Telegraph | March 30, 1946 In the beginning, the handful of Canteen women worked from the lobby of the Cody hotel. With troop train movements still a military secret, only Miss Wilson was informed when they would arrive here. The small group worked out their own code system. Twenty or thirty minutes before the train was to arrive, Miss Wilson called one or two of the others, saying, “I have the coffee on.” They in turn called others, and every one hurried to the depot. They worked from the Cody lobby for a few days, and then Union Pacific switchmen offered them a small [shack] beside the tracks, where fruit and magazines could be stored and dispensed more easily when trains arrived. When the Canteen had been in operation about a week, Miss Wilson learned that Bill Jeffers, president of the Union Pacific and hometown boy, would be through North Platte. When the train pulled into the station, she marched up to his private car, knocked on the door and briefly stated the facts of the new Canteen. “The dining room of the Union Pacific depot has been empty for a number of years, and we would like to use it,” she said. “Take over tomorrow,” Jeffers replied.
equipment and supplies will be kept there and donations of cash and other items may be taken to the committee at that location. The room is large enough to keep an ample supply of material on hand at all times. Miss Rae Wilson, committee chairman, yester- day received the following letter from F.C. Paulson, U.P. general manager of the eastern district: “Mr. [William] Jeffers has referred your letter of Dec. 18 to me, relative to establishing a canteen in the space formerly occupied by the restaurant in our North Platte depot. “I have asked Mr. [Edd] Bailey, our assistant superintendent, to contact you with reference to the use of these rooms as a canteen … so that your worthy program can be carried on with the least amount of inconvenience. “I know that you are doing a very worthy job and want to do everything in our power to assist.” Yesterday the ladies of the Canteen committee greeted more than 500 service men passing thru the city. … Miss Wilson said someone would be on duty at the Canteen quarters from nine in the morning until about ten at night. Last night the com- mittee stayed late so that no soldier might be disappointed on New Year’s Eve in not finding a welcome here. Telegraph reporter Margaret Brown elaborated on this period in this story from the Canteen’s closing weekend.
The Canteen, shown here sometime in 1942, wouldn’t acquire its trademark hanging sign for another year.
William M. Jeffers, born in 1876 to one of North Platte’s first Union Pacific employees, joined the railroad in 1890 as a call boy. He had found space for the World War I Red Cross Canteen while U.P. vice president and general manager in 1918. His hometown’s main street had borne his name for nearly a decade before Jeffers became U.P. president in 1937. Now he again showed his heart had never left North Platte. Daily Bulletin | Jan. 1, 1942 Thru the courtesy of the Union Pacific railroad the soldier’s Canteen committee is now comfortably housed in the dining room at the U.P. station. All
The following excerpts represent decisions by many North Platte clubs in the Canteen’s first weeks.
Telegraph | Jan. 6, 1942 Regular meeting of Sioux Lookout Chapter D.A.R. [Daughters of the American Revolution]
32 CANTEEN: AS IT HAPPENED
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