Our Firstborn and My First Radio Job

On October 6, 1942, a little girl was born to us at Presbyterian Hospital. Marsha Joan, weighed in at 5 lbs and 8 oz, delivered by Dr. Billington, internist. Dad called her "Snooks" and later "Blondie." Helen's mother Mrs. Vertna Crawford came up to see her first grandchild and stayed a few days. At this time, mother and dad lived across the street in the same block.

Helen Marsh and Timothy Marsh with newborn Marsha Joan
Chicago, Illinois - October 1942

Helen Marsh with Daughter Marsha Marsh - Age 4 Months

November 9th, 1942. "Got a Job." The Placement Service at Coyne lined me up with a position as Communication  Technician with the Sixth Service Command, a branch of the Signal Corps. Immediately after graduating from Coyne, I went downtown to the F.C.C. Office and passed my amateur exam, having studied the Morse Code in the communication branch at Coyne. This got me the job. My place of employment was at the Merrillville Station, Indiana, located on Highway 30, north of Crown Point, Indiana, about twelve miles south of Gary, Indiana. The Sixth Service Command had taken over the old Mackey Postal Telegraph Company Network, that consisted of several stations located out on the prairie to get away from man-made noise. There were stations at Merrillville, Hobart, Lowell and St. John, all interconnected by land lines called order wires, that we used to talk by telegraph sounders (clickety-clack) to the other stations in the network. Our ID call was MV = Dah Dah - Dit Dit Dit Dah. I learned to read my ID even if I dozed off, as you were prone to do on a slow night at 2:30 in the morning. These stations were all equipped with huge long rombic wire antennas, fie hundred feet long and ninety feet high, headed toward Greenland and Canada, so that the Chicago Headquarters could communicate via our stations to Canada or Greenland and relay to the European Command.

Thanksgiving Day, November 26, 1942. Helen and I with our little girl, six weeks old, moved to Gary, Indiana. Lived at two different locations here. This is where Marsha Joan would sit in her high chair, pounding her tray with her spoon and hollering, "nic-n-na nic-n-na," (for milk and bread). Bright kid! We had a little cheap short wave radio that we listened to broadcasts from allied and axis stations around the world. I would listen to Morse Code stations to improve my copy speed but we had to keep the volume down so the neighbor would not hear it. People had the "Spy Jitters" and code was a red flag that might earn a visit from the Feds.

Helen Marsh, Marsha Marsh and Tim Marsh
Gary, Indiana

Blanche Marsh and Richard Marsh with Marsha in Gary, Indiana

It was a record cold and snowy winter of 1942-43. Had no car, most days too bad to drive anyway. So I had to ride the Hobart Transit bus to within a mile of the radio station and walk the rest of the way. All the operators worked a swing shift, never could get used to this killer schedule. The only names that I can remember of this group was my boss that hired me, Aaron Wilcox, a security guard by the name of Dyer who was about 60 and had come up from Dyersburg, Tennessee, off a little farm, to keep from starving. When he found out I was from Tennessee, he was the happiest old feller I ever saw. One other I remember was a Norwegian from Minnesota named Mortareud, we called him "Mort" (naturally). He was an amateur radio operator, just past the draft age and a good friend. I lost track of him after I left the Sixth Service Command, never able to locate him until about four years ago when I found out he had moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico. Checked in with my old friend Bob Gordon there and found out Mort had just died.