INTERVIEW WITH GEORGE HINE

Date of Interview: June 21, 2003 in Nashville Tennessee

Interviewer Ryan MacIvor
Transcriber: Case Mond

Ryan MacIvor:
So George Hine... George, why don’t you tell me or the camera your name.

George Hine:
I’m George Hine

Ryan MacIvor:
And can you spell your last name?

George Hine:
H.I.N.E.

Ryan MacIvor:
OK and what was your rank?

George Hine:
I was a district technician 5.

Ryan MacIvor:
...and that was a private first class?

George Hine:
T5. It’s like a corporal. T5.

Ryan MacIvor:
You were with the 341st Engineers regiment and company D. Now, you didn’t per se work on the highway, but what did you do within the regiment?

George Hine:
Well in Company D I got as far as Montana, a transportation outfit. We shipped back to North Carolina and I joined the 341st Engineers in Camp Sutton, North Carolina. During the trips to France, and everything, I was a reconnaissance man. I did a lot of reconnaissance work.

Ryan MacIvor:
Now someone told me to ask you about a song called the Pines. I wonder if you could sing me the song.

George Hine:
(laughs) I wish I had the words for it. In my company there’s about 4 or 5 people who can sing “In the Pines, where the sun never shines. [long steel rail, and a short crow’s tie]. They’d get together from Tennessee, Kentucky and Pennsylvania, they’d sing it every reunion. It more or less got to be the song.

Ryan MacIvor:
What were the names of those men? Do you remember?

George Hine:
Well, Harman Overpillar, and a guy named Little Joe Cross is dead, a guy named Elmer Morrison. We used to get together and they’d sing “In the Pines, where the sun never shines. Long steel rail, and a short crow’s tie” while we were on our way back home, you see. They’d sing it at every reunion. The point of it was that they’d ask the conductor the time of the day, and he says the conductor just threw his watch away because they weren’t in a hurry to get home anyway.

Ryan MacIvor:
So can you sing me that song?

George Hine:
No, that’s all I know. But, they did it for years. It got to be sort of sad. Someone said it did... you know, some of the guys dined out and they’d remember... The guys from Tennessee and Kentucky, and Pennsylvania, they knew all of that. And there was Joe Crowsfor. You heard them talk about him. He was their ringleader. It was a fun outfit to be in. We’d sing that song, do you.

Ryan MacIvor:
Do you know if they sang that song up on the highway?

George Hine:
No I don’t think so.

Ryan MacIvor:
So it’s just something they sang on the way back.

George Hine:
Yeah, I think so.

Ryan MacIvor:
You being part of that engineering group, did you hear many stories about the building of the highway?

George Hine:
Yeah, I was in two engineering outfits. The first one was 341st. Then I went to the Pacific on a forestry engineering outfit. And they also worked on the Alcan Highway. So I heard a lot of story about the Alaskan Highway.

Ryan MacIvor:
And what was that other regiment that you were with?

George Hine:
This was a company of engineers, forestry engineers.

Ryan MacIvor:
OK. And what was the number?

George Hine:
797. And then... We were... I went straight from France to the Pacific, from Marseilles. But this outfit, they were up on that Alcan Highway, cutting down the trees and clearing it out. Both outfits that I went to have been to Alaska, the Alcan Highway.

Ryan MacIvor:
So did they tell you any stories about the wilderness?

George Hine:
I they talked about fishing in the wilderness, run the tracks, how hard it was to do, you know. Some of those guys were up there just a short while, and you know the reason they went up there, don’t you? They were worried about the Japanese. And the first thing they did was build a highway up there in a hurry, in case the Japanese would start coming through, you see. And that’s the reason they went up there. So they got engineers from all over the country to head up there.
And Dawson Creek was one of the headquarters. Most I’ve heard about Dawson Creek was that sign. And in my hometown, which is also Brownwood, or Irly, one of the prominent restaurants there in town, named Section Head, and their son, the proprietor’s son, went to Anchorage, Alaska to college and they’d go right through Dawson Creek every when time they took the road. And when they got back one time there was a whole bunch of signs of Dawson Creek. And I said I know who painted all those signs. Carl Lindley painted them. (referring to the Sign Post Forrest in Watson Lake, Yukon not Dawson Creek, BC)

Ryan MacIvor:
That’s up at Watson Lake.

