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11/20/08 |
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After leaving St. Vibiana church, my first thought was to look for the Transient Bureau. That evening, however, I came across the Union Rescue Mission on So. Sixth St. I went in and was glad to get a meal and to sleep on a bed. |
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The next day I registered at the Transient Bureau, which limited me to a 3-day stay. After that, I had no other choice but to sign up for a boy's camp. I agreed to go to one that was near Los Angeles. It was called Camp Cummoche, located in Griffith Park, beside the Los Angeles River. The next morning, with 30 other mostly teenaged boys, we were driven to the campsite in Griffith Park.
Camp Cummoche was a federal transient camp for boys. It was not a Civilian Conservation Corps (C.C.C.) camp, nor was it like the Transient Bureaus in the large cities, where you could rest, freshen up, and move on. It was strictly for boys, under 21. We could work and earn our food and shelter, and receive a credit of 50 cents per day. That credit went towards our clothes, a rail ticket to our home state, and $12.00 cash on the day we departed.
Some boys earned their rail ticket earlier since their home state was closer to Los Angeles. It would take about four months for my ticket to Ohio. So Camp Cummoche was really a transportation camp to get the young "runaways" 'back to their homes. If a boy did not have any home to go to or if his home surroundings were unfavorable, he could stay on a cash basis at $5.00 per month. There were about 300 boys in our camp. We slept ten to a tent. Mr. Wells, the vocational director, was responsible for organizing the various work details. Since I knew how to type, I became his assistant in the office. |
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I processed applications and assigned jobs. The boys worked in the camp and throughout Griffith Park, reconstructing roads and pathways. They were also sent to clean up the beach in Santa Monica. A new observatory was being built on the very top of Griffith Park. (The one made famous in the James Dean movie "Rebel without a Cause.") We sent a work crew up there every day helping out with the landscaping.
Camp Cummoche became a new opening for me. I was meeting new friends and getting many benefits. For example, every Monday evening our truck driver, Bill Cook, would take 40 boys to the theaters in downtown Los Angeles to see "free movies". Since it was my job to make up the list of names it was easy for me to see most of the pictures.
The camp also provided "free postage" to write letters home. And write I did, to my family, to relatives, to Catherine, to my boy friends back home, and to my new friends that had already departed from our camp. I began a correspondence with Joe Baron, the pal I met in St. Louis and then met again in Grand Junction. He was back home in Passaic, New Jersey. In writing to Catherine, at first I wrote about our camp, the beach, movie studios, and certain movie stars that I had seen. This vein of writing came to a halt in my next two very long letters. I laid bare my heart and soul. Now that I was not in Bedford, it was easier to pour out my thoughts and feelings. The two thousand miles between us was a factor, no doubt, but I also sensed an up-tick in courage. We had met in a dancing class, but in the four years of accompanying her to an occasional movie, never once did I reach out to hold her hand -- not even in the darkened theaters. Incredible, I suppose, but it's true. Only in the beginning, at the dancing class, did we touch and have our arms around each other. That was four years earlier when I was 17 and she was 13. In writing those two letters I experienced a tremendous sense of relief. I was free to open up and express my true thoughts and feelings. It was a moment of discovery -- of self-awareness -- a sense of being true to myself. After a few weeks, I moved into more private quarters, sharing a tent with Oral Bartholow, my office co-worker. He told me that, shortly, he would be put on a "cash basis" at $13.00 dollars per month. Only two other boys, Bill Cook and Bill Siegert were receiving that same pay. Later on, I was happy to get on the same "cash basis". If this doesn't seem much, you must remember we got food, shelter, camp-wear clothing, postage, and movies, and this was all free. My goal was to save my pay for several months and then try to get something better outside the camp. Thanks to the kindness and generous help from Mr. Wells, I received many additional benefits. He loaned me his library card so that I could take books out from the Los Angeles Library. I, subsequently, read two books,"Main Street" and "Dodsworth", both by Sinclair Lewis. Mr. Wells took me to the Philharmonic Auditorium