Interview with Herbert Berg
Interviewed by Kristopher-Jamaal Clemmons
Hogan Campus Center, College of the Holy Cross,
Worcester, MA
November 4, 2002

Kristopher-Jamaal Clemmons (KJC): Mr. Berg, I have just some background questions. When were you born?

Herbert Burg (HB): April 10, 1919.

KJC: And you were born where?

HB: Right over by where the floral shop is at 840 millbury street in Worcester; Quinsigamond village.

KJC: Born and raised there, huh?

HB: Right

KJC: In terms of your family, how big was it?

HB: What was what?

KJC: Your family, how big was it.

HB: Well, my father died when I was only 13 months old. My oldest brother was almost five. My brother henry was 3. And, ah, my mother's father, my maternal grandfather, and aunt moved in and helped bring us up. Yeah so I never knew a father

KJC: In terms of WWII, what's the first thing you think about when you think of WWII?

HB: Well, I was affected by it some before the war had started because I was growing orchid plants in the green house and I had sent an order to a Harry Glosfeld out in Sao Paulo Brazilfor some orchid plants, but he wasn't allowed to send them to me. They tied them up because he was a German national. And that was back in 1940 and you couldn't do business with a German national.. That was before the war started.

KJC: Oh…

HB: So that was my first experience. Then of course in 1941 we couldn't get easter lilly bulbs from Japan. Most of the easter lilly blubls came from Japan. This was in the fall of '41. So the easter of '42 there were very few easter lillies available. So that was another experience.

KJC: So the war mainly, kind of , affected you economically at first?

HB: Right

KJC: So I guess those are your beginning memories of the war. What are your strongest memories of the war?

HB: Well of course I remember where I was when I heard the Japanese had struck Pearl Harbor. I was down in Woodstock, Connecticut, in a swamp collecting winter berries for my arrangements. Winter berries had been red berries you see growing in the swamp. Then of course, everybody that was of age changed their draft status. And I decided that I would go into the navy instead of the army.

KJC: Why was that?

HB: Well, my mother's uncle had had a farm in Barrington , RD. we spent a a lot of time in Newport, RD and I used to see sailors in some of the ships and decided I would want to do navy instead of the army. So I was sworn into the navy on st patricks day 1942. And we came out of the recruiting office in Springfield where they sent us to be sworn in, and there were big green headlines in the Springfield papers General McArthur was in Australia. They had taken him by submarine to Australia.

KJC: So, you were how old when you enlisted?

HB: I would have been 23 the following month… it was in March and I would have been 23 in April.

KJC: So how did you feel? Was it a general response to the attack on Pearl Harbor that motivated you to go or how did you feel when you heard about it?

HB: Well, of course I was quite upset about it as I'm sure everybody was. I wasn't really ready to go right away because I was really just establishing my business. But, uh, the thing had to be so it had to be and I did have an older gentleman that was working for me. So between he and my mother they kept the business operating while I was in the navy.

KJC: What was the community response to Pearl Harbor?

HB: Well, I guess everybody was upset about it. You didn't know how to react, I guess. Those of us that went into the navy, or the marines, are the coast guard or what have you, were just civilians. We weren't professional soldiers or anything. But a lot of my friends went in before I did.. Some of them volunteered right away, but I say hey, I had the business so I delayed for a period of time. The news wasn't very pleasant.. That we were being hammered back from nearly every place.

KJC: How big of motivation do you think it was that your friends were going to war?

HB: Well, I suppose you felt that it was a case of, God felt it had to be done. And that was it.

KJC: How did you perceive the enemy, because I can imagine being in that time, or being in a situation such as that, especially now with all of the different rumors of war going on.... But as a young man about to go off to war… the ways in which you percieve even who you were fighting against. And even after you learned what was expected of you, how did you perceive the enemy?

HB: Well, they declared war on Germany three days after the attack on Pearl Harbor because they were apart of the axis powers. You know, prior to the attacks on Pearl Harbor we were more or less isolationists. We thought that was somebody else's war. And yet when it happened, I don't know , more so later on, whey I was out in the pacific, I realized that the Japanese that were out there, many of them did not want to be out there any more than I did. They used to produce the easter lilly bulbs for me and petunia seeds and other things that in my business I depended on the Japanese more. So, that was the feeling that they had that they didn't want to be in it anymore than I did. But these were things that I normally had depended on the Japanese for in my business. But a few people cause these thing to happen, and I'm not a political scientist but that's just my take on the who things.