George Hine:
Yeah, wherever the signs are painted.

Ryan MacIvor:
Yeah, that’s Watson Lake.

George Hine:
And he painted how far it was from there to his home in Denver, Illinois, Carl Lindley did. But my town, in that forest of signs, they’ve got a sign to Brownwood, Texas, [?].

Ryan MacIvor:
Could you tell us when you were born?

George Hine:
Yeah, October 1st, 1921.

Ryan MacIvor:
So when did you join the Army Corps of Engineers?

George Hine:
1942.

Ryan MacIvor:
And were you drafted?

George Hine:
Yeah. I started to college. And that’s the time I got ready to get a book. I never did get a book. That was in the time of confusion stage and everywhere. To start college, not start and wait. So in July of 1942, I went to take my physical and in September I went in the army.

Ryan MacIvor:
Do you remember how much you got paid a month?

George Hine:
$21

Ryan MacIvor:
And when you left the army, what rank were you?

George Hine:
T5. That’s a Technician 5. It’s the same thing as a corporal. With the T for Technician.

Ryan MacIvor:
And where did you do your basic training?

George Hine:
I did that in North Carolina, Mississippi, and Virginia and Montana.

Ryan MacIvor:
So when you were transporting the goods, you went as far as Montana?

George Hine:
No. I went up there to take more basic training, in Helena, Montana. I was in advanced crew and we had already all our truck driving done in Mississippi, Camp Shelvey. And we thought, maybe we were ready but we didn’t know where we were going, you know, whether we were going to Japan or up North. A lot of us figured up North. When we were in Mississippi, we used to take training at night, start the trucks. They wouldn’t freeze over in Mississippi, you see, in case you went to Alaska.

Ryan MacIvor:
Is there any stories or anything else you’d like to share with us?

George Hine:
This outfit, we’d start having reunions right after the war. And the cooks, more or less, they’d got the first reunions up, because they’d fed everybody and they knew everybody. And Charlie Hall, who’s up here, was a mess sergeant. And the first two reunions they had was in Ryan, Ohio. He was a cook. I didn’t even find out about the reunions - I moved from North Carolina to Texas, to go to college - then I heard about it. It’s been a fun trip. I’ve had a lot of great vacations, you see, going up north, down south, everywhere, to meet these people. And most of them, all really amounted to something in their professions that they were in, which I thought was nice.

Ryan MacIvor:
What did you do when you left the army?

George Hine:
I was a college administrator and PR man. [A top journalism was at all] And the last job, I was assistant to the president at Houston Baptist University, down in Houston. And I was also at Howard Payne University in Brownwood and Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene, Texas. You see, my job carried me all over the nation to sports events... Came up to Nashville five or six times, to education meetings and that deal.
When I would, say, have a meeting in Atlanta, I’d call up a friend you met, Talbert, Mrs. Talbert. They’d meet me at the airplane in Atlanta. When I got to Kansas City, Betty Filger, that you met and that’s hosting this, they would meet me in Kansas City, see. Everywhere we went, there was somebody within 40 or 50 miles you would know, in the Uniteds States.
Maxine and I have been to a lot of reunions. The man you met this morning - I guess you did -- Snyder -- we’ve attended... the folks up here have made more reunions than anybody. It’s been a fun group. My wife’s made them all too.
We’d stay in touch with each other. I’ve heard about Alaska, and Dawson Creek. And see, in Brownwood, they had the Streamliners, they’d take a trip every summer. I got to see all those pictures, they’d show me what they did on those vacations. Those streamliners would be going right through Dawson Creek and everything.

George Hine:
And in summer, in September, we were up to, Princess Cruise, we went all the way to Anchorage. But it’s been a fun trip. Of the six up here, five of them were to Alaska.

Ryan MacIvor:
For the record again, could you just tell me your name?

George Hine:
I’m George Hine, H.I.N.E.

Ryan MacIvor:
And you were with the 341st Engineers Company D. And this is June 21, 2003, in Nashville, Tennessee.

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