This is Part I of a Trilogy. Part II will be posted tomorrow, Part III the following day.

Bobby Hardin was barely 18 when he enlisted in ’43. Prior to that, he’d never been further than 50 miles outside Fort Stockton.

After 13 weeks of basic training he found himself on a train heading from one side of the country to the other, where he would ship out and cross the Atlantic to serve his country on the battlefield of another. His youth and inexperience kept him from fearing the fight that was to come, but not the loneliness that already gripped him. Raised by his maternal grandmother and having never had a girlfriend, his sense of solitude was sometimes overwhelming.

When the troop train pulled into North Platte, Nebraska, as nearly every single one did, 17 minutes were allotted before the train would pull out again. That gave the ladies of North Platte just enough time to board the train with a basket full of brown bags, one for each soldier.

Known as the North Platte Canteen, all the ladies in town had been serving the troops in this way since the trains began running. Each bag contained an egg salad sandwich, an apple, a cold bottle of fresh milk, and an ample wedge of homemade cake.

The volunteer assigned to Bobby Hardin’s car was a 17 year old girl named Jo Ellen, a senior at North Platte High. She was pleasant, if plain, and greeted each soldier with a smile and genuine wishes for a safe journey. When she got to Bobby she lingered just a moment or two longer, sensing his loneliness.

As he unwrapped the sandwich from the waxed paper it was encased in, he caught her looking at him. Taking the apple out of the bag, he shined it on the sleeve of his wool uniform. She slipped the Parker fountain pen out of the pocket of her sweater and lifted the bag from beside him. In a script that was feminine and flowing, Jo Ellen wrote her name and home address on the back of the wrinkled brown bag and handed it back to him. “Write me if you want to.” she said, and then continued down the center aisle of the pullman car.

Write her, he most certainly did. A couple times a month at first. After a month or two, it was every week. Later it was every day. His letters were sweet and tried to mask what he was witnessing. She wrote back, though not quite as often, as she was getting ready to graduate and working at the canteen almost every day.

After a year, he wrote that he loved her. A few months later, she reciprocated.

After two years, when he was just months from coming home, he asked her to marry him. He told her he had a job lined up back in Fort Stockton, as well as an apartment they could rent. He told her that he had saved nearly all of his army paychecks and, if she agreed, he would send her the money to take the train to Fort Stockton. Once she got there, there would be enough money to buy a brand new Ford convertible. He’d made all the arrangements.

She agreed. The journey from Anzio back to New York by ship and then the trains from NYC back to Texas all felt longer than the time he’d spent in Europe. When the Santa Fe Chief pulled into the depot, he hoped to see Jo Ellen on the platform, but couldn’t spot her in the crowd.

He grabbed his duffle bag and headed through the station and out the front entrance. Just outside the door, he saw the Feather Grey over Red Ford Super DeLuxe convertible parked right in front. It had just been waxed, the top was down, and it was beautiful, just like the dealer had described it in his correspondence.

He looked for Jo Ellen, but all he saw was a letter under the windshield on the driver’s side, written in the flowing, feminine script he’d been reading for over two years.

Part II of the trilogy will be posted tomorrow.