I finished Holy Name High School in 1938. I wanted to go to college. The only college [talked about] in the house was John Carroll, John Carroll, John Carroll. My brother [Robert] had graduated in the JCU class of ’37. We lived in Cleveland Heights. It was a logical progression: If I went to college, it would be John Carroll.
We didn’t have any money in the house. The tuition, room, and board would have been prohibitive. I paid every penny of my way through John Carroll. My parents never gave me a dime. I stayed out of school a year after graduation from Holy Name in 1938. Most of the fellows in our class of ’43 graduated from high school in ’39. John V. Corrigan – the late John V., who was a judge – both of us finished high school in ’38, he from Saint Ignatius and me from Holy Name. I remember playing football against them.
Many of the kids from Saint Ignatius became my very dear and close friends once I got to Carroll. I always admired the boys from Saint Ignatius. It was easy to pick them out of the class. They were mature and so well educated, and I always envied them that.
I started classes in September 1939. I think we had – we always claimed – the largest freshman class ever enrolled in JCU up until that time. I think that we had about 130 in round figures, give or take a half dozen or so. Primarily, we were referred to as a “streetcar college,” because most of the students at JCU then were students from Cleveland. We had Bernet Hall. It was the only student dormitory on the campus then. Probably most of the boarders in Bernet were from Chicago, a large number of them from Detroit, and one or two from various cities around here – Pittsburgh, Youngstown, and so on.
I was very much impressed by John Carroll and the learning atmosphere. I was awed by the capabilities and the intelligence of the professors. The Jesuit priests are so helpful. Always willing to help seek you out and offer assistance when they saw that it was needed. That really impressed me.
I have a nephew who is a Jesuit. He’s been in Nepal for 53 years. Jesuits set a good example. Always did for me. They were ready, willing, and able to help.
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[The Depression] is why my dad had no job. He had been in the construction business, and you know what the construction business was during the Depression days. My brother had gone to Carroll, and he had a football scholarship. Tuition was no problem. When I came along, my football and basketball days were left behind in high school. I had to work my way through, plus, when we got in my sophomore year, I was ready to be drafted as were some other students of that age here at John Carroll.
So we had to sign up in some kind of officers training program. I signed up along with a dozen other fellows in V-7, the navy officers training program. At that time, we had two years of school left – we had our junior and senior years. That meant we’d graduate in June of ’43. The navy said, “You fellows are all going to be finished with college by January 1943.” Obviously, this caused problems and questions in our own minds, so a group of us went in to see Father Ed McCue, who was the dean.
We told him of our dilemma: that the navy said we’d have our college degree by February 1, 1943, at which time we are going to be ordered to report for the navy midshipman school south of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana. He said, “Well, let us think about it and see what we can work out.” He was very sympathetic to our problem. As it evolved, he said, “You won’t be able to take a major. If you’re in business school, you can stay there. You’ll just take basic courses. Elective courses kind of went out the window. We went to school through the last two summers, we went to school on Saturday, as I recall, and we took some courses in the night school.
We finished two years of work in a year and a half. It worked out all right. We got through it. We had no alternative. Everybody was realistic about this – this was it. If we didn’t like it, we could say to the navy, “Forget officer training school and make me a seaman second class instead.” None of us wanted to do that. It turned out all right. Eleven or 12 of us finished in January. At that time, in the senior class, there were 71 students. Thirty-five or 36 of us were in the first accelerated class that JCU ever had. We graduated January 17, 1943. Of those 35 or 36, 11 or 12 of them had signed up in the navy V-7 program, and we all reported to South Bend on February 1 for our officer’s training program.
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Midway through high school, I started to work at the University Club at 3813 Euclid Avenue. Anderson 10091 – I remember the telephone number.
In the summertime, I took care of the tennis courts. They had eight clay courts, and four of them I sprinkled, rolled, and lined everyday. That was my job in the morning. I would take care of fixing up the courts – readying them for play – and then I would help the pro give tennis lessons. If I wanted to, I’d stick around in the afternoon and play tennis with the members if someone came along and didn’t have a partner and wanted to play a game. I did that for six summers.
The job extended beyond the summer months. I would work at the front desk on Sundays, when the club actually was closed as far as the dining facilities. They had rooms to accommodate 21 bachelors who lived in the club. I worked at the desk on Sundays and in the holiday seasons or when there were parties and dances. I’d cashier at the bar, which they had downstairs. They really helped me get through college.
