Paul Henry Blackmon

Paul Henry Blackmon
Born	Paul Henry Heacock 26 August 1928 New Jersey
Nationality	American
Parents	Otto B Heacock (father) Emily Seaworthy (mother)

Paul Henry Blackmon, born Paul Henry Heacock was an American who was born in New Jersey, moved to Missouri, went into foster care, and lived on a farm throughout the great depression and WWII. He later went into the service in June 1946, served as patrol duty for a plutonium plant in Washington state, then somewhere in Albuquerque, New Mexico, discharged in December 1947.

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/75356711/otto-b-heacock

https://www.ancestry.com/search/?name=Otto+B_Heacock&event=_Missouri&count=50&name_x=_psx

Before Birth

Before August 1928

Before the birth of Paul, came first Edward, then the second child, Evelyn, then Leroy, then Paul Heacock.

Childhood

26 August 1928 - Birth

Paul Henry Heacock was born 26 August 1928 in New Jersey, United States. He was born to Emily Seaworth and Otto Heacock. He lived on Main Street of the city (which was close to Newark).

1929 - The start of the Great Depression

In 1929 the Great Depression in the United States began. Due to the fact that Paul's father was minimally educated and that he lost his street conductor job, the Heacock family decided to move back to Missouri.

Between 1929 and 1930 - Moving to Missouri

When Paul was less than around two years of age, the Heacock family moved to the town of Poplar Bluff in Butler County, Missouri. Because the job situation around was poor, the Heacock family became farmers and so lived on a farm. Housing was almost non-existent.

Between 1930 and 1935

While living on the farm, since Paul was too little, he didn't work any particular job. Otto on the other-hand, was reportedly street-wise, despite not having much education, and apparently could fix and do anything on the farm. Many people also knew Otto that were in the local area. Being the entrepreneur he was, he bought what he said were apple trees and when they were going places from one place to another, he would along the way sell apple trees. Their father was a good provider in food, but it was frogs, fish, and whatnot.

Otto had become a functional alcoholic and also had a temper. A WWI veteran, he was in France and was attacked with mustard gas by the Germans, and was exposed to it in the process. How much it affected him isn't known. He barely spoke of his experiences, except for the fact that the Germans sprayed him with mustard gas.

Otto and Paul's brother, Edward, didn't get along. One day when he was 16, they got into a fist fight, and so he left home and went to Detroit, Michigan, probably never seeing each other again. It might have been around this time period or before that when their mother Emily, gave birth to fraternal-twins, Pauline and Edna, who were "different as night and day from one another". His mother was reportedly a "nice jolly fat lady".

Paul went to schools within Butler County, what he called possibly country schools. Paul personally was someone who liked to read, but up until 1940 for him there wasn't much to read for him. Their primary life concern was finding something to eat, a place to sleep, and a place to go to school.

1935 - Death of his mother

When Paul was seven years old, his mother passed away. After the passing of his mother, the Heacock family disintegrated. Paul, not being consulted, and probably on both the opinion of his father and the state authorities, was told that he was going to be put into the Missouri Foster Home Program, and so started going in and out of such as well as living with family. Paul only had two pairs of pants, a pair of shoes, and a couple of shoes as his personal belongings. Paul had a "So what?" reaction to news, there was nothing that he could really do. Sometimes Otto would pull the family back together again just for later for them to be separated again.

Evelyn, probably around this time or afterwards, married young so that she could have a place to live, marrying to an alcoholic who was in the road construction business, driving what is called a "motor patroll", was the grader. Having a great job the two lived well.

1940 to 1946 - Last foster home Paul lived in

In 1940 a couple, Laura Bill Hensen and Lloyd Arch Blackmon, on a farm decided they wanted a ten year old boy, and so moved into another foster care home along with his fraternal twin sisters Pauline and Edna.

Back when gas was 15 cents a gallon, his foster mother told him that she was at a store (this was in early fourties). A woman came into the store to see the store manager and asked:

I have a dime, how much candy can I buy for my children for Christmas?

Paul himself didn't have a particular preference in candy, anything that was sweet. On the food side, fried chicken was a delicacy, and so normally potatoes, beans, some meat.

Although Laura and Lloyd never adopted Paul, they did change his last name.

Paul remembers many shanty towns that were around. He did make friends with some of the residents but not lasting friendships. This was normally due to Paul's frequent movement from one family and one foster home to another. Paul discovered that the secret to surviving in a foster home was to be very nice to the lady and don't make waves.

Adulthood

June 1946 - Entering service in the United States Army

In June 1946 Paul entered service into the United States Army. He specifically went into the Army to go into college.

December 1947 - Discharged from service

In December 1947 Paul was discharged from service.

Between 1948 and 1955 - Going to college

In 1948 Paul went to college. In 1955 he graduated from University of Missouri with a degree in Physics and Mathematics.

