Telegraph | Sept. 6, 1943 A soldier walked up to the desk at the Canteen Monday [Labor Day] and asked who was working today? The lady in charge laughingly replied, — “the labor organizations, and if you don’t belong to the union, you can’t eat.” His reply, snapped right back, was, “I belong to the biggest and best union in the world, the union of the United Nations, and I am going to eat plenty,” and he did, with the help of several representatives of the many labor unions working at the Canteen. “Passion Plays” depicting Jesus’ death and resur- rection became popular in Europe during the Middle Ages. The Black Hills Passion Play, which emigrated from Germany in 1932 with Josef Meier — the seventh in his family to portray Christ — was performed regularly from 1939 to 2008 in an outdoor amphitheater in Spearfish, South Dakota. Now Meier and his troupe came to North Platte for an indoor Canteen benefit performance. (The “advance man” below had worked on one of William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody’s last shows.) Daily Bulletin | Sept. 15, 1943 C.W. Finney, representative of the Passion Play to be presented here October 1 to 3, is in North Platte taking care of advance work for the produc- tion. The play will be presented three matinees and three nights at the high school auditorium. … The event is being underwritten by the chamber
of commerce, but all civic organizations and church- es in the city are asked to cooperate. Proceeds over expenses will be given to the Canteen. Members of the choirs of local churches will be invited to make up the choir for the production. The Canteen provided concessions for North Platte’s only taste of major league baseball in the sport’s modern era. While the New York Yankees and St. Louis Cardinals played in the 1943 World Series, two barnstorming teams of big-league players staged an Oct. 7 “all-star game” featur- ing future 1945 National League Most Valuable Player Phil Cavarretta of the Chicago Cubs and wartime ace pitcher Dizzy Trout of the Detroit Tigers. Trout’s regular team would beat the Cubs in the 1945 World Series. Daily Bulletin | Oct. 5, 1943 The Lions club [members] have just received word of the official rosters and probable starting line- ups. Both teams will present a star-studded cast headed by rival first basemen. Captains of the two teams will be Phil Cavarretta of the Nationals and Dick Siebert [St. Louis Browns] of the Americans. The addition of Cavarretta has strengthened the National leaguers quite a little and adds a former World Series veteran to the lineup. Dizzy Trout wound up the regular season with Detroit in a blaze of glory. He was credited with his 20th win of the season, and that’s good pitch- ing. Trout will be here to try to stop such hitters
as [Frenchy] Bordagaray [Brooklyn Dodgers], Cavarretta, [Phil] Masi [Boston Braves] and others. The “Frank Merriwell” reference below recalls an early 1900s comic strip featuring a fictional high school star.
Daily Bulletin | Oct. 8, 1943 By Larry Hayes, Sports Editor
A crowd of nearly 3,000 baseball fans saw the American league All-Stars defeat the National league team in Jeffers park yesterday afternoon. The final score was 5 to 4.
The North Platte Telegraph
62 CANTEEN: AS IT HAPPENED
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