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LIFE LESSONS ‘Follow through’ 100-year-old WWII vet urges

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Posted: Friday, November 11, 2016 10:54 am

If you start something, finish it. If you never finish anything, you never accomplish anything.”

That is the main advice Carl Gibes has to share with those who ask the 100-year-old for life lessons learned.

The World War II bomber pilot is a Chicago, Ill. native now living in Enterprise.

“I succeeded in the military because I stayed with it,” Gibes said, sharing a glance at a framed portrait of himself in his military uniform. “Set your goals and follow them.”

Gibes was born to immigrant parents two years before the end of World War I. His father lost his insurance business, home and car during the Great Depression in 1929.

“My folks had a nice bungalow. In today’s world it would still be considered a really nice home,” Gibes said. “We lost it so we moved in to the back four rooms of a neighborhood confectionary store.

“Four little rooms. That was tough but as kids, we didn’t realize it,” Gibes said as he described life for his parents, himself and two younger sisters. “We sweated it out in a little four room place. You manage. That’s life.

“I’m ashamed to tell you,” Gibes said, laughing out loud as he remembered life in the next years, during Prohibition. “My father was an operator, selling alcohol illegally. Any alcohol was all sold undercover. That was his business.”

To the outside world, Gibes’ father was in the real estate business. “That was his cover,” Gibes said shaking his head smiling. “His business was illegally selling 180 proof alcohol wholesale to all the speak easies.

“He got it from (the American gangster during the Prohibition era who was co-founder and boss of the Chicago mob) Al Capone, you’ve heard of Capone? That’s the way it operated,” Gibes recalled. “You had wholesalers and retailers. The cops knew it. They were paid off.”

As a youngster, Gibes helped his father deliver liquor to the speak easies in the Chicago area. “My dad said, ‘Do this,’ and I did it.”

When Prohibition ended in 1933, making the sale of alcohol legal, Gibes’ father opened a tavern. “In those days, they were family places to go,” Gibes explained. The back rooms were set aside for women.

Gibes met his future wife, Hildegarde, while he was working at a department store in Chicago.

Gibes job was to serve as an usher for the Colleen Moore dollhouse. One of the most popular silent film stars of her era, Moore had assembled 100 industry colleagues to craft a $500,000 miniature castle. During the Great Depression, Moore toured the country with the six-foot tall castle raising funds for children’s charities. “That was the main attraction at the store that Christmas. That was my first job,” Gibes said, adding that the one-of-a-kind castle is still housed at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago.

 “I was going to night school at Northwestern University. Hilda had a job as a waitress at Steinway Drugstore,” Gibes said. “On the way to school, I’d stop there and have lunch. From that point on, it’s history.”

Carl and Hildegarde were married April 15, 1939. World War II began Dec. 7, 1941 and January 1942, Gibes volunteered for military pilot training.

“I was pretty old when I enlisted,” Gibes said. “The war was going on already and they were running short of pilots.

“It happened so fast. I joined one day and the next week I was gone,” Gibes said. He completed basic flight training in Albany, Ga., and advanced flight training in Columbus, Miss. He then served as a twin-engine instructor.

“Then I got orders to the Pacific Theatre as a replacement bomber pilot,” Gibes said. “Mind you, I’d never even been inside of a bomber, so here I’m going from a training airplane to fly B-24s, a four-engine monster.”

Assigned to the 5th Air Force in February 1944, Gibes went to Port Moresby, New Guinea, and bases in Luzon and China. “I flew about 12 combat missions over in the Pacific as a co-pilot. Then I was promoted to pilot as a 1st Lt.

“Two days before they dropped the atom bomb on Nagasaki, my bombing group had bombed it with B-24s,” Gibes said. “We went in there originally to put them off guard. We had no idea what we were doing at the time.”

Gibes’ military medals include the Air Medal with Oak Leaf Clusters, the Pacific Theatre Ribbon with three Bronze Stars and the Philippine Liberation Ribbon with Battle Star.

With the end of WWII, Gibes served as an instructor pilot until his discharge from military service. He then returned to work with the Chicago Transit Authority and joined the Air Force Reserves.

“I started at CTA as a one-man streetcar man,” Gibes said, adding that he graduated to driving buses and ultimately retirement from the CTA as the director of personnel, responsible for personnel actions of 9,400 employees. He retired from the Army Reserves as a major.

The Gibes’ moved to Enterprise from the Jacksonville, Ark., area in 1986. His wife, who passed away July 31, 2005, was a retired office manager for the Monsanto Corporation.

The couple are the parents of Shirley Lumsdon, living in Florida, and Ron Gibes, who lives in Enterprise.

Also living in Enterprise are Gibes’ grandson, Ronald, Ronald’s wife Erica and the couple’s sons, Crews and Trace.

During their marriage, Carl and Hildegarde Gibes travelled extensively, to include visits to the Canary Islands, Africa, Portugal, Spain, Germany, England, the Azores, the Caribbean, Alaska, the Hawaiian Islands, Japan, Guam and Singapore.

The Gibes’ were active members of St. John Catholic Church and active members of the ballroom dancing group in Enterprise. “When Hilda died, the dancing died,” he says shaking his head. Gibes said he still can’t believe that he is 100 years old. “It amazes me.

“It’s funny how a life patterns itself and you never know where you’re going to end up,” Gibes said. “It’s been a long and interesting life. I was able to fulfill everything that I started out to do.

“It’s a matter of staying with it,” Gibes added. “If it’s worth starting, it’s worth finishing.  None of this would happen without the encouragement of my wife, family and God’s help.”

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