hoover’s Office were absolutely perfect, correct and clean of any misinformation. If there were ever to be any questions, he was to have and to furnish the answers—Now. Mr. B of course had daily contact with Miss Gandy; that is not to say they were on a first name basis. Miss Gandy did not have a first name; she was Miss Gandy. She had always worked for Mr. Hoover. She personally managed his files, personal affairs and paid his personal bills, etc. To my knowledge, she had no Bureau associates or casual friends. Contact with her was to be formal: You were not expected to bow, at least physically, but do not waste her time with chitchat. When contacting her and to receive even the vestige of a smile from her was about the best thing that was going to happen to you all week. I do not know, but I expect she received the same Bureau protective services, as did Mr. Hoover and Mr. Tolson. She, Hoover and Clyde Tolson, Hoover’s number two man, ran the FBI from at least about 1930 until Mr. Hoover’s death in 1972. She passed away recently and it was only then that I learned she had a family. She was a very nice, extremely capable and very proper Lady. An ice cube would not melt in her hand.

My associate and carpool friend, ‘Mr. B’, reported to Cartha D. DeLoach, an assignment privy to most top-level information and activities of the day-by-day FBI. Mr. De Loach was Deputy Director, ranking as the number three authority in the FBI, under Mr. Tolson and Director Hoover. (Mr. DeLoach had personally selected and assigned me, and an associate, to make an in-house highly classified training movie for use at the FBI Academy). After retirement, Mr. DeLoach authored, ‘Hoover’s FBI: The Inside Story by Hoover’s Lieutenant’. After DeLoach’s retirement he was twice offered the Directorship of the FBI, once by an Attorney General and later by a President. He chose to remain in corporate life, as a Vice President of Pepsi Cola, probably because he could not afford the pay-cut as he had a large family to provide for and to educate. May he R.I.P.

Mr. Hoover was involved in one way or another in many sensitive investigations and Governmental matters. He was an extremely able man, but he did need assistance in some areas and that assistance had to be dependable. Clyde Tolson became a Special Agent in the late 1920s and had informed Hoover he could only stay in the FBI a short time as he had other interests that would be a priority over continuing in the FBI. Hoover appreciated Tolson’s candor, however he found that Tolson’s work in those turbulent times for the FBI to be peerless. As Tolson took on more and more responsibility, his performances were priceless to the FBI. His instincts were right on the mark. Hoover worked with a very high bar, and Tolson cleared it consistently. His instincts, flawless performance and selfless ambitions for the FBI and personal sacrifices in the performance of his duties led Hoover to persuade him to stay on. Tolson was essentially Hoover’s alter ego. Both men led an ascetic life whose guiding interest was the FBI. These characteristics are to my knowledge unheard of among Government employees and officials outside of the FBI.

Clyde Tolson had the same professional and personal characteristics as did Hoover. As had Hoover, he brought these characteristics to the job. Like Hoover, he was not personally ambitious; he only wanted to see that the FBI became the supreme law enforcement organization of the land. He wanted its reputation to be beyond reproach, its effectiveness without question. He was confident that he could work with Hoover to achieve these goals. Like Hoover, he was a 19th Century person. Personal standards then taught to be high. Life not expected to be easy. Pleasure came from the satisfaction of success. Accepting responsibility was the fiber of their job; their job was the FBI. Both were highly intelligent and had analytical minds and when a decision made between the good of the FBI and the man, the FBI came first, but the man must be judged fairly according to this code. This attitude was not conducive to developing office friendships. Men of this caliber were rare, and took long development. Hoover and Tolson learned in the 1930s that it was not wise to have semi-social contacts with lower ranking FBI executives. Some who were prone to sometimes take advantage of these contacts for personal prestige, or advancement. Hoover and Tolson did not have this problem; the FBI came first. If Tolson should do something that harmed or reflected badly on the FBI, he knew he was out. If Hoover screwed up he would put in his resignation immediately, and Tolson would remain until replaced.

This sounds quite old fashioned; it was, but it worked. They did relax. They usually lunched and dined together; in these ex-official activities, there was no office talk, as the area was not usually secure. Sometimes they discussed their hobbies of horse racing or boxing. When they both vacationed at the same time for a few days, they usually attended one of the major horse-racing or boxing events. They went to the ‘two dollar’ window to place their bets. In their youth I recall hearing they played tennis with each other. They lounged; they read while on patios. They took photos of each other with non-Bureau amateurish type cameras. They had separate hotel rooms. Rumored, on good authority, that Tolson snored. You will not hear from me if Mr. Hoover was so afflicted.