to see a ballet by the Carlo Troupe, and also to the Pasadena Playhouse to see "Both Your Houses". This play by Maxwell Anderson won the Pulitzer Prize in 1934. On weekends, he took me on several driving trips. We visited the old Spanish Missions, San Diego Harbor, Santa Anita racetrack, Pomona, and Claremont. Once, in downtown Los Angeles, I asked Mr. Wells to take me to the Bank of America. I received my first $13.00 payment on January 15th, and was able to open a savings account, with a $17.00 deposit. Now I had only 50 cents to last me until my next payday on February 15.th We took an exciting trip to Big Pines, high up in the San Gabriel Mountains. Mr. Wells came with our group of 40 boys. I did a lot of snowball fighting, sleigh riding, and tobogganing. I went to a dance and had a lot of fun. The resort, which was hosting the Western Amateur Ski Jump Championships, was so crowded with visitors that we didn't have any place to sleep. So we slept under the stars that evening. Living in Griffith Park turned out to be a wonderful experience. One day we were able to see President Roosevelt and his wife when they visited the Veterans camp that was next to our camp. In the evenings, if we saw klieg lights piercing the sky that meant a studio was shooting a movie and we hastened to take it in. One night Bill Siegert and I saw Paul Muni on a movie set. The picture was "Black Hell", later changed to "Black Fury" by Warner Bros. I spoke to Paul Muni and got his autograph on a penny postcard, which I still have. On another night Siegert and I saw Joe E. Brown in "Alibi Ike." Then, that same evening, we saw the set for M .G. M.'s "Public Hero Number 1". By that time, it was midnight. When they stopped to eat, the assistant director invited Siegert and I to eat with the workers. We did. It was a delicious meal. On another evening, Bill Cook and I came upon a scene near our camp where a car was upside down and on fire. This set was in the Paramount picture, "Car 99". Two men were flipping nickels. As we approached them, the taller man, (Fred MacMurray), asked if we wanted to flip. Bill Cook joined in the gambling. I just watched. Since I wasn't aware of their names and didn't recognize the actors, I felt this had to be a small budget "B" picture, and it probably was. After a week or so, I noticed a large advertisement in the L. A. Times Movie page. The movie was "The Gilded Lily" with Claudette Colbert and her new co-star, Fred MacMurray. I was astonished, and wished I had flipped a few nickels with him. After six months, things began to change in camp. Our Camp Director, Mr. Loop, was transferred to Camp Etiwanda, 70 miles east. He wanted me to go with him, but it was too far from Los Angeles.
My close friends started to leave camp. Bill Cook met a girl, Millie, and they were going steady. He got a job in a water heater factory in Burbank. My two co-workers in the office, Oral Bartholow and Jimmy Vaughan, departed on April 15th: Vaughan returned to Minerva, Ohio and Bartholow joined a C.C.C. camp in San Diego. The 3 C's took in boys from the Transient camps in California to refill vacancies of company units that had dwindled in size. It was an option that I might take up later on, especially since the pay ($30.00 per month) was much higher.
I was in camp over seven months and was getting restless. With sympathy and permission from Mr. Wells, I quit working in the office. What brought this to a head? A new clerk was hired at $50.00 dollars per month to supervise the office. He was supposed to learn how to do the monthly reports from me. Instead, he told me to continue to do the reports and he would simply sign them. That triggered my quitting. Mr. Thompson, our new camp Director, tried to talk me out of leaving the office, but I told him I'd appreciate the outside work for a change. I assigned myself to work on the labor crews, rotating from one to the other. Working only 6 hours there was more time for reading, and I felt much better doing the physical work. Later on I started to work with our new truck driver. He was aware that I could not drive, but that was okay as long I kept the truck in good condition -- gassed, oiled, greased, and washed. We drove the truck to the other three Transient Camps. The route to Etiwanda took us through Pasadena, Arcadia, Monrovia, and Azusa. At Camp Etiwanda, I got to see Mr. Loop again. Camp Harry L. Hopkins was only a 20-mile trip up the Santa Monica hills. The third camp route went through Glendale, Burbank San Fernando, Newhall, Saugus, and then up a canyon to Camp Francisquito. While driving on this trip, in Newhall, we saw the hilltop home of William S. Hart, the first big cowboy movie star. I stayed on the truck detail until my departure from camp on May 24th. It was now time for me to move on, to see if I could make it on the "outside". Hugo P. Cipriani |