Everything I earned went to John Carroll. I dearly loved the University Club. A nice class of people. I’ll never forget my experiences there. Helping the pro with lessons helped me in my tennis game. He did the teaching and I chased the balls. My exposure to tennis helped when I came to Carroll in my freshman year. I won the intramural championship as a freshman. I was proud of that fact.
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I was sitting at the switchboard [at the University Club] studying one of my books. The place was virtually deserted on Sundays. An occasional resident coming and going – that was it. On the radio, they broadcast the news of the attack on Pearl Harbor. One of the residents came running down from his room upstairs and shouted to me, “Bruce, did you hear the news?” “Yes,” I said, “you seem so excited about it. Will that affect you?” “I will probably be in my uniform in a week.” He was a graduate of the naval academy. Within a week, he was gone in his uniform.
[Up to that point, the war in Europe] was kind of far removed. We all thought it was inevitable that we would probably be at war, although we hoped we wouldn’t. Pearl Harbor made the war more realistic. The bombing of Pearl Harbor made it absolutely inevitable that we would go to war.
Shortly after that, we heard about the V-7 program and signed up.
[In midshipman school at Notre Dame, the navy regiment] had one portion at the campus. We saw very little of campus life of the regular students. Really no opportunity to associate with them.
We had a lot of anxiety [about fighting in the war]. Question marks. What will this be like? We were young and brash and fearless and nobody thought of being killed or anything like that. Just do your duty. It was our duty and it had to be done.
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I was assigned to a mine sweeper on the West Coast. I went to the navy station at San Diego, and it didn’t give us any duties or responsibilities immediately. They said, “Report to the station every day and we’ll find something for you to do.” A couple of us didn’t think very much of San Diego, and we had the opportunity to go to San Pedro [California]. None of us had been there, so [we decided to] take our chances and take an assignment up there. When we reached San Pedro, I was assigned to a mine sweeper in training. I stayed.
We would sweep practice mine fields at various bases on the West Coast around Catalina Island. On each mine sweeper, there are four officers. One of those officers on every ship was assigned to mine warfare school in Yorktown, Virginia. So I went back to Yorktown and took a four-month course in mine warfare. That’s all the equipment you use, how you use it, and how you prepare as far as the strategy of sweeping a mine field.
I finished there in April 1944 with orders in hand to report to YMS-46 in the Southwest Pacific. “We think that the ship is in New Guinea,” they said. “Go and look for it.”
In the meantime, my wife and I got married. We got married, she went with me to the West Coast, we were together for two weeks, and then I was gone for two years.
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Mr. Thompson went in search of YMS-46.
[I was part of] a group of us officers who reported to the USS Washington, the battleship, and sailed to Pearl Harbor. Pearl Harbor didn’t have a place to assign us at the moment, so we spent two or three weeks at an officers’ rest and relaxation – R&R – facility there. One day, they sent a small group of us by plane to Brisbane, Australia. We had four stops [on islands] on the way. It was the first time in my life I had ever been in an airplane. I remember they had a lot of secret equipment on there for siting on the airplane.
We got on this navy seaplane, and there was a lot of anxiety for me since I had never been in an airplane in my life. We taxied down the water runway, and the plane couldn’t get up. Tried it two or three times. Finally, the pilot announced to us that we had to take some of the weight off the plane. I said, “Let us off!”
Instead, they removed some of the equipment that they had on the plane. We took off and got to Brisbane. We reported into the navy office there. As far as I was concerned, YMS-46 is someplace in New Guinea. I said, “How do I get there?” They said, “We will wait until they have a ship going up there.” There was a refrigerated food ship going to New Guinea – to the southern part at Port Moresby – in so many days. “Just go down to the dock and ask them if they could take you.”
I walked down and said to the captain, “I am assigned to YMS-46. Can you take me?” He said, “Yes, I can take you.” He took me as far as Port Moresby. I got off and checked in the navy beach there, and they assigned me a place to sleep. They told me, “The best way to find your ship is to [ask around at] the officers’ club this afternoon. It’s open from 4 to 6.”
[The club] was nothing more than a tent – a crude shell. I walked around to the fellows at the tables. There were a dozen at each table. I said, “I’m looking for YMS-46. Is anybody going north?”
Mr. Thompson landed a ride on a coast guard ship. A few weeks later, in the early summer of 1944, he found YMS-46 and began his tour of duty.
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YMS-46 was a 167-foot-long wood-hulled mine sweeper with four officers and 25 to 30 sailors.