They also visited or vacationed with a few friends outside the Bureau, such as Clint Murchison and Sid Richardson. They spent minor social or luncheon contacts with Jack Warner or Walter Winchell, and occasionally with a few senior members of Congress, such as the long-time senior Senator from Montana, Senator Mansfield.

From the Forties through the early Seventies there was a ‘news’ columnist whose forte was finding something that reflected badly on the National Government, its officials and National politicians: Drew Pearson. Pearson had ‘moles’ planted everywhere. Our moles told us he had a permanent small staff whose assignment was to target the FBI and Hoover. In the late 1960s, Pearson and Anthony Summers, an author of ill repute, cultivated a convicted prostitute. They publicized the woman going public with the information that she had seen Hoover cross-dressing at a ‘party’.

Mr. Hoover and Mr. Tolson did not attend ‘parties’. They both liked occasionally to sip a bit of Jack Daniels during their relaxation, and were adverse to a possible photograph made of such an occurrence, which they felt could be made to reflect badly on the FBI. She passed away in the late 1960s or early 1970s. Pearson and other especially leftish news folks as soon as Hoover was deceased, and Tolson was in extremely ill health, saw to it that Hoover and Tolson’s lifestyles placed side-by-side with the ‘cross-dressing’ account. The popular culture of the day, and of course today, cannot conceive of the ascetic lifestyle led by Hoover and Tolson. Anthony Summers, a disreputable author, after Mr. Hoover’s death spread factually false and unfounded allegations about Hoover’s and Tolson’s lifestyles. This thoroughly brought out and factually refuted in Mr. DeLoach’s book.

After Hoover’s death, accounts surfaced that during his tenure, ‘Black Bag Jobs" were performed on some Soviet and Iron Curtain country’s facilities and personalities. Much noise was made about these activities: The FBI had snuck in the backdoor of these facilities, without asking permission and had read or stolen the codes used by that entity to report to the Kremlin and other foreign intelligence services on the designs of our military equipment!

How awful.

Such ‘awful’ methods and other difficult and dangerous activities by the FBI made it possible in early 1940-41 for Mr. Hoover to inform FDR that the Japanese were conducting naval exercise of methods to bomb shallow harbors such as Pearl Harbor. FDR chose to ignore the information. The FBI broke up the spy ring that made it possible for the courts to get convictions of many of those involved in stealing Atom Bomb secrets and giving them to the Soviets in the 1940s. Stalin knew we were making the bomb before Vice President Truman did when he became President following FDR’s death.

Mr. Hoover and Tolson saw the potential and place of the FBI in the US Government.

They were adamant that the FBI was not to become, or be thought of, as a ‘National Police Force’. They were not ambitious for position; they wanted to make something that had not been done before.

What they made was unique and became world famous. They saw an opportunity and a challenge that intrigued them.

Richard C. Coffman January 2014

WINIFRED’S

LEGACY

An Angel on My Shoulder

PROLOGUE

It is told on good authority that long, long ago when GOD informed St. Peter that it was time for little Richard to be born. St. Pete opened his Book of Lives to Richard’s page and scanned it from top to bottom.

St. Peter turned to GOD and remarked, Father, this one is going to need a lot of work. You made his body just about perfect, but this Free Will part you insisted on throwing in appears to me to be a little wiggly on this one.

GOD drew a deep breath while sprinkling a little wet blowing snow on Southeastern Montana and replied, I know, I have had some concerns about his father and uncle from time to time. So give little Richard a fresh, eager Guardian Angel; one that understands this individual Freedom, and who can encourage sensitivity, understanding and re-enforce a sense of responsibility to perhaps better guide him along the paths I have laid out for him. Getting him to work hard though is going to be a problem. You should assign Winifred to him. She will be available soon, she will enjoy the challenge.

St. Peter made the appropriate entry into the book and smiled to himself as he noted GOD had done all of this without using any thunder and lightning. Amen.

CHAPTER 1

The Diary

When little son was twenty-eight months old, I took sick. Dr. Brown says that I have tuberculosis; he seems puzzled, however, with this diagnosis, as it has been over seven years since I worked as a nurse at a TB hospital. However, as I recall, several of father’s old army Buddies had developed the disease, long after they were out of the army.