Notes:

- History buffs know that the war didn't end until the peace treaty was signed in 1 January 1947. That is why he is considered a WWII veteran.

- He had five siblings that survived, no idea how many that weren't alive

- Many years after his childhood Paul went back to Poplar Bluff and found many residence saying that they knew his father Otto and that he had a son Paul.

- After Edward moved out Paul only saw his brother two or three times before he passed away.

- Paul doesn't remember much about his mother, and has one picture of her, but she was kind of shorter than he is. "A nice jolly fat lady" that he guesses was wonderful he doesn't remember.

- Left off at interview at 20:27

- Paul lived in houses with a dirt floor, that he built a one room house with a dirt floor that they lived in because he said that it costed a little over a total of five dollars, he cut the logs down, brought them together, spent the money for nails, and something else, that being his biological father.

- Generally for the fourth of july, in the county that he lived in, there was a central place where people came together, there was block ice so you can have cold things, you could dance, there was a bit of drinking. The question around the time was "are you going to the fourth?", meaning are you going to this central gathering and join in the celebration. For Paul they were fun, there were a lot of things a kid could do

- For the next seven or eight years after his mother died there was no celebration (afte the question of whether that was in his initial home) at all

- It wasn't until he got into the last foster home that there was christmas after going into foster home

- Can't remember how many foster homes, the one from 1940 to 1946 was the one that was stable.

- The last foster home, the one where they changed his name, they were great, he was an army veteran, peacetime veteran, had some kind of service disability, and he had a big pension for that period of time. They didn't have electricity, but they had everything they wanted to eat, brewed it on a stove. There was farming equipment but they had a car, they had a paper (newspaper?) every sunday, he had a radio with a battery charger windmill on top of the house. He was incapacitated, he was unable to function, Lloyd.

- The families from before, not really remember, lived with one of his aunts, one of his uncles who happened to be when he was the town policeman, the wasn't the deputy, he had some kind of a, he had a pistol and a badge. The uncle was named Ira Heacock, his wife was, she was blind since she was twelve years old from iceskating and falling, hitting something on the back of her head. By that time they were in their fifties. She went to state blind school and so was able to function, and was able to read braille, very intelligent woman. Paul remembers that since he was the town policeman, everyone knew Paul and him, and so they generally got into the movie, a movie once a week. For Paul, there was a [base] ball team, and so he got into that. Usually Paul would have a dime or two to spend on something.

- The story is is that foster mother wanted a baby, but couldn't have any children, there were no babies available, but they were able to come home with a ten year old boy. In retrospect for Paul, it wasn't all altruistic, they lived on a big farm, and she was the manager of the farm. Of course he husband, he was fairly intelligent, but he couldn't do any physical work, and Paul thinks that she wanted a farm man, and so that's why they got a ten year old boy to help.

- In any case, Paul's job on the farm was everything. There was a horse barn, the horses requried to do all the planting, and so Paul knew how to manage that. But he never learned to ride a horse, since he was afraid of horses, even to this day.

- 28:40 He could hornace, drive, plow, among other things.

- Other than his sister, who he lived with from 1940 to 46, they were in the same family until 1950

- His only job that he had was on the farm, nothing that was outside of the farm, in the town, etc,

- Paul would make friends from school, but they all drifted away. For osme reason, he was enamored with going to school and reading, and a lot of them were not interesting with going to school. He was validactorian for his small high school. Grandin Consolidated was the name of the school. It was housed at a works progress administration during the depth of the depression. The government sent out young people, they built things and were paid a certain amount per month. They needed jobs and that was basically the only things they built, trails, parks, and that sort of thing.

- Paul doesn't know why he got so much into reading. He doesn't know whether it was his mother potentially reading to him when he was little (he doesn't remember that happening). In the Blackmon household, there was always a Sunday paper. He would read the comics to his foster father since he was blind. He had his radio that he kept on.

- He read everything that was available, maybe the westerns were his preference but he isn't sure what his favorite types of things to read were. There were no classics for him. The entertainment that he had besides reading and cinema, on the farm, they had a fourth of july where they would go to town. There was always people there with a fifty pound solid block ice. They would bring it home and they would make ice cream and bake cookies and that's about it. Those kinds of things were a delicacy of the time. The sickest he ever got was too much ice cream with cookies. He went out under a tree and fell asleep. He thinks that he slept for about three hours.

- The movies that he got to watch at the theatre were all westerns. The guy who set up the movie (Paul thinks every week) charged a dime to watch, all of which were westerns.

- The games that he really came up with/really played were in high school. He played Basketball, part of the softball team. He was never really good at them, too short for basketball, baseball he was mediocre at it. In basketball him and his team got to play other highschools, but he was always on the back bench. He was probably as tall as he currently is (2023). He doesn't remember anyone specifically from those teams. He joined the teams because they were the only things he could really do, and also because he was physically strong, could lift a 100lb bail of hay. He wasn't one to sit and do anything.