We went through mind sweeping operations in New Guinea. We went to the Admiralty Islands and swept mine fields in that area. Then we started preparing for the operation on the Philippines.
There are wood hulled mine sweepers and metal. The metal ones were old WWI destroyers or larger mine sweepers. The reason they have wood-hulled ones is because wood-hulled ones can go into a field of magnetic mines.
Most of the mines were planted 20 feet or deeper. The draft of the mine sweeper was nine feet. We could go through a mine field almost totally impervious to hitting a mine. Every once in a while a mine sweeper would hit a mine.
YMS-9 struck a mine in Corregidor and sank in 10 seconds. I saw it. It was right in front of us. YMS-9 was our companion ship.
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All of a sudden, you hear the sound of artillery whistling past. I’m standing there with a seaman named Wayne Wright. “Where the hell did that go?” We continued on. Then Wright came up, and he was holding a 5-inch shell in his arms. “Mr. Thompson, look at this.” “Where did you get that?” He said it was on the floor of the engine room. It was a dud.
We were terrified. Very much so.
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The biggest mine sweep operation of the war was in Borneo. The Japanese fleet had a hold up there. [The Allies] had mined that harbor to block the Japanese fleet in the harbor. I don’t know how many ships were in there. Sometime in 1945, we were sent to Borneo. There were 37 mine sweepers. As I recall, 16 of them were sunk in 16 days. They were all sunk by mines we had planted. We were given a plot of where the mines were in the harbor. There was a river coming down into the bay, and it had a strong current. The Allies had planted the mine field several years prior to the time we were sent down to mine sweep it. In the meantime, the ebb and flow of tides and the current made the mines “walk” – gradually move around. We went first to these mine fields and found nothing. Then all of a sudden our own mine sweepers would hit our own mines and blow up immediately. Mines were all over. That was the worst mine sweeping operation of the war. Sweeping our own mine field.
We were there for a couple of weeks. We started sweeping at night. All kinds of dangers increase. Impossible to see. It was total darkness – everything on the ship. All the lights were out.
We were recovering our gear under the darkness of night, and I yelled out to the bridge, “Turn the engines on and go forward.” And the fellow who was up there thought I said go in reverse. All of the mine sweeping gear was not fully out of the water. He put it in reverse, and we engaged some of the heavy wire rope sweep equipment. It got caught up in our twin screws. It was wrapped around there, and we couldn’t get any real speed or power and had to dropout of formation for the next couple of days. Somebody had to go down in the shallow-water diving outfit to try and cut that wire. Since I was mine sweeping officer, I couldn’t tell one of the sailors to go down, so I had to do it. It took parts of three days and three nights to pry out all of that wire that had wrapped around the propeller. It was a matter of cutting individual pieces of wire. I was recommended for a special medal but never got it.
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We try not to think [about hitting a mine]. You try to just think of what you are doing. There is the element of fear. We never had to transfer anybody off the ship because they were a psychotic case or anything such as that. You get used to it. We usually say we aren’t going to hit a mine, as they are down 20 feet, and we feel we’re going to sail right over them.
Once we were in a mine field, there was a mine right there – it wasn’t down 20 feet. It was right next to the ship. You learn to live with it.
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Some years ago, when the political situation in the Philippines was very anti USA, I thought to myself, “You wouldn’t be alive. We saved you. Wrested you out of the hands of the Japanese.”
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You’d watch for every letter from home. Everything you wrote was censored. The officers censored the letters. You hated to have to read the letters the guys would write.
You live so close together. Just a small ship. This was not the spit and polish and fancy uniforms. Shorts and khaki shirts were our uniforms.
I enjoyed it. It was pretty good food. I never missed being on the battleship or carrier. Most of those ships are staffed by officers who had been in the military academy at Annapolis. In the small-ship navy were almost all reserve officers. Every once in a while, we would see somebody in our contingent who went through Annapolis. “Oh, were you the low man in the class? That is why you got assigned to be with us!”
The mine sweepers were always two, three, and four weeks ahead of the regular navy. We’d see the big ships in port when we returned to a base that was established.
I had a pistol and I don’t like guns. The only time we ever put the guns on was when we went into a mine field, in case we got blown overboard or sunk and found our way to an island. I never liked guns. Still don’t. I never shot the gun once in two years.