KJC: Now, how long were you actually in the war?

HB: Well I was discharged on medical discharge Dec 14th of '44, but the… I was fortunate I got the kind of duty I requested out of bootcamp. At the time I went in of course, we didn't realize how bad things looked. Instead of a normal 6 weeks of boot camp I only had three and a half, long enough to get shots. But I got my selection of navy aviation. A lot of fellas just went to the fleet without any training, but the fact that I got into naval aviation, I was an aviation gunner- we had to wait until '43 until the aircraft carrier was ready for us. So we had a lot of training.

KJC: So did you feel like… you mentioned how you didn't necessarily want to be there. Did you feel like an active participant in the war or do you feel like the war is something that just happened to you.

HB: Well, it just happened, but when you're out there you're participating for sure. You talk about where the visitor's center is going to be down near the old Washburn wire rope factory. Of course, my life depended on wire rope because when you come back and make a carrier landing, the tale hook has got to hook onto a wire rope to keep it from crashing into something. And presumably the air craft carrier was made down in the Four River of Quincy so presumably the wire rope was made right here in the village.

KJC: Did you feel a sense of connection to people back in Quinsig when you were out there on the front lines?

HB: Oh yea, of course, when you're under combat.. The worst of that is flying through the anti-aircraft. Once the fighter planes come at you, you have something to do to occupy your time. You're just flying in on a target, and as the anti-aircraft get closer and closer, that seemed to be the worst part about flying through anti-air craft. And when the fighters come, as I said, you had something to occupy your time. You always think about the other fella out there. He probably didn't want to be out there any more than I did. There are a few human beings with twisted minds but most of us are not warriors at heart I don't believe.

KJC: When you got back did you go right back to work

HB: No, I went right back

KJC: How was the energy in Quinsig when you got back, since by then we were well into the war?

HB: I was discharged in december of '44 so things were more or less starting to wind down. I figure the Battle of the Bulge was going on. Of course Okanowa, and Saipan, were going on in the Pacific. But it was really starting to wind down. While we were losing a lot of men everywhere, we were gaining a foot hold and making progress. But Quinsig was.. The same gas was rationed, and food was rationed. So it was a little different living considering everything, we couldn't really complain. We had a lot that so many other people…
And some of my slosest friends are now listed as stars in the Worcester memorial here. One of my best friends, he didn't go into the war. He worked for Winslow skate company making ball bearings. That was a critical industry so he never went in to the army but was killed at the Coconut Grove fire down in Boston. They were celabrating the Boston College, Holy Cross football game. And he was one of the close to five hundred casualties in the Coconut Grove fire. So sometimes you can lose your life in ways you don't expect to.

KJC: How did people respond to you when you got back?

HB: I don't know if it was anything different. My customers welcomed me back, and when I got in they would call. But it was a little different because most of my close friends were still in the service. But it wasn't too long. Within a year they started to come back to, so… of course the American Steel and Wire was working full blast.

KJC: Would you say that economically Quinsig was doing better or worse when you got back as compared to when you left?

HB: Well, it was hard to say.. Probably about the same. The American Steel had started to gear up during the 1930's… supplying things to Great Britain and so forth, so at the time of the war I think they had about 5000 people employed down there at the south works. Just prior to WWII they had taken down the company houses- six- and made that into a parking lot because employees were starting to buy automobiles and not relying on the trolley so much. But that started to change before the war.

KJC: Did you notice any big changes upon you coming back?

HB: No, I don't think there were any big changes then…no I can't recall any that….

KJC: Were you married before you left for war?

HB: No I married in July of '45 when I came home.

KJC: How was family life during that time period? How did it change?

HB: Well, it happened that my oldest brother was stationed in California so he was able to come home. He was best man. I had gone with Ethel since she was a junior in high school. But starting my business and then the war coming on delayed our getting married until I was discharged. But there weren't any great changes that…

KJC: When you first went to war you felt like it was something you had to do- your duty. How do you feel like your duty changed upon returning home?

