Ventura, Oxnard, Santa Barbara, Belmont, San Luis Obispo (again)

From Mines Field, they were transferred to Ventura and then to Oxnard where they were required to perform shore patrol. It was at this point that Simon transferred from his company to a battalion. A good friend of his, Leonard Robothen (phonetic spelling), helped him get transferred which turned out to be a very good thing because the line company he was in did nothing but walk and walk. Everywhere they went they walked, unless it was over a long distance. Then the Army would load everyone on trucks and take them to a place where they had to walk some more. More important than that, at the end of the war, Simon found out just about a half a dozen of the original guys came back from the entire company.

Once transferred, he was given the opportunity to drive vehicles, something that he had wanted to do since he had joined the service. Old weapons carriers, leftovers from earlier battles, were sometimes used for shore patrol along with Jeeps. As soon as it got dark, Simon and another soldier would patrol a specified section of the Coast Highway. They would patrol from north of Santa Barbara almost to Los Angeles, Ventura, and Oxnard and then turn around and come back to base. This went on all night for 8 hours. If anyone stopped on the road or were on the beach anywhere along that section of highway, they would have to tell them to leave, because there was a curfew that started at sunset. This was all caused by a Japanese submarine that shelled an oil tank farm. It was only a 5-inch gun which wouldn’t cause too much damage, but it scared the military enough to patrol the shoreline. The Navy pursued the submarine, but it simply disappeared. Simon was certain that the sailors on that submarine were really scared and a long long way from home. Nothing was ever said about the submarine crew or whether they were able to get home safely.
(Note: That crew did make it back to Japan.)

Because he had access to vehicles, he had the opportunity to take Jeeps out on the beach and, of course, try to climb the sand dunes. He had a great time trying to turn that Jeep into a dune buggy. Of course, most of the time he couldn't get over the dunes and the Jeep would just bog down all four wheels. Little did he know that harmless play turned out to be basic training for the landing in France.

Another part of patrol duty included checking the buses coming in from all parts of the country for Japanese travelers. If there were any Japanese present, they were expected to go to internment camps, even thought they were Americans. Simon never really found out where they went, and never really realized what was happening to them until later.

While in Ventura, Simon’s family came out to see him. There were 5 people in Jim’s small Model A that traveled all the way from Nebraska to California using narrow 2-lane roads (there were no expressways or even 4-lane roads at the time). They had suitcases strapped on the fenders, the hood and on the back of the car. The car lacked hydraulic brakes – it only had mechanical brakes. It was noisy, rough riding and unpredictable, but they drove around 45 to 50 miles an hour and they made good time. It took them 3 about days to get to California.

They traveled 3 in the back and 2 up front. Coova, Uncle Gus, Nick, Katherine and Rosemarie all made the trip. Coova was (Aunt) Sadie's brother-in-law. Coova married one of the Garrino sisters and Sadie was a Garrino. Of course, at that time Nick wasn't married to Sadie, but Coova was Uncle Gus' brother-in-law, and Coova’s sons were in the service in California also. They were from the Omaha outfit and they were all in the same regiment and stationed with Simon. Uncle Gus didn't have any boys in the service because they weren't old enough.

During the trip to California, they experienced an accident that almost became a disaster. At Flagstaff, Coova was driving the car when he saw that he was about to hit a large hole and slammed on the brakes. The wheel slid into the hole, hit the other side of the hole, and cut the tire open with such force that Coova lost control and they rolled the car over. The person hurt the most was Simon’s Mom, Katherine, who had some pretty severe bruises, but she was determined to see Simon, and a few bruises weren’t going to stop her. But the lack of tires almost did stop them. It was difficult to find tires because of what was going on, but they persevered and finally found two used tires. This slowed them down, because these tires were not in the best of shape and they couldn’t drive as fast as before.

Unfortunately, Simon was moving around quite a bit. When his family initially got to California, they were told that Simon was in San Francisco, so they traveled to San Francisco only to find out he had already moved back towards Los Angeles. Uncle Gus got sick just as they arrived in San Francisco, but he and Coova had relatives there that they were visited. Uncle Gus was so sick that he went back to Nebraska by train. Rosemarie went with him. After that was done, the three that were left drove all the way back to Los Angeles, where they finally met up with Simon.

They stayed with Simon about one week. At that time, everything was so unsettled that it was difficult to find places for civilians to stay. But Simon was able to convince the base commanders to allow them stay in the camp. While they were there they all had a chance to go to a rodeo, California style. When they left there were only Nick, Fred Coova, and Katherine in the car, which made the traveling a little easier. They weren’t in such a rush as when they went to California, so they took a little longer to make the trip.

The next move for Simon was to a camp north of Santa Barbara. The camp was located in the mountains and was more like a big golf club than it was a camp. It had a large older building (the clubhouse) where the officers stayed. Simon and the rest of the enlisted men had to stay in camps. This was the type of location in the mountains where optical illusions tricked the senses into thinking that you were going uphill when you were really going downhill. (Possibly the Mystery Spot off Branciforte Drive in Santa Cruz, California.) People would stop their cars and release the parking brake, thinking it would roll in one direction but it would roll the opposite direction (seemingly uphill). Simon personally experienced this phenomenon during a bus tour when they stopped the bus, everyone got out, and took turns “climbing” the hill only to observe the old bus rolling toward them. Everybody swore they were going uphill but they were actually going downhill.

The next transfer took Simon to Belmont. There he got the opportunity to haul supplies with a weapons carrier--a half-ton truck with four-wheel drive and a post for a machine gun on top. (Only the line companies would have machine guns actually mounted on the vehicle.) Whenever Simon was hauling supplies there, he would take the long way around and travel up the coast to San Francisco all the way to the Presidio, located at the base of the Golden Gate Bridge. Occasionally the truck would seem to have a mind of its own and take a detour to Oakland and then they would have to find their way back to the Presidio. Many times, after the truck was loaded, he would go to Oakland, then come by way of a two-lane highway or the seven-mile bridge that spanned San Francisco Bay. Anything to break up the boredom and travel a different route.

One day while Simon was at the Presidio, he asked his sergeant if he could go across that Golden Gate Bridge just to at least say he went across it. So, the old sergeant said, "What are you waiting for?" Simon happily drove across and back the entire length of the Golden Gate Bridge, fully impressed by its six-lanes of traffic. The road he usually traveled was only two-lane traffic with an occasional four-lane road, but they were pretty rare.

The hospitality in California was unequaled. There was never any problem from the citizenry if a soldier was present. Often servicemen were invited into California resident’s houses for a meal or just to visit.