On the day after I first began hemorrhaging, Dr. Brown made another house call to bring me new medication and examine me again. He brought with him another doctor, Dr. Yates I think, and Dr. Brown’s nurse, Miss Woodfill. After both doctors had made their examinations, they went out into the hall where they talked and made notations in my chart.

Exhausted I lay back in our bed and watched the low dark clouds scuttling before the gusting west wind. The only sounds were the rattling of the shutters against the house, random wind gusts shifting of the windows in their frames. Soon Miss Woodfill, who had been my son’s nurse, came in with my new medication and announced that she was going to give me a back-rub and bed bath. She was so gentle and I was so tired, I certainly had no objection to that. After administrating the medication, which she noted into my chart laid on the chair beside my bed, she rolled me over for the rub. I could read on the chart one word in Dr.Brown’s handwriting: Terminal.

I am so scared, Whatever will become of my baby? Will he get sick too? Will Curt? Oh God, help us please!

CHAPTER 2

Winifred

We do not know of Winifred’s youth now. The dreams and memories of her girlhood have faded into the shadows of time. Her known contemporaries have joined her in peace and spirit. I hope her spirit will look with favor and perhaps some satisfaction upon this effort to mark her memory in time and to register the appreciation of her by those she left behind.

Also left behind were a few crisping pages and some fading snapshots of physically frozen moments of her life. These moments and notes of hers were long stored away and only recently found for our review and contemplation. Of her early years, we know little. As of 1919, she, and her younger, sister Helen were teachers and living at home with their father Joseph Harrison Smith on his farm near Coal, MO. From some of the snapshots we see a young woman nearly grown, on the threshold of life. Ironically, the earliest portrait photograph is a graduation photograph upon the completion of nursing school as a Registered Nurse; the profession she has chosen that will soon take her life away. That is in her future; the next frozen moments show her, happy back visiting on her father’s large farm: first clowning in her mother’s clothes, then wearing the current Victorian fashionable, Dress up for the city life. From these we can vision this young nineteenth century woman confident in her future and ready for whatever fate awaits her.

Among her yellowing papers we learn that she was one of ten surviving children, next to the youngest, born to parents who early had sacrificed all but their lives in a devastating ‘War Between the States’. Her father, Joseph Harrison Smith, born in 1845 in Patrick County, Virginia enlisted in the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, Headquarters Company A, Third Virginia in 1961, and who served under Generals Robert E. Lee and James Longstreet. He was the son of Foulks G. Smith and Mary Ann (Handy) Smith, both said to be of old Virginia families. Foulks said to be of English extraction and Mary Ann said to be of German descent. Winifred’s father had ten children, six daughters and four sons. As of 1919 three of the daughters were deceased, one brother killed while serving in the Confederate Army. Her father’s home in Patrick County Virginia had been destroyed by the war, and he had in 1866, emigrated to Central Missouri and acquired a homestead in west central Leesville Township near Coal, Mo. In 1869, he married Winifred’s mother, Frances Helen (Nichols-Parks), a widow also a war emigrant, but born in 1854 in Henry County, MO.

Winifred’s oldest brother, Hugh A. Smith, became a professor and was Head of Romance Languages Department at the University of Wisconsin; he had studied at Harvard University and held Masters and Doctorate degrees. Two of the older brothers became successful farmers; a brother had attended the University of Missouri but died at a young age. Two older sisters married businessmen, another had married a professor. All of the siblings had at least a high school education. All of the sisters had at one time taught school. Her younger sister (Helen) married a professional US Army officer.

We learn that a major influence to this family was the established and growing Presbyterian community in which their farm was located. Throughout the personal papers of Winifred’s we see that she felt secure and comfortable in her faith. It would appear that this and the daily observation in this community of the human suffering from the inadequate medical facilities made common by the frontier environment, and of the ravages of ill health brought upon both veterans and victims of the recent War Between the States, might have inspired Winifred’s decision to become a nurse.