HB: Well, the fact that my business was there, there wasn't that much of a change for me. I came back and Quinsig hadn't changed that much except for myself- a little older. But all the merchants that were in Quinsig at the time I left were still here. So things were pretty much the same, I guess, prior to the war. They used to have a Boston braves and Holy Cross baseball exhibition game here. They didn't have that anymore. So that had cahnged, but other than that I don't know.

KJC: What did you feel like your responsibilty was to the war effort prior to your discharge as a business man in the community?

HB: Well, to support my country any way I could of course. I realized that I was one of the fortunate ones, and airgroup duty on the carrier is I guess hazardous- we get extra pay for it, 50 percent of your base pay, and of course any one overseas gets twenty percent base pay during the war. But in between combat missions the carrier made ice cream everyday. So I could go down and have sundaes, to in the afternoon, two at night. And every ten days the fleet oiler comes along and gives carrier gas and fuel oil. And we'd have ice cream that day. And of course the food was tremendous. And we were out 51 days one time with outh stopping for gas and fuel oil and we ate three good meals a day. There were 3400 men on the carrier. It was a lot better than being a soldier in the trenches somewhere on K rations. And we were only hit by anti-aircraft once. But we were able to get back to the aircraft ok. So I was lucky. Lucky to get back to my favorite Quinsig village. And I would write to the fellas still fighting, tell them I hoped that they would be home soon… safe and sound. And we'll have fun together again.

KJC: Did you actively support the war.… I guess there were a lot of posters and advertisements about the war at that time. Did you have any of those around?

HB: Yea, I think they had a poster in the floral shop on war bonds, but… naturally we supported it… I mean, it was something that had to be accomplished. When you look back on things we probably should have declared war on Germany sooner than we did. It took pearl harbor… I mean, we had a mad man on the loose. Japan's problem of course was no oil. They had no natural resources. They had to depend on the rest of the world for natural resources and probably were never interested in coming to America, but they wanted the Dutch East Indies for the oil to be under their control. And that's, again, just my feelings about the thing.

KJC: But that's interesting… given your take on the war, and what you would have liked to seen done, or see the U.S. do earlier. And today you see a lot of war movies come out that depict WWII. How much different are those movies from the experience that you lived? Or are they different at all?

HB: Well I guess being out in the Pacific is a lot different from being on the European front. I mean that's certainly miserable. We were on a new carrier and I say life if you weren't going on combat mission, life aboard ship for us was a breeze. We had an air conditioned ready room. So when I was in the heat of the South Pacific I know I went down to my bunk and had a leather reclining seat… I pushed the seat back and slept in the ready room. You had a ready room next to the parlor so that you'd get your briefing, if you were going out on a flight, you'd get your briefing in the ready room. And if we didn't have a flight we'd walk on the cat walk on the deck sometimes, sit on the tall part of the ship and watch the flying fish you know, get a way from the ship. So as I say, my spot in the Navy and getting to do the I.S. war was-

KJC -not bad.

HB: When I think about bad I think about some of the people who had it, you know, I saw what the marines went through at Tarawa(?) and we lost almost 5000 casualties there. Almost 1000 marines killed and over 5000 Japanese were killed to take a little island, a mile and a half long and a mile wide and only ten feet above see level. But I was one of the fortunate ones that had an easy time of it between combat missions.

KJC: Were there any tensions that emerged in Quinsig? I guess, were there any neighborhood rivalries, even in terms of the Swedish nuetrality during the war. How was that perceived or was it perceived at all?

HB: No I don't there were any contentions here. There was the only thing that- and I'm not positive that it was a fact, but probably was- but there was a resident in Quinsig the was taken out that was supposedly spying for Germany. He disappeared and I don't know what came of him. He was gone before I got back and was told that he was being taken out as a German spy. I don't know if that is a fact, though.

KJC: Were there a lot of suspicions like that?

HB: I don't think so, none that I ever heard of. There were probably most of the people here of Swedish persuasion had been here from, well there was a group that came here in the middle 20's, but most of the group here, most of them came or were born here in America. And though Sweden was a nuetral country I don't think that there was any dissention, or none that I ever heard of. This was just something that happened and we had to do our part. We had a lot of national defense work down at the old steel and wire and at a lot of the other mills around. Morton company and all the ball works rather than what they normally did- you know the Winslow skate company which is gone now, it was a company that normally made ball bearings for roller skates. They ended up making ball bearings for all types of war equipment. They were located up in the Green Island section of Worcester. They weren't in Quinsig. But you had Johnson(?) steel and wire down on Lysand (?) avenue. They all did defense work. And all defense workers, some of them lived in Quinsig, some of them lived outside Quinsig of course.

