Autobiographical outline: Kenneth Allen Freeman

Year	Age	Description and/or Information
1931	born	Kenneth Allen, the 2nd son of Wallace Hall and Eva Day Freeman born Saturday 26 December 1931, 2:30 am 1630 Worth Street, Fort Worth, Texas. Dr. Allen A. Lang attending. Wallace was 24 and Mom 22. Herbert Hoover was president and we were two years into the "Great Depression". Wallace was a steel worker courtesy of Uncle Cortez Day who was a supervisor at the Texas Steel Foundry.
1932	1	Franklin Delano Roosevelt elected president.
1936	5	Wallace built small frame home on an acre of Grandad’s (Olin Knight Freeman) farm. The little house was a clapboard, frame, two bedroom with no electricity or water. Light was from kerosene lamps, cooking was done on a kerosene range, there was a real ice-box and the only heat was from a fireplace. Water was drawn by the bucket-full from the well out back and there was an outhouse behind the pecan tree. It was built mostly from left-over and second hand lumber. It would be poor today but by depression era standards it was about average for rural Texas. We did not know we were poor because everyone was. Telephone service comes and a hand crank phone is installed in the big house. We are promised electricity soon.
		Ken and Stan; probably 1936 but could be school pictures for 1937.
1937	6	Started school, Smithfield Elementary, Smithfield, Texas. I would be with most of my first year classmates for the next ten years. The school was a small and crowded two story brick. There was a gymnasium built by the WPA, a small clapboard lunchroom, a coal shed, windmill with water tank and two ten hole outhouses. The teachers were strict and smart and accepted no excuses for failure to perform. I was fortunate to be able to read before beginning school. Electricity comes to the farm but no plumbing yet. Classmates that I can recall were: First Grade: Abbbot, Tom Autrey, Lawrence* Autrey, Bonnie* Autrey, ......[f]* (lived across from school) Berry, Billy Wiseman, Gorman Sturch, Loy Moreland, Roy Harston, Frank Hay, Rose Lewis, Latrell Polinski, Pauline McKelvy, Phyllis O'Conner, Bobbie Ruth Stuart, Nancy Owen, Sally Null, Lorene Later: Masters, James Samuels, Bobby Rose, Sterling Estell, Delbert Howard, Delores (* not related)
1938	7	Danny Jack Freeman born. Mom had bad time and had to have hysterectomy. Wallace and Mom separated. Living with "Granny" Kathryn Hall Freeman on the farm. Everyone worked on the farm and there were no small or easy jobs. Grandad was the only one with a real job, with the Frisco Railroad, and he was rarely home.
1939	8	First and only bicycle and first gun. I got the gun before the bike. Working after school on farm. Wallace and Mom divorce. We watch in despair one cold winter Sunday morning as our little home burns. The tenant had left the fireplace unattended and sparks had set the house afire.
1940	9	Grandad Olin K. (OK) Freeman died 2 September 1940, Labor Day, during lunch at Triangle Inn, Sherman, Grayson Co., Texas. His death was a tragic loss for the family as it seemed to disintegrate afterward. Grandad left Granny in good financial condition but she would struggle with the farm for many years.
1941	10	Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor on Sunday 7 December and country is at war. I heard of it on the radio as we sat listening to the evening news. We children could not comprehend the reality of war so far away.
		Ken, Danny and Stanley; probably 1942 but no later than 1943.
1943	12	Wallace enlisted in the Navy as a Seabee (construction) as a Petty Officer First Class. Dad was too old and draft exempt but found a loop-hole by joining the Seabees. Mother marries Oscar Warmuth 9 October. Zuma Drucilla Smith Day, "Momma Day", my grandmother, died 28 November. She was a kind and gentle grandmother.
		Ken and Latrell Lewis: 1943 school play pictures. The walking stick was my great grandfather Capt. Wesley N. Freeman's: see family biographies.
1944	13	Oscar enlists in the Army. He was too old to be drafted and had an exemption because of his defense industry position. Living with Mom in Ridgelea and attending school at W.C. Striplin Jr. High, a Junior ROTC school in Fort Worth, Texas. We were not afflicted with racial diversity quotas then and attended about any school within our district. I wanted ROTC and Mom consented with the provisio that I found my own way to school. Work newspaper route morning, evening and Sunday. Wallace wounded at Iwo Jima. Live part time on farm.
1945	14	Oscar wounded in Austrian campaign. Buy my first car, 1929 Dodge Sedan, in partnership with my brother Stanley. I had saved $50 from my paper route earnings and Stanley sold his steer calf for the same amount and we bought $100 worth of kid trouble. It was a good thing that the sheriff was a friend. President Roosevelt dies and VP Harry S. Truman becomes president.