Suddenly our next moment of Winifred shows that she is married. We learn from her that the marriage is solid and satisfying. Her young husband, Marvin Curtis Coffman, born1890, at Walker, MO, she fondly called ‘Curt’. Curt, is devoted and attentive and is providing her with closely held love and comforting security. They appear to be genuinely good, friends and comfortable in enjoying each other’s company. Curt, a World War I veteran, now is an accountant with the Missouri Pacific Railroad. He had started employment with that railroad at age seventeen. This employment provided them free basic transportation on any of the major railroads. They take trips by Pullman cars and coaches to the South, the East, Texas, and to the Gulf of Mexico areas. There is a brief account of her accompanying him on a business trip to Laramie, WY. She and her husband make their home in a newly built house of Carthage Stone masonry construction, which Curt, his brother Tam and their father, Luther had built shortly after the close of World War I. (This house cost about $2500.00 to construct!) It is within walking distance of the bustling, prosperous city-square of Nevada, MO. Curt’s office is on Cherry Street and across the street to the East from the Mitchell Hotel and Moore’s Department Store, and is within walking distance of their home and the city square. They have a small circle of good friends and they attend various social functions in the area. Winifred is now a stay-at-home housewife, having permanently retired from her nursing career at local hospitals and sanitariums. They have a new 1925 Essex automobile, a black, closed two-door touring sedan that has a heater, an electric windshield wiper and windows that roll up and down. About four years into their marriage, they have a son. Winifred begins a baby-book and a diary with the advent of his birth. She notes as follows.

CHAPTER 3

The Baby Book

When my baby was born, he was such a beautiful, wonderful baby. Of course, when Dr. Brown first brought him to me, he was all red and wrinkled. Boy could he yell! He was not happy with his new environment at all. I soon took care of that, and he has been the perfect baby ever since. He even wiggled out of his wrinkles very quickly! Curt’s father, Luther and mother, Fannie (Francis Elizabeth Torbert) Coffman, passed away several years ago; I so wish they had lived to see their wonderful grandson. I am sure they would have been as pleased and proud of him as Curt and I are.

After Curt first held and examined him he said to me as he handed our son back to me, He’s perfect right down to the crooked little fingers like you have. At least he won’t be a piano player! Then I remembered telling my sweet husband once that I had such an inward curve to my little fingers that my mother and older sisters had given up on teaching me to play the piano correctly—I couldn’t reach octave keys. Curt has the same low opinion of musicians and billiard players in general as he does of drunks. I am fortunate though; he likes dancing, which is good, for he could not carry a tune in a basket.

My sweet baby’s nurse said he weighed seven pounds even and was just about twenty inches long at birth. Dr. Brown said he looks like he will be a healthy, tall one when he grows up. Uncle Tam, Luther Talmadge Coffman, born 1887, near Lone Jack, MO, Curt’s older brother, agrees.

Tam seemed impressed that my baby was born at 12:20PM: Just in time for lunch. Tam and his wife, Grace, (Callaway) keep saying that my baby is the most beautiful baby they have ever seen. I am so pained to watch Grace as she holds him so tenderly and lovingly, her two children had died in infancy. Grace is such a strong woman you would never know the pain she must feel, even though her children’s deaths were several years ago. My mother lost an infant; she never spoke of it. I only learned of it through my oldest sister. I am so glad and fortunate that my baby is strong and healthy. I can’t imagine the anguish of losing your newborn baby.

Tam is so considerate of her that I expect he was a great help to her. I so wish my mother had lived longer and could see my beautiful baby. She so loved children, which is fortunate since she had eleven. Our minister was our baby’s last visitor today, and the date is set for my baby’s christening. Because our minister’s schedule accommodates his traveling around to other churches, the christening is going to be late. I hope it will not be cold and windy, like the day he was born. We are going to name him Richard Curtis. I picked ‘Curtis’, which is a family, name, and together we chose Richard.

A Few Weeks Later

Dr. Brown says my baby is gaining weight nicely now and is doing fine in all respects. He says that it will be OK for Curt and me to take him to see my father. Father’s farm is near Coal, MO which is near Clinton, so we will take the train most of the way for the visit. Tam and Grace are going to go with us on the train, as it would be quicker and more comfortable than if they drove. Curt, Grace and I love trains; Tam says that he got enough of trains when he was in France during the War to End All Wars. He admits however, that American coaches and Pullmans with their soft upholstered seats, steam heat and drinking fountains were big improvements over the French ‘cars’ that the army rode in. Those ‘cars’, were actually box cars, and were labeled on the outside,"40 Homnes—8 Cheviot (I’m not too sure about the spelling, but it meant that the cars could carry forty men or eight horses!).