KJC: How did the local churches respond to the War?

HB: Well I guess everybody was involved in buying war bonds and doing everything they could. People couldn't travel of course. We had a B ration for gasoline of course because of the business. But we went out and made one trip a day. We didn't go out several times. If someone called after a certain time in the morning, we usually left between 11 or 12 to deliver the flowers to the hospital. And if anyone called after that they would have to wait till the following day for that. So you'd stretch your gasoline requirements out for what you could get.

KJC: Did local churches....

HB: In Quinsig there was a Methodist church, there was a Lutheran church, and a Covenant formally a Congregational church, and there was a Swedish corp of the Salvation Army. And then there was the Baptist church which they just moved a week ago.

KJC: Yea, I saw that. How did they respond to the war?

HB: Well, I think they had- seems as though the ladies aid society had different meetings where they would get up bandages and things of that sort to send off to the men. And I can't remember that there was any USO program right here in Quinsig. But I know that there was one in the city. I know down at the YWCA my wife used to go to the USO dances and YWCA used to be on Chatam street. And they had different things for the servicemen. Of course you had Fort Devins which is the nearest army place up in Worcester. Boston was the nearest naval base. And I think the whether any of the churches had any programs other than the bandage programs, I'm not sure.

KJC: Did people tend to… did you notice a change in church attendance? Were people more religious during this time?

HB: Well, I don't know if there was anymore or any less, probably things were about the same. Probably as far as church attendance in the area it started to drop off. After the war when many came home and were married and built homes around the area they left Quinsig Village. Or in my case, I married a girl that belonged to what was Salem Square Covenant Church. It was where the shopping center is now in Worcester. Its now Salem Covenant on East Mountain Street. And, so of course I went to church with her. I had been confirmed in the Methodist church. it's the first Swedish Methodist Episcopal church. The first Swedish church of Worcester, which my maternal grandparents were charter members of, of course. Religion may have been the reason for them coming to America, I don't know. Of course the Lutheran church still is the church of Sweden. But they belong to the Methodist church in Sweden when they left Sweden. But that's not a part WWII- that's long before WWII.

KJC: Well, that kind of sets everything in context, you know. We talked about the rations and people not having the same types of leaway in terms of travel. What did people do for fun during those times?

HB: Well, to be honest with you I don't know. I suppose they still had the movies, they had not T.V. just the radio. And you'd tune into the radio at night to hear what was going on. I don't know that there was any other…. Of course prior to WWII they would have carnivals down at Roy Square…. Sometime the churches would put on special programs down there, but I don't think any of that was held during the war. Some of it was resumed after the war, but, the American Steele always had that plot of land designated as a community center.

KJC: Was that heavily attended?

HB: Yes, it was quite heavily attended before the war. Prior to the war, not everybody had automobiles. Everybody had come through the Depression. Things didn't start to pick up until '37, '38, ''39 when many people got automobiles. So more things were held in the community for that reason. As automobiles started to come in the community naturally things started to spread out.

KJC: Did any other social groups- or even political factions- emerge, not necessarily in response, but in relation to the war?

HB: Well, Quinsigamond post American Legion was formed by WWI vets prior to the war…. And there were men who worked at American Steele and Wire and who had served over seas who had different events. There were organizations that had events down at the community square. But i don't know if they had any during the war. I don't know until I came back, but then the war was over and members returned and they probably had some lawn parties and things like that again. During the war I don't know if there was much of anything was going on accept to go down town to the movies. Like I said, I don't think the USO had any operations going on in the village itself.

KJC: Even before the war, in 1935 the passing of the Wagner Act, did that affect you?

HB: No it didn't affect me, it affected my brother Henry who was working down at the cable works at the time. He was the only one of us that ever worked for American Steel other than my grandfather- Burg and Granpa Holst- but the Wagner act did away with company unions. American Steel had their own union. And at the time American Steel was paying the particular job my brother Henry was on a little over a dollar an hour. And the Wagner act you had to take cut in pay sense all the other guys working under this position were only covered for 95 cents an hour. So the Wagner Act cut the pay of many people in Quinsig village. But, that was the… when did you say that was-

KJC: 1935.

