Galesburg in World War II will be a weekly column exploring major events of the war, their local impact, and daily life in Galesburg as it unfolded, week by week.

War erupts in Europe

On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland. Two days later, Great Britain and France declared war on Germany. This was the beginning of World War II. In Galesburg, this news blared in banner headlines and filled columns of newsprint with thousands of words of uncertainty, fear, and Polish death.

“Poland has been invaded by German armies, her cities bombed and her seaport bombarded,” wrote an editor at the Galesburg Register-Mail.

“Countless lives will be lost, untold misery and suffering inflicted, and billions in treasure which might have been used in the improvement of humanity’s lot will be wasted in a senseless military effort to realize the ambitions of a glory-crazed fanatic… President Roosevelt has expressed his belief, which will be echoed in every American heart, that the United States can and will stay out of the prospective conflict.”

Roosevelt urges U.S. neutrality

Did the war feel far away for folks in Galesburg as they listened to President Franklin D. Roosevelt on the radio the evening of Sept. 3?

“The most dangerous enemies of American peace are those who, without well-rounded information on the whole broad subject of the past, the present, and the future, undertake to speak with assumed authority, to talk in terms of glittering generalities, to give to the nation assurances or prophesies which are of little present or future value,” Roosevelt said. He insisted the United States would remain neutral in this new war.

Prices climb in Galesburg

Regardless of how far the war was and how the residents of Galesburg felt about it, it did not take long for the city to be affected.

The weekly Galesburg Post reported that sugar in Galesburg rose from 4 ½ cents a pound to 7 cents a pound in four days. The price of 48-pound bags of flour jumped from $ 0.99 to $1.65 to $1.25 to $1.95.

“The price soaring is not limited to sugar and flour,” declared the Post. “Pork, beef, corn… all are up.”

Labor Day parade marches Forward

But life did continue in Galesburg from Sept. 1 – 9.

Labor Day was celebrated in Galesburg and included the yearly parade. The grand marshal was Henry Magoon, and the largest group in the parade was Union No. 405, United Brick and Clay Workers of America.

A crowd of about 400 people went to Lincoln Park to hear William Tracy, secretary-treasurer of the United Brick and Clay Workers. Tracy declared that no matter what happened in Europe, America would remain free of “Hitlerism” thanks to the three pillars of patriotism, churches, and unions.

City council debates ordinances

The city council met during the week, with discussion focusing on proposed ordinances regarding health regulations for food handlers and the allowance of bowling on Sundays, the appointment of Dr. E.H. Seifert as commissioner of health, and the consideration of bids for the destruction of remains of the former Marsh Horse and Mule Company at Cherry and Waters streets.

Butler plant issues first paychecks

After Labor Day, men returned to work at the new Butler Manufacturing plant to continue work on a government contract, producing grain bins. On the 7th, the first Butler paychecks in Galesburg were issued. A total of $5,442 was paid to 175 workers. But those were only the first workers at the plant, as by the time of the first checks, more than 400 men were employed. The first Galesburg-made bin to be erected in Knox County was at the farm of Russell Swigert, southeast of the city.

Explosion in Hillsboro injures former residents

A former Galesburg man and his wife were injured on Sept. 3 in Hillsboro when their apartment building exploded. The explosion was caused by a suicide bombing of a 74-year-old former owner of the building who lived in the basement. The man used 240 sticks of dynamite at 2:17 a.m. and was the only fatality. Six were injured, including Dale Clifford and his pregnant wife, Maxine. Both were hospitalized with multiple injuries but would recover.

Crime and court reports

• Three men were arrested as suspects in the gang rape of a 24-year-old woman. According to the Register-Mail, the woman threatened to commit suicide if her name was used in the newspaper.
• Another case was being investigated in which “a local girl and her escort were lured into an auto” by four men on the Public Square. They were then driven northwest of town on U.S. 150. The four men then allegedly beat the man and attempted to rape the woman. The man was reported to have needed stitches from injuries caused by the beating.
• James Marsden was arrested after being accused of smacking neighbor Thelma Lundeen in the head with a piece of lumber during an argument over an apple tree in the 100 block of Ohio Avenue. In a twist, when Lundeen went to the police station to make the complaint about Marsden, it was found that she already had a warrant out for her own arrest. She was accused of acquiring lumber on credit using a false name from a firm in Henderson.
• Multiple reports were received of a man harassing women in the area of Knox and Day streets. The man allegedly was asking women where they were going and then “was guilty of indecent exposure.”
• Four teenagers were taken into custody, accused of being caught in the act of stealing “dishes, curtains, antiques, tablecloths and other articles” from a vacant home at 444 N. Academy St.
• A 1939 Ford sedan was stolen from a downtown parking lot on East Simmons Street but was later found abandoned in the 600 block of South Academy Street.
• An anonymous complaint was made “to halt the activities of a band of gypsies encamped just outside the city limits on Grand Avenue.”

Pico wins fourth golf title

In sports news, Jack Pico, who won his first golf tournament in Galesburg in 1926 as a teenager, won the City Golf Championship at Bunker Links for the fourth time, overcoming Dan Crouse and defending champion Claire Johnson.

Knox graduate heads to aeronautics training

It was reported that Robert C. Twyman, 24, a Galesburg native and Knox College graduate, was being sent to the Spartan School of Aeronautics at Tulsa, Oklahoma. Twyman, a Lieutenant whose parents remained in Galesburg, had graduated from West Point in June and married in Oklahoma only two weeks before his assignment. Twyman did not survive the war. He was killed in an air crash in California in 1944.