The coach we were in wasn’t crowded, so Curt selected seats for us in the middle of the car, as this is the most comfortable portion of the coach to ride in. It doesn’t get as much of the little side-to-side jerking that you feel on either end of the coach. Curt also made sure all of the windows closed tightly, so little Curtis would not get a cinder in his eye. Every time the Conductor would come through the coach he would make admiring little ‘baby noises’ at little Curtis who would usually smile back at him. I am glad the Conductor was considerate enough not to try to shake hands with our baby, as the Conductor appeared to have a pound or two of ground-in coal and soot on his own hands.

Just after we boarded the train, they changed locomotives and connected other cars to our train. Curtis would react with a little jump or jerk whenever the connecting cars would bang together, making a loud noise and a jerk following the connection. His eyes would get big as saucers, however not a peep out of him. The sudden whistles from the engine didn’t faze him—I expect he was used to hearing that noise at home as we lived not far from the depot and switching yards. Once we got moving, he settled down for a nap. The rhythmic clicking of the wheels on the rails and the gentle swaying of the coach makes it very easy to fall asleep on a train.

My brother-in-law, Ralph Lionberger, met our train in his large blue touring car and took us to my old home. My home there was just the same, but it seemed ages since I had been there. It seemed so empty though without my mother. As usual, however some of my brothers and sisters with some of their families were there. They live not too far away and often visit my father, so I knew they had come to see my baby. My father seems to have aged some since I left and appears frail and to move with more deliberation than when I lived at home. However, he is very alert and closely interested in the matters of the farm and the community; he is able to do quite a bit of the lighter work around the place. He also still attends the old veteran’s re-unions around the area. He says the ‘Blues and the Grays’ mainly like to get together and continue telling big lies to each other. It is so amazing to me how they seem to care about and respect each other now, when once not so long ago they were so vicious and hateful to each other and their respective causes. I can hardly imagine these old men so gentle and caring to their grandchildren now, when it was not so long ago that they had once set out to eagerly kill their enemy, especially when they knew that enemy might very well contain members of their own families.

My father and Tam hit it off right away, as they both were true horse lovers. Tam took great delight in the telling my father of the blooded harness-racing trotter he used to have; how the horse was descended from the record holding trotter, Red Major. My father would tell Tam of the fine Thoroughbreds that were descended from some of the fine horseflesh that his and my mother’s families had had before the war. They both expressed great sorrow in seeing battlefields strewn with dead horses during their respective wars. Both observed that perhaps the one good trend in modern warfare was the advancement of mechanical ‘beasts-of-burden’, and the phasing out of the use of horses in modern wars. Tam lightened the mood by telling how he had joined the army to get into the cavalry, but ended up in the Quartermaster Corps in charge of a bunch of kitchens. (I noted that he left out the part Curt had told me of his getting a battlefield commission that took him from the front lines, and into kitchens to the rear of the fiercest fighting. Of course, my father neglected to mention his award of the Confederate Cross of Honor by General Lee. [Curt readily laughs that he fought The Great War peeling potatoes and trying to learn telegraphy!]) Tam knowing we Scots are not enamored of the French, took great delight in explaining to my father that the French loved to eat horsemeat. My father thought this was most ridiculous, as well as sad, and that it said a great deal about why the Americans had had to save the French from the Germans.

My Curt and my father have little in common although they seem to hold mutual respect for each other. Father is impressed that Curt is Doing well in this ‘new age’, and is working with a big, substantial company, the Missouri Pacific Railroad. (My father and his family had not had the bad experiences with the railroads and banks that many families had had in post-Civil War Missouri.). Curt, with respect to farms is much like a fish out of water, but he does admire how my father has been able to improve and enlarge his small homestead into a large, profitable holding. Curt is like my oldest brother Hugh, who couldn’t wait to get as far away from farms as he could. I do wish Hugh could be here now as I think he and Curt would like each other quite a bit. They are far apart in formal education with respect to Literature, but Curt speaks and writes well and has a great respect for learning and education in general. Tam says Curt was very good in school, but that he had had to drop out of high school and go to work for the railroad to take care of their mother. Tam had gone into steady work right out after his elementary school graduation. Yet both can do mathematical calculations in their heads faster than most people can do such figuring on paper. Curt once showed me one of his English workbooks that contained a theme with a grade and quality that would draw the envy of more than one college graduate. Yet aside from Hugh, Grace and I are supposed to be the ‘educated’ ones in the family!