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Some guys went through hell [in the war]. The part of the war we had, I look back and say, “Heh. Got shot at once in a while.” [Our mine sweeper is] so small and insignificant. They aren’t going to drop a bomb on us. We were so small there wasn’t much to shoot at compared to a destroyer.
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VJ Day was the day I got my orders to come back.
It was a great feeling of relief to get out of the navy. I know a couple fellows who stayed in the navy and had great lives. There were a couple of times in my civilian life that maybe I regretted that I left the navy.
Mr. Thompson found the transition back to civilian life a major adjustment.
We were living by a set of rules in the navy. Always having someone telling you what to do. Even though you were an officer, you always had a higher officer telling you what to do. Then you are out on your own. Cast out on the sea.
Unfortunately, I didn’t have a plan in mind. [At John Carroll,] I started out in the business school but had no plans for the future. Just was going to graduate and get out and look for a job. How I envy people who know what they want to do. A sign of maturity. I was very immature.
My wife’s family had a travel agency. It was the biggest one in Cleveland. I thought about maybe joining that, but she had two brothers. They naturally went into the business.
I went to work for a company in Columbus selling heating equipment. I remember when I took that job and I was driving down there on a Sunday night to start work on Monday. I was so sad I almost turned around and came back. Because I thought, “We were married for a little over two years and I spent it mostly away.” It was just a feeling of sadness. “I know Monday morning I’m in Columbus, but I’m going back home. Forget it.” I stayed about six months. Even on some of the weekends, I couldn’t get back home to be with Mary Ruth. Eventually I quit and came back to Cleveland.
I made a living. We eked it out. I got in the wrong field, in retrospect. When I came back from quitting the job in Columbus, I went to work for a company selling space. I went to newspapers selling advertising space for shopping news. And then it was 57 Ohio newspapers we represented and national advertising I represented. I enjoyed that. I did that for about 12 years.
From there I went to industrial magazines for Chilton publishing company. I spent about 46 years selling advertising space and enjoyed it. I really liked it, but now, in retrospect, I [know] they controlled the amount of money you made. And that was the catch. I liked it so much that I didn’t think about it much. I thought they’d be nice.
I remember sitting in a bar having lunch thinking of bad choices, talking to some fellow I used to see there. He said, “I’m with Merrill Lynch. What do you do?” I told him I sold space in industrial magazines. “You make any money on that?” he asked. I told him what the commission set up was, and he said, “Every year, you renew your contract for the following year, and I bet they tell you what you are going to make.” I said, “That’s about it.” He said, “I’m a stock broker, and I sell and sell. We do not negotiate every year the way you do.” I look back and could have made tons more. I wouldn’t have to worry in my retirement.
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Bruce and Mary Ruth Thompson have one son, three daughters, and six grandchildren.
[Our son,] Bruce, was with the government after he graduated from Georgetown. He became an aide to Senator William Roth, Republican senator from Delaware. Bruce was his aide for seven years. Then he went to Don Regan in the Reagan years. He liked Don Regan and Don Regan liked him. He was assistant secretary of the treasury. [Then he went to Merrill Lynch.] We are very proud – he’s 59 and just retired.
We were a very close family. My father-in-law lived with us on South Belvoir for a few years before he died. We have a four bedroom house. We like the house and the location. Been there 54 years. The kids all went to Gesu. All very active. None of them would go to John Carroll. [To them, it would be] just like going to Gesu.
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I see everybody on their cell phone now. I reluctantly had one forced upon me about a year ago. Have used it probably less than five times in a year.
I’m just amazed by the technological advances that we have now. Such an intrusion, I think, sometimes. I can see the advantages of reaching anybody you want whenever you want. I left my cell phone home in a box. If we go someplace, I charge it up and take it with us.
It’s a different world. Isn’t as friendly as it used to be. You have to be so defensive all of the time. Frankly, it scares me. It really does.
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The happiest moment in my life? Oh, my word. Marrying my wife. She’s a wonderful wife. She’s a beautiful catch.
Mary Ruth, she’s in poor health now. She’s on a walker. She is gradually slipping into Alzheimer’s. You can be with her, sit with her, talk to her, and you aren’t aware of it.
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I’ve always been happy to be alive. I’m a joiner. I participant in just about anything and everything. Very rarely say no to people when they’d ask me to serve on this committee or do this.
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Some years ago, one of our daughters was in an auto accident. That was horrible. That was probably the worst thing we had to go through. She was hospitalized in a small hospital in Oxford [Ohio], where she was doing postgraduate work at Miami University. She was in the hospital there for three months. Badly broken femur and hip.
