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MR. AND MRS. JAMES NEAL WORKMAN

The love story below is an excerpt from a book in which Lou Workman Souders was a contributing author.

Lou is the daughter of Helen and Jim Workman, formerly of Lincolnton and McCormick, who now live in Clemson, South Carolina.

This story is special for at least two reasons: it gives readers a feel for what life was like during World War II, and it involves two people, whom I dearly love - my Aunt Helen and Uncle Jim, also known as Auntee and Unka Jim.

In fact, the wedding dress in the photo was worn by my mother, Jacque Wright Johnson; my aunts, Frances Wright Stewart and Vera (Chick) Wright Burton; by Chick's daughter, Helen Burton Rogers; and by Lou.

Enjoy - Jacquelyn Johnson, news editor for The Lincoln Journal.

My War Bride

James Neal Workman as told to Lou W. Souders from A Cup of Comfort for

Weddings: Something Old,

Something New

Edited by Helen Kay Polaski

A whole new world opened up for the people of Lincolnton, Georgia and McCormick, South Carolina when a bridge was built over the Savannah River in 1939. These small towns, only fourteen miles apart, had never been exposed to each other. In 1941, when the road was paved on the South Carolina side, the teenagers were the first to explore. The boys from McCormick drove to Lincolnton- to the West End, the local drivein and teen hang out- to check out the new crop of girls.

It was in August, when I first saw Helen Wright, daughter of the mayor. She was just back from a month in Daytona Beach, tanned and beautiful, wearing a white dress in the latest style. My friend, Rudolph (Strom), had dated her younger sister Vera, so on one of our many trips over the river, I asked Rudolph to set me up with Helen. He tried, but Helen refused. She said her boyfriend had just moved away.

I kept dropping by and she finally went for a ride with me to keep from being rude. Helen was always busy and usually out, so I courted her mother. Mrs. Wright and I became great friends. She even helped me in my quest to see her daughter. Helen's friend, Leslie (Reese) also helped once, when she and Helen were on the road to McCormick. She asked Helen to get out and check the tires for a flat. As soon as Helen complied, Leslie roared off and left her stranded on the highway. Naturally, I just happened to come along to pick her up.

Helen and I dated off and on until my junior year in college in May 1942, when I took a school deferment so I could join the Army Air Corps. My orders sent me to Maxwell Field in Montgomery, Alabama. Because I contracted double pneumonia, I was allowed to go home for two weeks in December, and by then, Helen and I were getting serious. I asked my mother to order a ring for me from the drug store.

Helen, now a senior in high school, was a cheerleader and class president. She was having a great time while I was jealous, homesick, and so lonely. In February, I asked her to come to Montgomery to marry me. Both of us had to get permission from our parents and Helen had to get the principal's approval, too.

We were married at the base chapel on February 20, 1943. Our wedding night supper was a hamburger from a filling station. We found a room at an old wooden hotel with the bath- room down the hall. Afterward, she went back to school and I went back to my base.

After Helen's graduation, my daddy gave us a 1940 Chevy Coupe, which Helen drove to Seymour, Indiana, to meet me. Shortly after Helen arrived, I received my assignment as copilot on the B-24 in Pocatello, Idaho. Since my next assignment was in Riverside, California, and I didn't want Helen driving that distance alone, I offered our car to a soldier from my unit who was on leave. He drove the car as far as North Carolina and my father picked it up from there.

In December, I was sent to San Francisco, where we would begin flying our planes across the country en route to our assignment in the war, and Helen began her return trip home by train.

With the help of a station clerk, Helen was routed to Georgia. Since it was Sunday and no way to verify her funds, she persuaded the ticket agent to take a personal check for $108. He trusted her and told her that if on Monday morning the check was not good he would have her put off the train - no matter where she was.

Dressed in a suit, heels, and gloves, eighteen-year-old Helen began the journey from California to Georgia with $20 in borrowed cash, thanks to the bombardier's wife. Luckily, two businessmen and a woman took her under their wing on the first leg of the trip. They played Pokeno and the loser had to buy the meals. They made sure Helen never lost.

But when she got to her next stop, the connecting train was full of soldiers; civilians weren't allowed on board. One soldier suggested she get on with his group, and so she did. Once on the train, Helen sat on her suitcase in the aisle, between cars, and occasionally in the lavatory with the door open. The USO served food at the stops, and the soldiers brought her something to eat each time. When she arrived in Georgia, she still had the $20 in her pocketbook!

For the next nine months, I flew my thirty missions. We wrote letters, sent pictures, and prayed. When I returned, her parents let us have their house that first night. We stayed up half the night opening wedding presents and talking. Nine months later, we were the proud parents of a baby girl. Three boys were to follow.

After sixty-two years together, Helen and I still kiss when we go over the bridge with the moonlight reflecting on the water, she still irons my underwear and our sheets, and we still call "Pop Eye" when we pass a car with one headlight and remember the wonderful times. It was an era when two young people, so much in love, took the chance to marry during the war and it worked. The times were such that an eighteenyear old girl could go from coast to coast and be safely helped by so many nice people. A man of twentyone could pilot a plane, go into combat, have his plane shot up, write a diary to the woman he loved, and come home to a wonderful future.

This little girl, whom I love very much, followed me across the country, wrote and prayed for me around the world, and is still my war bride today.