as told by Bob


My dad, Glen Schader, was in WWI. He grew up in Osceola. I think he was the youngest person in Clarke County to sign up. He enlisted in the Navy and they transferred him into the Marines. Dad never talked about it very much, but I know he was in France, in the medics, and went through one of the worst battles of that war. I haven't a clue how to spell it — it began with Chad.

Toad Mumper told me that when Dad came home, they were playing baseball on east Grant Street. Dad was nothing but blisters from mustard gas. He lost one lung, and was in either Camp LeJeune or Quantico hospital for quite some time. He came home in 1919, and went to work for Earl Able, who was a plumber. He worked for him until 1926, when Dr. Harken helped get him started in the plumbing business.

During WWII they were going to draft my dad again, but because he'd lost a lung in WWI, he couldn't pass the physical. They asked him to go into a defense plant, and he had a choice of going to Belleview, Nebraska, or Baltimore, Maryland, or Wichita, Kansas. He chose Belleview, which was the Omaha area.. He was a sheet-metal worker in a factory where they built B-29s. We were there during the war, and the day the war was over was the day his job ended. Our family returned to Osceola in 1941.

Robert (Bob)

I was born in Osceola in July 1936, to Glen and Hazel Schader. I had one sister, Mildred. She married Stanton Conger and both are now deceased. I have a nephew, Bob Conger who has the Car-Quest Auto Parts Store in Osceola. He is in the National Guard, in Special Forces.

I was in kindergarten at West Ward school when Dad the took the job at Belleview. We moved to Council Bluffs because we couldn't find a place to live in the small town of Belleview. We lived there, where I went to school until I was in the third grade. By that time they had built a bunch of new houses, so we lived in a new house until the war was over. My kindergarten was in Council Bluffs where I continued through second grade, at which time I went to school in Belleview. I was in fourth grade when we came back to Osceola.

No part of plumbing appealed to me when I was a kid, and I told my dad I wasn't going to be a plumber. His reply was that he didn't care what I did but I was going to work, so I went to work at the Chevrolet Garage when it was Lewis Chevrolet. I started washing cars there when I was 13 years old. Later one of my really close friends was Pete Ahrens. He worked at the north Standard Oil Station for Shorty Twombley and I worked at the south Standard Oil Station for Bro Saner. We ran around together all the time.

I graduated from high school in 1955, and in 1956, my buddy, Pete Ahrens, and I enlisted in the Navy together. We went to Great Lakes, Illinois for basic training, after which they sent me to machinist mate school in Great Lakes. When I got out of there, I went aboard an aircraft carrier, the USS Princeton in Long Beach, California, which was our home port. Compared with what some fellows went through, mine was a good duty. I worked in the engine rooms, the boiler rooms, and on steam heat, air conditioning, and refrigeration. It was a fairly comfortable. We had good food, and a warm place to sleep. With a full crew, the squadron aboard, we had approximately 3500 people, approximately the population of Osceola.

I Made three cruises to the Far East and the South Pacific. It was during the cold war, so there was tension between the United States and Russia but no conflict. We had one scare. A submarine chased us for 30-some days. Formosa was a problem. It was in league with Russia. We kept cruising around the island and were warned that if we came within 12 miles they would start shooting. We would pull in sometimes and they did start firing at us, but they were more warning shots than anything.

I was in service from 1956 until 1960. I was in longer than Pete because when my discharge papers came out, we were in Yokosuka, Japan, just south of Tokyo. They called me to the personnel office and said they were sending me back to the states for a discharge. I asked how I would be going back and they said I would be flying. I said, "I am not flying back. I've been on this ship for 3 1/2 years and I'm going to ride it back." They warned me, "You will have to extend for this cruise. You may be here three months or six months," I said, "Whatever. I'm going to ride it back."

When I came home in 1960, I went to work for my dad in the plumbing business. Thus began my career that at one time I wanted no part of. But Beverly, whom I married soon after my return to Osceola, and I will attest, it has been a good life.






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Last Revised June 13, 2015