Their eyes were glazed like they were on hop

 

Their eyes were glazed like they were on hop

    This is one of the rare but deeply personal stories told by my Dad in his more relaxed moments. Unfortunately much of his fascinating early life was obscured by alcohol and stress from a job that was extremely demanding. When he had a moment and was in the mood he had some great stories. We were never sure if he actually graduated from Huntington Park High School in 1931 but prospects were thin in a great depression plagued America. One third of his job-aged peers were out of work and many wandered the country trying to find a way to earn any kind of living. BC set out on many journeys across the U.S. during these hard times and by the date he settled down and married Charline he had been to all 48 states and probably broke many a law along the way. He hitched rides or rode the rails in risky positions that could have ended his life at any time. He committed small crimes and seperated rubes from what little cash they had while crossing the sorry nation. He once had to fight for his life in a box car over a pair of shoes and saw men killed with razors on the streets of Chicago. There were two ways of getting around without having money: riding the rails which involved actually getting into cars of a train and riding the rods which meant hanging onto the outside of a car for great distances. He once saw a pal frozen solid who attempted to pass through Colorado exposed to the elements without a coat. At all times railroad security was on the hunt for guys like him and their method of discouraging freeloaders was to beat them brutally. On this occasion he was riding the rails on a long journey in a boxcar with lots of company. There was no food and no way of jumping off the train in small towns where they were unwanted and hated by local cops. He says the train was ascending a lenghty grade while passing a field ready for harvest in Texas when men began jumping from the slow moving boxcar to dash into the field for whatever was growing there. He soon learned it was turnips but these guys desperatedly needed something in their stomachs to assuage the ache. He said as they ran back to get on the train as it increased speed "their eyes were glazed like they were on hop" due to the hunger of the poor vagabonds. Such was the life of young men on the road in these bad times. BC survived and managed to live to have four kids and a sometimes content wife. He did not have to eat the turnips as he lived on his wits and not his strong back.