Grace and my mother would have been kindred souls. Grace has had some formal education in art and music and is quite accomplished working with oils and canvass. My mother showed me some of her early drawings and I thought they were quite good. She passed them off as of little consequence. For when the ‘babies’ came along she never seemed to have time to work on her skills further. I have done some casual drawings, but Curt likes them more than I do. Perhaps he is just being nice. I much prefer being the mama of the most beautiful, sweet baby in the whole, wide world!

My father thought little Curt’s baldhead was just right, but figured Curtis would need a haircut before he would. I swear Curtis was showing off whenever my father would hold him, Little Curt would do his best smiles and gurgles and seemed to like shaking hands with my father. Curtis also appeared fascinated with my father’s neat moustache: he would touch it with his tiny hands and fingers. I am sure he would soon get the notion of pulling on it. At least my father’s graying ‘lip ornament’ is clean and free of tobacco juice, unlike so many of his war veteran friends.

Uncle Tam made a point of telling me that when Curtis was old enough to understand that I must remember to tell him that he (little Curt) had shaken the hand that had shaken hands with General Lee. According to my father, the General had shaken hands with every man in Company A, his headquarters company, first after the battle of Gaine’s Mill and lastly at Appomattox. That is so like Tam: sentimental and romantic one minute and then the next minute, he is the ‘Hail fellow well met’ who at the first opportunity might break out into the latest song from Tin Pan Alley, or even an old favorite Southern traditional song. His rendition of such melodies as ‘My Old Kentucky Home’, ‘Jennie, With the Light Brown Hair’, or ‘Red Sails in the Sunset’ would almost make the hair on the back of your neck stand up.(Just between you and me Curtis, I think the reason your father doesn’t appreciate musicians is because his big brother is so good at music.)

My older sisters, Ida and Audrey, are also here. Jewette planned to come, but at the last minute had cancelled her trip here. My youngest sister, Helen, is too far away and couldn’t come as she is expecting any day now. Anyway, either Ida or Audrey is just about holding Curtis constantly. I hope he gets time to take a nap now and then. They carry him around telling him about everything in sight; explaining what this is or who belongs to that and so forth. But, he seems to like it this way, because as far as I can tell, he sleeps through most of the night. I get so tired that I sleep like a log from his bedtime ‘snack’ until he is ready for ‘ham and eggs’ the next morning. I admit to leaving many of the baby chores for Curt and Grace now however. Grace is such a light sleeper: Tam says she inherited the trait from her great aunt kidnapped by Indians and later rescued by Daniel Boone.

On the train back to Nevada, I think we were all talked out, at least Grace and I were. Curt and Tam went back to the Lounge or Club car for cigars. Knowing them, I am sure they found someone with whom they could discuss cattle, horses or railroading. I was so tired I slept most of the way on a couple of pillows and blankets the porter brought me. Grace cuddled Curtis who did his share of snoozing also. I awoke once when the train switched onto a siding to let a fast freight go pounding by. I saw Grace gazing at Curtis in her arms with a tiny tear starting down her cheek. I felt so sorry for her; she is such a good person. She would have curled up and died if she had known I had seen her in a weak moment.

A few months later Curt and I took Curtis to see his grandpa again to celebrate my father’s birthday. Little Curtis now crawls everywhere, has four teeth and is going to church with Curt and I. He has perfect timing by sleeping through our minister’s (often somewhat boring) sermons. We took him to his first picture show. He didn’t like that; the horses and wagons and big people appeared to him to be heading right for him. His best defense was truly loud and attention getting. Curt took him back to the theater office while I stayed to see if William S. Hart or Mary Pickford really did survive that terrible fire. Or, was it Douglas Fairbanks and Zazu Pitts and that great train wreck? I do remember his reaction however. Curt and I decided that it might be better manners if we didn’t inflict him on strangers too much for a while. We frequently visit with the Brewers and Curtis often gets to visit little Jo Anne Thomas there. When Curt leaves to go to work in the mornings my baby cries to see him go, but usually I can soon distract him from his misery with some of his toys. When nine months old Daddy bought him a ‘Kiddie Car’ and they soon became inseparable. He can say Mommy and Daddy, and does so regularly and often. We also got him a wicker baby buggy with a folding top, springs and tall wheels so he can ride comfortably when we walk down town. He loves to ride in it with the top folded down. It is also very handy whenever I have some shopping to do; with its large wheels, it is easy to maneuver up and down stairs or steps.

