Dispatch From The Convoy

Cub Reporter Julia Lawrence is traveling with a convoy of army vehicles to recreate the Transcontintental Convoy of 1920. She’s sharing her experience with us with daily reports.

June 9, 2009
We got to Washington, D.C. today and then drove to our hotel in Laurel, Maryland.  The convoy will group up in Laurel.  We went through a bad storm with hail, big rain drops and cold winds.  We found out later that day that Washington, D.C. had an F-0 tornado strike.  An F-0 tornado means the winds do not go over 70 mph.

June 10
Today, Dad, our friend, Steve, and I went to Washington to see some of the sights.  This is my first time in Washington.  We went to the American History Museum at the Smithsonian.  We saw old trains and old ship models.  We also looked at displays about the presidents of our country.  There were also some very cool science demonstrations. While we were there at American History Museum, over at the Holocaust Museum an 88-year old man started shooting at people.  He killed a security guard and he got shot by a different guard.  He is in critical condition at a hospital.  Because of that , we had to stay over on our side of the National Mall.

June 11
Dad, Steve and I took the Metro from Laurel to Washington.  The Metro is Washington’s train and subway system.  Today we went to the Air and Space Museum.  It’s part of the Smithsonian, too.  We saw battle planes from World War II like B-26 Marauders and P-51 Mustangs, German and English planes.  I also got to see the Wright Brothers first plane.There were lots of exhibits about space, too.  We looked at an exhibit that explained about gravity and movement.  Plus, there were lots of cool rockets to look at. After visiting the Air and Space Museum, we went to Chinatown to eat.  We ate a Thai restaurant.  It had spicy food.

June 12
On Friday, we went to the Pentagon for the Army’s 234th Birthday Party.  We have to leave early around 6:30 in the morning.  The Army let us bring our military vehicles to display in the Pentagon’s inner courtyard.  Because of security, they wouldn’t let us take pictures of the Pentagon building, only the courtyard and our vehicles. The Army gave all of us a special coin about the Army as a present. We all went to the cake cutting ceremony and sang the Happy Birthday song to the Army.  Then, they cut the birthday cake.  Besides cake, we ate lunch at the Pentagon.  After lunch,  we went on a tour of the Pentagon.

June 13
On Saturday, we got started on the actual convoy trip. I am the youngest person on the convoy right now.  Everyone else is adults.  First, we started with our ceremony where people talk to us and tell us to have a great time and good luck.  Then we were on the trail leaving Washington headed to Pennsylvania.  Lots of police officers and state troopers led the way helping us get out of Washington since it’s such a big city. There were some problems today.  The first problem was when Mr. Louis broke an axle.  Then Mr. Gary had a dead battery in his vehicle.  So we had to stop and get them repaired. We drive through Gettysburg, Pa.  today.  It was where there was a big battle during the Civil War.  We could see the battlefields as we went through town. Finally, we got to Chambersburg, Pa. where were stopping for the night.  I met some kids my age, Nick and Parker and played on the playground near where we put our vehicles on display for people to look at.  After that, Daddy and I left for our hotel.

June 14
Today we started out by going through McConnellsburg, Pa.  We saw some very nice people there.  They were waving at us as we drove by.  We had some problems with some of the vehicles.  Some of the military vehicles are very old. Our jeep was built in 1974 and it’s one of the newer ones in the convoy. In Everett, Pa., boy did they have a show for us!  There were so many people lining the road there that I couldn’t even count them all!  They had signs says, “Thank you!” and “We support our troops!”  It was very cool to see.

June 15
Today the convoy traveled to Wooster, Ohio.  We left Greensburg, Pa. and visited the Flight 93 Memorial in the fields of western Pennsylvania.  Flight 93 was one of the planes that crashed on September 11, 2001.  It was like a fence of clothes, hats and other things left by people as reminders of the passengers of Flight 93. Then the convoy headed to East Palestine. Ohio.  We had lunch there. The whole town (it’s not very big) shut down just for us.  Everyone wanted to look at all the different vehicles in the convoy. That afternoon, we were on our way to Wooster, Ohio. Instead of camping out like we did most of the way to Washington, we stayed in a hotel.

June 16
Today was a rest day! Wahoo!  The Marlboro Volunteers provided us with all of meals.  On the rest day, people make sure there jeeps and trucks are working right and fix any problems.  Two people were working on a World War II command car.  Command cars are what generals rode in. It had to have the entire engine replaced. Then Dad and some others worked on our jeep.  Our right front wheel was leaking brake fluid.  An MVPA member named Howie worked to replace some parts on our jeep. I helped Mr. Brad make dog tags for people to buy.  He said, “You get unlimited free dog tags,” because I was a good helper.  I was like “Wow!”  Then he made some dog tags for my friends. At the end of the day, Dad took me to the hotel to swim.  It had a really neat pool room.

June 17
We drove from Wooster to Upper Sanduskey, Ohio in the morning.  It rained on us some.  We had lunch in Upper Sanduskey.  We had ham and cheese sandwiches for lunch.  Then we were back on the road headed for Delphos, Ohio.  We did a parade through the town and stopped at Delphos High School.  After we had supper, I got to play some.  At our hotel, Dad and I got on the computer to look at photos of the convoy on the MVPA Web site.

You can see them here: http://www.mvpa.org/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/39112187@N02/ http://www.army.mil/convoy/