HB: Yea, I remember he took a cut in pay.

KJC: Well, did you feel like you were in a different position because you owned your own business and didn't work for US Steel? Did you feel like because you were a business owner you were protected or did it make your economic experience of the war different?

HB: No, I don't think I felt anything about it. It was a struggle to…. Actually I had started to go onto Mass State, which is now University of Massachusetts. But on of my agriculture teachers had loaned me $400 dollars to get another greenhouse so I went and had to stay and work and never got on to college. Had to pay off the loans…. Four hundred dollars at the end of the depression was pretty good money, compared with what you probably pay to go through college today.

KJC: That's true…. Now going back to the actual war- what was your response when you heard about D day?

HB: Well, I was very happy of course, I had lost most of my friends. They had been killed in squandrons. I didn't see any of the blood and guts that so many thousands had to go through in Europe. 'Cause its all so senseless when you come right down to it, and yet we may have to go through it again, it looks like. We got a few nut cakes in the world that ruin it for all of us.

KJC: What was the community sentiment?

HB: Well, I think that the community felt about the same as I did. So more of our sons and more of our friends could return home… coming home again. One of my cousins who had worked with me at one time, was killed just before the end of the war. My brother Henry's brother-in-law was killed just before the end of the war. So, if it would have only ended sooner a couple more close ones would have been alive today. It just didn't end soon enough.

KJC: How did you first find out the war had ended?

HB: I imagine I heard on the radio… you talking about D day in Europe?- yea I heard about it on the radio. We usually had the radio going in the greenhouse. I had greenhouses along with the floral shop so I had a radio going up front and a radio in back to hear what was going on.

KJC: Did you celebrate, or was it more of a somber, bittersweet type of thing?

HB: No, it was definitely somber. There weren't any celebrations, just a lot of thought about the waist that had gone on- human waist. In the case of one of my closest friends, who was Jewish boy- Joey Applefeld- when we won a slug came through the plane- bingo, right up through his heart. Hardly any blood in the plane or anything, his name was on it. Yet other planes came that were shot up, you don't know how they made it- yet one bullet got the plane, had his name on it. So you think about it, 'cause after the war when I did any traveling I went and visited the parents of all my friends who were killed. Which I know they all appreciated, it was kind of hard to do. Joe had just been accepted for flight training just before he was killed. It's a strange world!

KJC: I guess this is about it, but is there anything that sticks out in your mind that we still haven't talked about?

HB: Yes, the thing that sticks out is that I got back, and my plane was only hit by anit-aircraft once. I had an excellent pilot who had just gotten out of junior college, he was a year younger than I, but he was an excellent pilot. Got me back all the time. We still communicate on Christmas cards. I went to visit him 6 or 7 years out in California. And I still can remember that seen… I'll never forget it.
I'm thankful that I had the type of duty I had and nothing more. I met a lot of great people and made a lot of great friends, its just too bad it had to be under those circumstances. But, thank goodness they used the atomic bomb to end things as soon as they did.

KJC: How did you feel about that?

HB: Well, its too bad so many civilians had to be killed, but like I said, 99% of us there were civilians wearing a uniform. We didn't want to be there. We didn't want to kill anybody…. We wanted to get it over with and come home again to live like human beings. I said before, I had a florist friend in Los Angeles, Arthur Ito, who was Japanese, his wife was Japanese. His wife taught Japanese at the University of Wisconsin to intelligence officers. One of my friends from Auburn attended classes. And Arthur Ito interpreted war message. He was in the Navy, and went on Guam and was an interpreter and interpreted for prisoners that they took there in Guam. They said a lot of them wanted to die for the Emperor, he said a lot of them just wanted to live the same as you and I do.
But Quinsig was a great place to grow up, a great place to live and a great place to come back to.

KJC: how do you feel like Quinsig has changed since that war period.

HB: People have changed. But for an old section of the city, the people that have moved into Quinsig have maintained th property pretty well. In the old days we described the village as only those who attend Quinsigamond school. Now with the new set up we have we include holy cross college and the other part of the hill here, Davenport street and some of the other streets. So, its always been a great place and I look forward to the moves that are being made that are going to bring back a lot of the great history of Worcester.