Curt and I made him a little ‘Bird House’ so he can ride comfortably and safely in our car when we go for a drive. He loves it, but goes to sleep soon after the car starts. Shortly after he was about nine months old, I drove him up to see Grandpa, as Curt could not make the trip this time. The trip went well, as the roads were good this time of the year, not too rough and fortunately no mud. I like making the trip on the train better though. The car is very convenient, but I do get so very tired. Curtis however, likes them both—he just likes to ride.

Shortly after our return, Curt and I and little Curtis went with the Missouri Pacific Boosters group to Branson, MO. Curtis really enjoyed that trip as he found many people to make over him and to play patty-cake with him. We also have attended many baseball games with him this summer. He is on whole milk now; I nursed him for the last time in mid-summer. He can stand-alone and can move his Kiddie Kar backwards very well when he is on a suitable surface on which it can roll easily. He really loves going to Grace and Tam’s place. He likes to toddle around in his bare feet in the cool grass and clover. The chiggers though just about eat him alive. He weighs twenty-four pounds now. Mrs. Brewer and I took him to Kansas City so we could do some shopping; he was very, very good the whole trip, but he is getting very heavy for me to carry very much. A short time after we returned, I think he had the Chicken Pox. When that was over, Mama gave him his first hair Cut.

Curtis celebrated his first birthday by climbing up onto a chair all by himself. He now has eight little teeth and one jaw tooth. His vocabulary is still close to the basics: Bye-Bye, Daddy, Burn {!}, Now, Car, Bottle and Mommy. Within a very few months however, he was asking, Where’s the ball, Where’s the car, Where’s Daddy and Here we go! and quite a few other words. It wasn’t long until he learned to get Daddy’s slippers and find the newspaper for him. He wasn’t too particular as to which day’s paper it was, so I guess he hasn’t figured out reading just yet! He regularly goes with Curt and me to the Booster’s Club when we play Pinochle there. At about eighteen months, he discovered what fun it was to ride on Tam’s dog, Nig. Nig didn’t seem to mind and would patiently wait for him to climb back on when he fell off.

Curt and I went to Appleton to see my sisters, Norma and Helen and their children. Norma’s are a few years older than Curtis and Helen’s son, Stanley. We all had a swell time, but I got so very tired. I am glad the trip was on the ‘Too-Too Train’. I think I am going to hold off on traveling for a while unless Curt can go along also.

It was shortly after this last trip that somehow little Curtis got away from me at home. I had gone upstairs for a few moments to put away some clean sheets and had left him downstairs in the parlor. When I returned he was not to be found anywhere! In near panic and since it was warm weather, I looked out on the front porch. There he was, down the steps, down the walk to the street sidewalk and charging off in the direction Curt takes to go to work. In the rain!

When Curtis was about eighteen months, I got him a little doll, and Grace and Tam got him a little Teddy Bear. He likes to rock them and sing ‘Rock-a-bye-baby’ to them. He has a little high-pitched bird-like voice; I think he inherited his musical talent from his father who can’t carry a tune with a bucket! When he isn’t rocking them, he likes to ride them around in his little red wheel-barrow. Whenever we go out, Teddy must go along, but Mommy Bear (doll) must stay home and ‘keep the house’.

We set Curtis’s first Christmas tree up out on the front porch. I decorated it with popcorn garlands, which Curtis promptly tried to eat, and a few candles. We were afraid to light the candles for more than a few minutes in fear of the whole thing catching fire. Curtis got a new bonnet, some new shoes, coveralls, a tricycle and a big red metal coupe car with wooden wheels that would turn so he could roll it. He insists on taking the coupe to bed with him. He even parks it under his chair when he eats. I am relieved I was able to talk Curt out of getting him a train for Christmas. Otherwise, it would probably have been on the dining room table and we would have to wait for the train in order to be able to pass the potatoes. We all went to the Presbyterian Church Christmas party; there was a big Christmas tree with presents for all of the children. When Curtis’s name called by Santa, he trotted down the aisle for his present, a little red drum.

I am so lucky.

Curt is so tender, thoughtful and so considerate of us both; I have the most beautiful and healthiest sweet baby there is. I am the most fortunate and happiest person in the world.

