November 17-20, 1974: My Only Trip to Thorp, Wisconsin
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For Christmas this year, I decided to drive home, rather than fly. That came about because Ted Hollander and I had an installation near Pittsburgh the week before Christmas, and I decided that it would be too complicated to try to fly. I didn't mind driving, so I thought I would do the whole trip in my car.

I left Chicago early Sunday morning for my drive to Pittsburgh (actually McKeesport, just to the northwest of Pittsburgh). It took me all day to drive there, but it was a pleasant drive, with all but the last few miles being expressway. I found the motel where Ted had made our reservations with no problem, and when I got there he had already arrived.

We had dinner and discussed the installation and training that we'd be doing. For the next three days, it was a normal installation, with Ted actually installing the software and making some modifications and me doing the class. As we often do, we had one dinner with the Auditor and a couple of his people. Everything went well, and on Wednesday evening I gave Ted a lift to the Pittsburgh airport and I headed on down south for Christmas.

I wanted to make a couple of stops back around Fort Lee, where I had been stationed, so I drove down through Washington and then south towards Richmond.

Just south of Fredericksburg, I pulled off I-95 onto US 1 to see if I could find the converted motel where I had lived during the summer when I was a Class B Agent at Camp A.P. Hill. This was during my stint at Fort Lee, Virginia, before I went to Korea in 1969. The motel was still there (see picture above, left), and apparently people were still using it as a residence. I can still remember watching the first moon landing in July on my small TV, and I can remember when the water well went out one day and I watched the drillers come back to redrill and repair it. The apartment I lived in was the right-hand one in the left-most building in my picture. Sharing the space with me were two other officers- Robin Orkney and Stan Trussell.

I continued down to Fort Monroe, following the directions Tim Mayfield had given me, and found him and his family living in post officer housing there at Fort Monroe. If you've been working through this album (and if the pages for 1970-71 are done, you have already met Tim and his family; he worked with me at the Finance Center at Fort Harrison after my return from Korea.

There's not a whole lot to say about the pictures I took during my visit (I stayed for two nights at a motel just off post), so let's just take a look at them:

Fort Monroe is right at Hampton Roads, where there is a large naval base. Here is a ship coming in to that harbor.

The Mayfield's daughter at the back door of their officer housing.

We had one full day to visit, as Tim and his family were leaving for Alabama and their on Christmas the next day. I recall that Tim and I went to see the movie "Earthquake" (which had just come out the previous month) that afternoon after he'd taken me on a quick tour of Fort Monroe. I had a nice supper with Tim and his wife at the Fort Monroe Officer's Mess.

Tim's officer housing is right across the street from Hampton Roads, and these are his two kids looking out over the water.

This is the front door of Tim's family's officer housing.

This is CPT Tim Mayfield, again across the street from his house looking out over the entrance to Chesapeake Bay.

Early the next morning, Tim and his family were off to Alabama in the Ford Mustang that was his pride and joy.

For my part, I headed off to continue my Christmas driving vacation.

I drove back up towards Richmond and down I-95 to Petersburg and Fort Lee. Five years after I left, I doubted there'd be anybody still there whom I knew, so I didn't stop to try to see who was still in the Finance Office there.

I continued on down to Charlotte and the house on Somerset Drive to spend some time with my Mom. Since my Dad's death, she has gotten her driver's license and drives herself to play bridge- usually with Marie Segrest. But while I was there, I was her partner a couple of times. We drove to Southpark to do some shopping for the gifts we were going to take up to Judy's house.

The day before Christmas, we drove up to Burlington to my sister's house, and spent Christmas day with her and Bob and her young childrent Ted (5 years old) and Jennifer (4 years old). It is always nice being with my sister.

Two days after Christmas I left Charlotte to head back to Chicago. It was a long drive, but I did it in one day. Now that part of I-77 is done, I can take it up to I-40 and then take that west across the Appalachians to Knoxville. There, I picked up I-75 that leads up to Lexington, KY. Then it's a short jog on I-64 over to Louisville where I can get on I-65 that goes all the way to Chicago.

This was a nice Christmas vacation, and I enjoyed seeing Tim Mayfield again.

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	November 17-20, 1974: My Only Trip to Thorp, Wisconsin
	Return to Index for 1974