1946	15	Atomic Bombs, Hiroshima on August 6 and Nagasaki August 9. Wallace comes home, Oscar comes home, both crippled with wounds that would pain them for life. I fulfill a long time dream by joining the Civil Air Patrol as a cadet. Living on the farm most of the time. Learn about shortwave radio from a friend who had built one from a Popular Science and start my life long hobby.
		Civil Air Patrol cadet in 1946.
1947	16	First motorcycle, a late '30s Servi-Cycle. First date in Wallace’s old Model A Ford. Wallace began rebuilding the farm home, a new two story house, and I helped after school and weekends. I learned more about carpentry than I really wanted to know at that time. I have used those skills the rest of my life.
1948	17	Truman elected president. I go to Kansas with school friend, George A. Freeman (no relation) (d) to work on flood relief. We learned how to operate Caterpillar bull-dozers and could get them stuck in the mud as well as anyone..
1949	18	Join USAF 3 February. Basic training Sheppard Field, Wichita Falls, Texas. Technical training at Chanute Field, Rantoul, Illinois: Aircraft Mechanic September and Engine Mechanic in November. Go to home base Stuart AFB, Smyrna, Tennessee, 62nd Troop Carrier Squadron. Military is desegregated without any problems.
1950	19	North Korea invades South Korea and we are at war again. Our government called Korea a "police action" but when armies are shooting at other armies, it sure looks like war. Marry Dora Leopal Cole (d). We modify our C-119s for the Pacific flight and fly to Japan to enter war. Winter in Korea at Kimpo Air Field south of Seoul. Home base is Ashiya, Japan.
1951	20	Daughter Glenda Lee born 26 March. President Truman fires General McAurthur. Cease fire in July. Korean authorities take Rhee Chee Yung, our little Korean orphan boy away and we get into a bit of trouble for keeping him. We had saved the kid’s life when we found him naked in the snow beside the Han River. See his and "Duke" Densmore's picture in the Air Force pages. Reenlist USAF.
1952	21	More Korea. Eisenhower elected president. Rotated home to USA. When I reported to my new assignment, the 1740th Air Transport Squadron at Palm Beach International Airport, West Palm Beach, Florida, I was advised to not wear my uniform off-base. Welcome home soldier, thanks for doing our dirty work, you are welcome home but not in our town. Sent to Sperry Analyzer school in December and then C-124 training.
1953	22	My son Alan Cole born 23 May. Korean Armistice July. It is December 2001 as I write this and our troops are still there on the 38th Parallel.
1953	22	Discharged USAF as Staff Sergeant at Palm Beach International Airport, Florida, ROK Unit Citation, Presidential Unit Citation, UN Service, Korean Service with 5 Battle Stars. Enlist USAFR. Work Chance Vought Aircraft, Grand Prarie, Texas as aircraft mechanic. Meet my first sister, Patricia Lynn, while visiting Wallace and Vera.
1954	23	Attend Palm Beach Jr. College, Lake Park, Florida and work various jobs in and around Palm Beach, Florida. We had interesting classmates: Burt Reynolds, George Hamilton and Matt Markham. More important were friends of a lifetime: Wayne Layman (d), Al Wilbur and George Hackett (d).
1955	24	Divorce Dora Leopal Cole. Working Lockheed Aircraft in Marietta, Georgia as aircraft mechanic on the first C-130s delivered to the USAF.
1956	25	Back in regular USAF at PBIA in the 1741 Air Transport Squadron. Eisenhower re-elected.
1957	26	"Granny" (Katherine) Freeman dies 20 December in Smithfield, Texas. Marry Carolyn Elizabeth Collins. Discharge USAF. Re-join Civil Air Patrol. Sports car racing.
1958	27	Divorce Carolyn Collins. Marry Barbara Bliss. Work Salon of Music as electronics technician. Amateur Radio license: WN4AMW as novice and WA4AMW later as technician class. Oliver Washington "Poppa" Day dies 28 May.
1959	28	Work Southern Radio Service, Lake Worth, Florida. Sail on Susan of Providence, a 68 year old Wilbur Morse design Friendship, Maine sloop, with some college friends on an extended vacation (see Boating). We all learned sailing the hard way.
1959	28	Dean Crandall Bliss Freeman born December, in Fort Worth, Texas.
1960	29	Working Biscayne Radio Service, Lake Worth, Florida. Working on Kennedy election. John F. Kennedy elected president.
1961	30	Working East Coast Electronics, West Palm Beach, Florida. Presented personalized portrait of President Kennedy for work in primaries. Divorce Barbara Bliss.
1962	31	Working RCA computer division in Quality Control. Susie and I restore a Silhouette sail boat. Sailing and marathon power boat racing.
1963	32	Working RCA. President Kennedy killed 22 November.
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