*     *     *

CHAPTER 4

The Diary Continues Albuquerque, New Mexico

I am at the St. Joseph Hospital in the tubercular sanitarium unit operated by the Sisters of Charity, a Catholic order of nuns out of Ohio. I have now been here two weeks, 18 hours and ten minutes. It seems as if it has been forever. The past weeks have been like a hazy dream of never-ending exhausting travel, doctors with beards pouring over and prodding me. Nurses wearing hooded white habits. There were their aides, young and old, scurrying about so quietly, efficiently, taking care of me, and doing the hospital chores. I have a room to myself, although there is another bed in the room, but as of now empty. I have two large windows and a door opening out onto a large porch or balcony, although they refer to it as a patio. Opposite these is a door leading out into the hallway, which is the realm of the doctors and nursing staff. The entire room is painted white, including the woodwork. The floor is what I would call terrazzo tile, also a very light color. My windows face a southwesterly direction so I get plenty of light and sunshine. I have a large end table next to the bed, which has a bright electric lighted lamp with a heavy metal base and a light colored metal-framed glass shade. It has two levels of light, one enough to get around in a darkened room and the other bright enough to read by. Everything smells somewhat of a mildly perfumed disinfectant.

The doctors tell me that they cannot let me send letters to my darlings until they have studied my condition more for fear of contamination of the letters. I have to talk to someone other than to strangers, so I will put my letters and thoughts to and of you both in my diary since that will be my closest companion here. When I am well and can come home, I will read it to you so you will know how much I think of you and how much I miss you both. Lonesome is such a cruel companion.

When I got sick, Curt took my darling baby out to Tam and Grace’s farm. Grace’s last words to me were her promising to care for little Curtis just as I would until I could come home. Further, whenever appropriate, she would take every measure to make sure that my baby understood that she was just taking care of him until his Mama got well and could come home to him. Her wet eyes assured me that you were in the best of hands. Nevertheless, I began missing you the moment we parted. All I could think, would you miss me? What must you think of your mama leaving you? Will you even remember me? You are so young, so little. You will be around those you know and love, but I won’t be there for you. I must get well soon.

Dr. Brown following his examination and upon consulting with a doctor he knew in Kansas City, informed Curt and me that he strongly recommended that I be moved to a warm, dry climate. He suggested this hospital and its associated TB sanitarium known to have had some encouraging success in treating advanced TB cases. He was also to learn of a young nun who was a nurse assigned to California from the mid-west. He and Curt arranged for this nun to travel with us to this New Mexico hospital. Curt was so desperate to get me well again, and I am so anxious to get back to my baby, that we felt this arrangement was meant to be. No wonder the Presbyterians are Calvinistic in their theology.

Curt arranged for us to have a compartment on the Santa Fe train for the travel to New Mexico, and since the Pullman car was a combination, he secured a berth for himself; therefore the nun and I could have the compartment to ourselves at night, and during the day Curt would join us in our compartment.

The young nun was very nice, quiet spoken, competent and observant. She was a good listener and kept me talking about my family, where I had grown up and even my nursing training and my rather brief career as a registered nurse. She told me a little of herself growing up in a large Catholic family and being the only girl in a family of boys. She laughed a little noting that being the ‘middle kid’ had its advantages, so she got to hold her own with a least a couple of them. Her oldest brother was a priest in Boston, her father and two of her brothers were policemen in Chicago. Just in time, I bit my tongue and did not tell her how lucky she was for a brother being a priest in Boston and for her to be out of Chicago. From some of the things Curt had told me of the goings-on in Chicago, I did not believe it would be a good place to raise a family, especially so if three of the family were policemen. I think she was the most devout person I have ever known. Her world was nursing and her Church. We each said our prayers at bedtime silently together; hers perhaps to be worthy, mine just to see my son again.

The trip was very tiring and as much as I liked train travel, I couldn’t keep my mind off of that I was very sick. At the time, it was a relief not to have to do anything but rest and watch the scenery whizzing by. The changing of trains in Kansas City had gone much better than I had feared. The nun met our Missouri Pacific train from Nevada at the Union Station in Kansas City. She had arranged with the Station and the Red Cross unit there to get me a wheelchair to ride in between trains. Curt was so solicitous for my comfort and yet so very organized. I was able to make the transfer with little or no discomfort. The doctor has warned me that I