falotamil.blogg.se

With a magnifying glass I could just read the sign over its door: "Garbutt Field, Townsville, Australia." Searching for clues, I dug out the box of yellowed photos and found one tiny picture of a Quonset hut. Last year I vowed to trace his footsteps. "Australia's the best place in the world - go see for yourself!" was Dad's advice to all. And a little photo of Magnetic Island's shark net was like an illustration from a science fiction yarn. Peter, the boy on a sheep station whose horse knew how to shake hands, was like a faraway cousin. His exotic tales were my bedtime stories and I knew them all word for word. Like thousands of American GIs, my father had fallen in love with Australia. When private citizen Burns came home, he brought with him a big blue book about Australia, a box of photos and a kangaroo kit bag filled with memories. base, and Americans were welcomed into Aussie hearts and homes like long-lost kin.įrom March 1943 through September 1944, my father, Pfc. Japan's advance in the South Pacific was thwarted and an enduring friendship between Yank and Aussie forged. On May 7 and 8, 1942, Japanese and American forces in the Coral Sea engaged in history's first aircraft carrier battle. In the spring of 1942, the Imperial Forces advanced on New Guinea and Australia, intending to seize the territory and use it as a springboard to conquer the South Pacific. In the early days of the war, with Australian forces in Europe, the Land Down Under was a prime target for Japan's war machine.

I'm a boomer - part of the generation born after the World War II troops came home - and I grew up on my father's tales of Australia.