Not everyone who went came back, and those who did didn’t want to talk about it. That’s what Charlie and Harriett Muston remember about the soldiers who went to World War II.
Charlie lived in Avon in 1945 on a street with four houses. Harriett lived in Indianapolis. When the war ended, Charlie was 9 years old and Harriett was 8.
They remember writing letters to the “soldier boys,” air-raid sirens, blackouts and using ration stamps. Mothers and wives went to work and continued working after the war.
Charlie said he’ll never forget the day Pearl Harbor was bombed. It was unusually warm and his father wondered aloud where it was.
Their experiences at the end of the war were as different as their environs. Charlie’s family must have fired shotguns into the air. They celebrated a lot of things that way.
In Indianapolis, people crowded the streets. Harriett and her mother took the bus to Monument Circle. She jumped and played in the water that day.
“That was the highlight of my year,” Harriett said. “(Mother) never said one word to me about getting my shoes wet, my dress wet or anything. In fact, she was in the water.”
Originally published in Hendricks County ICON, 2016. Republished here for archival and portfolio purposes.