I do a lot of writing in coffee shops. When visiting my old hometown of Dysart, Iowa, I frequent KE Black Mercantile, a kitchen store and cafe featuring the world’s best biscuits and gravy. In the mornings, the old-timers gather for coffee and talk about the weather, church events, and (because it’s Iowa) farming.
Last week in the shop, I approached some old farmers, a couple of whom have, for years, helped represent Dysart’s veterans by marching Old Glory down Main Street at the head of the town’s Fourth of July parade. One of those farmers was Dean Young, whose service in the U.S. Air Force changed his life as well as the lives of a lot of people I knew as neighbors and friends. Let me explain.
Enid Bailey was six years old when World War II began. She lived in the small English town of Newton-le-Willows, which was right under the flight path of Nazi bombers on their way to Liverpool. Her mother cried the day her father installed a bomb shelter in the backyard. Their town’s grocery store was obliterated. Explosions could be heard all the way from Liverpool. One night, young Enid saw an orange glow in the west, a perverse reverse dawn. “Isn’t it beautiful, mother?”
“No. It’s awful. Go to bed, Enid.”
Each day, leaving for school, she worried she’d never see her parents again. They endured shortages of everything but grim British determination. Enid grew up during the war and Britain’s difficult postwar years of reconstruction.
Dean was raised on a farm near the tiny town of Truro, Iowa. He joined the Air Force in 1950. In 1953, instead of being shipped to the Korean War, he was sent to England. After World War II, the United States had left stockpiles of extra munitions in the United Kingdom. These were suddenly needed in Korea, and Airman 2nd Class Young was tasked with helping to identify which weapons were good enough to be used in the new war.
But on March 22, 1953, he made a discovery far more important than a stockpile of old bombs. That night, he happened to visit a pub where he met Enid. After a drink at the pub, the new couple went to a dance at the RAF base. It must have been quite a dance. By June, Dean and Enid were engaged. They proudly showed me their wedding photo from Sept. 26, 1953. Both looked young and happy, with Dean in his Air Force dress uniform.
When Dean’s time in England was over, Enid faced the difficult task of saying goodbye to her family. She returned to America with her husband, first to Chicago. She was thrilled to learn that there was no food rationing, which had been the rule in England since she was a girl. Everybody seemed better dressed. The war hadn’t ravaged Chicago as it had Liverpool and London. Dean’s parents welcomed them at the airport. Enid greeted her new mother and father. They were instantly close.
Later, the young couple lived and worked on the family farm. “I felt that I was dropped in the middle of nowhere,” Enid told me. She missed the sea. But she had been tough enough to grow up during the blitz, and she adapted. “I had to be a farm wife. Dress chickens, take care of orphaned sheep.”
“I made a real farm girl out of her,” Dean said proudly.
In her first five years on the farm, Enid gave birth to three of the family’s four daughters. Eventually, Dean and Enid left farming. Dean got a job selling farm equipment, and the family settled in Dysart. For decades, they’ve been important members of the community. One of their grandsons was a good friend of mine.
A host of children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren owe their lives to Dean and Enid falling in love 66 years ago. A significant part of my hometown and upbringing were shaped by Airman 2nd Class Dean Young’s mission in England and the wonderful bride Enid he found there. The service sometimes blesses us like that.
Trent Reedy served as a combat engineer in the Iowa National Guard from 1999 to 2005, including a tour of duty in Afghanistan.
