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Gottlieb 'Bud' Bieber Returns to Area
as Published Author
"Gottlieb 'Bud' Bieber Returns to Area as Published Author." Selby Record, 3 September 2003.
"I've never been an author before, "Gottlieb "Bud"
Bieber said, "but I kind of like the attention I have gotten,"
he laughed. "Imagine, I’m 81 years of age and I was a computer
illiterate for 77 years of that! 'Windows 95' opened a whole new world
for me". Bud's new found computer literacy launched his first
literary effort, "And So It Goes, As I Remember" published
as part of the Germans From Russia Heritage Collection, North Dakota
State University Libraries, Fargo, N.D.
"And So It Goes" embraces the wonder years of Bud's youth
on the farm in rural Campbell County, tilling soil with five black
Percheron horses with a two bottom plow, the economic hardships
of the "dirty thirties", lessons learned teaching in rural
country schools, slow dancing to "Stardust" during the
"Swing Era", closely following the "hitting streak"
of legendary ballplayer Joe DiMaggio in the Aberdeen Morning American
News, the harrowing days of World War II, and the nation's economic
rebirth following the war. The prose is accompanied by 26 pages
of sapiatoned plates.
The son of Heinrich and Katherina Bieber, Bud was born in 1919.
His ancestors were of German heritage. However, they had emigrated
to Russia during the reign of Czar Alexander I before finally immigrating
to America. Bud grew up on a farm in Campbell County, 14 miles southwest
of Eureka. He attended the Sutley Country School through the eighth
grade. As a freshman in high school he attended the Eureka Lutheran
Academy. However, when it closed in 1934, he attended his sophomore
year in Java High School. Students in rural areas were able to board
right at the school. "I lived in the west wing of the high
school which was the boy's dormitory," Bud said. "The
girls boarded in a two story house on Main Street in Java.
"When my mother passed away in 1935 my dad relocated to Aberdeen
and I graduated £rom Central High School in 1936. "
"Teaching is the greatest job on earth, "he said."
I had 44 nieces and nephews and I liked kids," he said, "so
I thought I would make a pretty good teacher. I attended Northern
State Teacher's College from 1936-37. Back then you were certified
to teach in country schools after a year in college. It was just
prior to World War II. Those were tough times and jobs of any kind
were hard to find. My first teaching assignment was at the Reuer
School southeast of Lowry. I had 16 kids in grades 2 through 8.
I was paid $55 a month, so you could see that I wasn't going to
get rich awfully fast," he laughed.
My next teaching assignment in 1938-39 was two miles north of Bowdle,
"he said. "I wanted to go back to school the following
year and I was already enrolled, but the job that I thought I had
fell through. Like I said, jobs of any kind were tough to find.
So I moved back to Eureka to the farm. I went from September to
December of 1939 without a job. However, in January 1940, a teaching
assignment opened up at the West Ryan School, 7 miles south and
1 mile west of Java due to the pregnancy of one of the teachers.
I was employed there from January to May 1940 and began the 1940-41
school year when on December 7, 1941 the Declaration of War against
Japan occurred!"
Bud enlisted with the Walworth County Draft Board December 26,
1941. He was sent to Basic Training At Navy Pier, Chicago, Illinois.
"I wanted to become an aviation fighter pilot. It was very
competitive but I didn't have enough college math credits,"
he said. Some of the MOS's assignments were rather random. I was
assigned to be an aviation mechanic. I suppose that was a good choice
because I was pretty good at fixing things on the farm. What had
once been a 21/2 year course in aviation mechanics had been condensed
to 6 months.
"The City of Chicago had set up a serviceman's center,"
he said. " It was a home away from home to many lonely servicemen.
Volunteers would come in and feed and entertain the troops. Some
of the most fun we had were during songfests. Volunteers were the
backbone of the War effort. Without those volunteers and individuals
who stood behind the troops, like "Rosie the
Riviter' I don't think we would have won the war.
It was at Navy Pier that I meet my future bride, Laverne Kroggel.
She was a secretary at an insurance agency in Chicago. "She
was very patient," Bud smiled, "because it was another
2 years before I would return and we would be married".
Although Bud wanted to become a fighter pilot he trained to ride
"shotgun" to fighter pilots as a rear seat gunner in a
two seater Douglas dive bomber at Aerial Gunnery school in Jacksonville,
Florida. "We learned to shoot 30 calibre and 50 calibre and
80 millimeter machine guns. In just 4 weeks we memorized all 70
different pieces of machine guns, disassemble and assemble a
machine gun in 25 seconds. We practiced like our lives depended
on it... because they did"!
Although admitting to "seeing action" during scouting
missions, including over the Solomon Islands, including the Battle
of Guadalcanal, the Battle of Munda and the Battle of Rabaul in
the southwest Pacific, Bud politely declined any personal narrative
of his experiences. "I'm certainly not an advocate of war,"
he said, "and I'm simply not interested in talking about it"
"We had a masterful leader in Franklin Roosevelt," he
noted. "Early on he painted Hitler as the pure evil he was."
"Diplomacy plays a major role in preventing wars, " he
said. "It is our responsibility as citizens to become informed
voters and vote for the best diplomat who will keep us out of another
war. "
After returning from the war in August 1945, Bud and La Verne were
married and settled in Chicago. Bud began a 35 year career as a
layout operator for Western Electric.
Bud has never interpreted retirement as a time to slow down but
to simply switch gears in an attempt to discover another "retirement
project". He purchased a Video Camera and has captured many
genealogical tapes for posterity that have become treasures to family
members. "I love to cook and make a 'wicked' cheesecake, if
I do say so myself".
Although LaVerne recently passed away, Bud continues to live in
Chicago. He has always loved to travel and between trips across
the country and to Europe, he always manages to make a visit "home",
a priority in planning his itinerary. Sister-in-law Evelyn Bieber
lives in Eureka.
A lot of literary nostalgia is available to you. "And So It
Goes" is available thru the publisher at:
Germans from Russia Collection
And So It Goes Book
NDSU Libraries
PO Box 5599
Fargo, ND 58105- 5599
or
E-mail: BBBR@worldnet.att.net
or
http://library.ndsu.edu/grhc/order/nd_sd/bieber.html
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