My wife virtually lived down there. She and another daughter, who was then a student [at Miami] rented a house off campus. That was where she stayed.
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I’ve always been close to the church. I like going to church and go to church all the time.
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I was an alcoholic. From January 8, 1982, until 2002, I didn’t have a drink. I institutionalized myself. I picked up the phone and called Rosary Hall – that was the alcohol rehab at Charity Hospital. I said, “I have problems. I drink too much.” They said, “Come in 3:30 tomorrow afternoon.” I said, “Boy, you don’t waste any time.” The girl said, “Well, sir, let’s make it 3:30 this afternoon.” She thought she was going to lose me.
There was a fellow in our office who had gone through Rosary Hall. When you go in, you have a sponsor. I told him, “I have to get some help. I am not doing this myself.” He said, “Yes, I’ll be your sponsor.”
I made up my mind at that time that I am going to be in control of myself. One day [in 2002], I decided I’m old enough now and I gave up [abstinence]. It has not been a problem. I know how to deal with it. I’ll have a couple of glasses of wine a week.
In Cleveland, the space reps for industrial magazines were very close. There used to be a lot of us – hundreds. I was very well known as a people person. Everybody knew about my problem and my recovery that was extremely successful – so much so that two or three top dogs at Penton called me and said, “Bruce, you’ve had a remarkable recovery. We have a man – would you work with him?” “Of course I’ll sit down and work with him. Who was it?” They told me, and I said, “That so and so! He deserves it!” The fellow became a good friend of mine and we cured him.
A couple of other guys from Republic Steel. They [had a staff member] they didn’t want to lose. They wanted to rehabilitate him. They called and asked if I would do it. A guy I genuinely genuflected every time I went into his office and now you want me to help him.
I did the same at Timken – they had a manager and I worked with him. During those 20 years, there were six or eight or 10 people I worked with. Had successful recoveries with all but one.
I’ve always been very proud of the fact that I had people recognize my recovery. Some people who you’re close with in a group – they really are observant I have a lot of protectors.
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I had a hip replacement a year and a half ago, and the other one was replaced three years ago. I have diabetes. I’m on insulin once a day. I would like to live a few more years. I’m 88.
I can’t play golf anymore. Arthritis.
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I’ve been retired now 16 years. For about 12 of those years, I really spent a lot of time here [at John Carroll] as volunteer worker in the alumni department helping with reunions. I used to be at all of the meetings. I really enjoyed it. We didn’t buy our house to be near John Carroll but to be near Gesu. But it has worked out to our satisfaction to be close to Carroll. Many years ago I was asked, “Why don’t you come and get active in the alumni association? We can always use you.” I used to be up here a lot – three days a week.
I’ve heard from so many people as to how invaluable old timers around here are.
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I came into [the class columnist] job. Let’s see – it was for our 50th Reunion [in 1993]. We had a fellow named Ted Saker, who was a student in our class, and he resigned shortly before our 50th anniversary. [The magazine editor] said, “Will you take over and do the writing?” I said, “I’m no writer. I’ll do it for just the issues just before our 50th. After that we have to get somebody else.” Now it’s 15 years – my word. I have most of those issues going back that far – and I’m still doing it.
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Father Frank Smith, SJ, was a professor in the English department for many years. [In the 1990s,] he had a private Mass every Saturday afternoon at 4:30 and Sunday morning at 10:15 in the chapel on the second floor of Rodman. He said, “I have this little Mass. If you’d like to come.” The first few times Mary Ruth and I went, we sat there, and I said, “Father, you need an altar boy.” He said, “Do you know anything about it?” I said, “I spent my life being an altar boy.” So he said, “OK, take over.” I was his altar boy for 10 or 12 years, up through 2002. I vested him before Mass every Sunday. After Mass, I took care of the sacred vessels. I did everything so that he wouldn’t have to.
We had a very very close relationship. We didn’t have many people at this Mass. Some Sundays we might have six. The next Sunday a dozen. It was just a small group. I did that religiously for 10 to 12 years.
This was until about 2002. Then when Mary Ruth got to the point where she couldn’t navigate very well. We just said, “Well, it’s a difficulty.” I said, “Father, I’m sorry. It hurts me. It pains me. But I have to resign my position.”
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When I was at St. Ann’s [in Cleveland Heights,] I was head of the altar boys.
As told to Ken Kesegich
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