- Leading up to the war, the political and economic opinion of his biological father, probably one of the dumbest guys around. He was a rabbid republican in a Democratic environment. From the stories that Paul was told, there were government distributed food and all the distribution people were democrat, compared to the fired republican. Paul doesn't remember seeing much of the government food. He didn't have a particular opinion of politics at the time. He read and heard about it in the radio and in the newspaper. As a result they weren't fond of the Japanese people.

- He remembers the Paul Harbor attack over the radio, a big thing for everything. Paul knew FDR did fireside chats but doesn't remember the speeches themselves. He was sure that they listened to them but were too long to comprehend. Over the radio they generally listened to (since it was his foster care father it was generally what he wanted to put on and they were generally not in the house instead out working). At night there was Fibber McGee and Molly. Bob Hope was also popular. So was Bing Cosby. Paul always liked to listen to music, it was the era of big bands. There'd be a big band from New York, Chicago, new Orleans, Salt Lake City, and Los Angeles. They listen to a lot of them (he doesn't remember the name of the bands), and were good enough programs to listen to on the radio.

- Paul is a fan of classical music. He also likes outlaw westerns. "The kind were you play it back and get your car back and get your wife back". Paul favored a different type of music generally.

- 39:30 What mischevious things did you get into? Paul and his family were kind of isolated on their farm, two or three miles apart the houses. Generally he didn't go into Halloween, turning over the outdoor toilet building, and so didn't get involved in those things. Paul never really got into much trouble or participate in those htings

- Paul was kind of a shy kid, and so he never really got a girlfriend or anyone like that in school. There was no place to go in a small little town that he was in, with around 240 people in it. They had a bank, a post office. in 1900 it was a town of 6000 people, the largest salt mill in the world, cutting old road pine trees. Grandin was the town name.

- Paul and his original family (possibly other families as well) didn't go to chruch. They weren't of a specific denomination. His mother was a member of an orthodox Jewish family. When she married his father, she was expelled, and so Paul never knew that part of his family. He remembers one grandfather, who made his own Wisky, other than that not much. Supposedly they came up after the Civil War from Alabama to Missouri.

- 42:20 A typical day for Paul on the farm was 5:30 or 5 oclock generally they had a man called a hired man who refurnished the house, a place where they would garden, he'd have a cow, that sort of thing. They paid him a dollar a day, plus furnishing a home, a place to live, a a pig or two to grow up and then butcher. He did most of the heavy work. It was 5 o'clock or so in the morning, feed the horses, water the horses, eat breakfast. Depending on the weather whether you were working out or not, if you were cutting hay, grass clings together so it doesn't dry when you're spreading it out, so you have to wait until the dew gets absorbed into the atmosphere.

- For the attack on Pearl Harbor, it was a Sunday, they were listening to the radio, and then all the sudden the announcement came that the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor. Paul was angry, but undirected anger.

- Generally the opinion of the time was stay home and not get involved in the war prior to the attack. Paul isn't sure he feel this way, but didn't remember completely what his full opinion was.

- In terms of Germany and their gains early in the war, they didn't know enough about the politics of Europe (him, his family, and others assumed), so that was a blur. However the Japanese was more of a focus. Paul had studied a little Geography, and so knew more about the Pacific than he did of Europe. He isn't sure why he did. He thinks part of the reason he remembers the Pacific was because the school had some National Geographic or monthly magazines, so Peleliu and stuff, Guam, Truk. By the time those things happened he was older and understood what was happening.

- 47:10 In school, Paul was blessed and "whats the other word, the bad part of not having to study", he was able to read a book once, and he was overjavel, Validictorian in his school, editor of the yearbook, those types of things, but was a small school. There was no journalist kind of club. They had a music teacher, a retired something, they hired her as music teacher, she did a lot of stuff, plays and that sort of thing. Mrs. Greezefilter.

- 48:30

Bibliography

• Paul Henry, Blackman (7 July 2023). "Interview with Paul Blackman" (Interview). Interviewed by Paul Sidle.
• "Paul H Blackman "United States Census, 1940" • FamilySearch". FamilySearch. 1940. Archived from the original on 20 August 2023. Retrieved 20 August 2023.
• "Paul Heacock, "New Jersey, Reclaim the Records, Geographic Birth Index, 1901-1929" • FamilySearch". 20 August 2023. 26 August 1928. Archived from the original on 20 August 2023. Retrieved 20 August 2023.
• "NARA - AAD - Display Full Records - Electronic Army Serial Number Merged File, ca. 1938 - 1946 (Enlistment Records)". Access to Archival Databases National Archives. 26 July 1946. Archived from the original on 20 August 2023. Retrieved 20 August 2023.