When There Is Something In The Water

North Platte, Nebraska, is the middle of nowhere.  Actually, it exists in what I believe to be a beautiful part of our country, western Nebraska.  Most people travel through North Platte on their way to Denver, Omaha, or Kansas City.   In their haste to get to their destination, travelers miss out on much of the unwritten history, the interesting features of oft-forgotten communities; that which defines them and us. 

North Platte, Nebraska, is twice the size that it was during the Second World War.  At nearly 25,000 residents, it is one of the largest communities in western Nebraska.  It is surrounded by irrigated corn fields and cattle, and it is home to the Buffalo Bill Ranch State Historical Park. The city also hosts the largest railroad yard in the world. Union Pacific’s Bailey Yard is located on 2,850 acres and handles 14,000 rail cars every day.  On average, every day, 139 trains travel on the east-west/north-south North Platte exchange.

Years ago, North Platte was home to what was known as the North Platte Canteen.  Bob Greene writes about this epoch in his book Once Upon a Town: The Miracle of the North Platte Canteen.  From Christmas Day 1941 to April 1, 1946, 6.5 million service men and women stopped for 10 minutes in North Platte while the trains upon which they were riding took on water. 

These soldiers were on their way to war in either Europe or the Pacific.  At that time, North Platte had a population of about 12,000.  Every day, sometimes up to 23 times a day, from 5 a.m. until after midnight, volunteers from North Platte greeted 3,000 to 5,000 soldiers. 

For 10 minutes, these regular people fed the equivalent of 40 percent of their town.  They served young men and women homemade sandwiches and pies made by church ladies.  They baked birthday cakes and, in some cases, they even danced together.  Three thousand to 5,000 soldiers a day; over 36,000 10-minute stops; 1,500 plus days—every day the citizens of North Platte greeted, served, and thanked our men and women who were on their way to war.

And now the part about there being something in the water.  Seventy years after the last soldier train departed from North Platte, 700 soldiers from the 142nd Field Artillery Brigade of the Arkansas Army National Guard were conducting an emergency deployment readiness exercise in Wyoming.  After their exercises were completed, a charter bus company had been hired to take them home to Arkansas. 

As reported in a recent Wall Street Journal article, the Army had budgeted for a stop to get snacks.  It was calculated that the bus would reach North Platte, Nebraska, about the time the soldiers started to get hungry.  A call was placed to the North Platte/Lincoln County Visitors Bureau:  Was there anywhere in town that could handle a succession of 21 buses and get 700 soldiers in and out for a quick snack?  North Platte said “yes.”

As the buses arrived at the D&N Event Center in North Platte, 700 soldiers were greeted by the ancestors of the North Platte Canteen.  The soldiers entered the event center to the smell of grilled steaks, turkey sandwiches, deviled eggs, salads, and, I’m sure, Jell-O (Jell-O is everywhere in the Midwest!). 

Country music was playing in the background, and North Platte’s Mayor Dwight Livingston stood at the door and shook every soldier’s hand.  It was one soldier’s 21st birthday.  North Platte resident Lisa Burke baked him a cake and, when she presented it, the soldier told her that it was the first birthday cake he’d ever received.  She cried.

When it came time to “settle up,” as we say in the Midwest, the 142nd Field Artillery was told, “Nope.  You’re not spending a penny here.  This is on us.”  Just like their ancestors, the citizens of North Platte served those who were serving us—free of charge.

For the last five years of this blog, I have written about various leadership virtues, the big four of which are kindness, listening, big picture thinking, and truthfulness.  Certainly, communities like North Platte easily capture the virtues of kindness and listening, but they also contain other leadership virtues that we’ve discussed like empathy, authenticity, humility, and an empowerment-oriented spirit. 

Yes, I believe that communities—like people—can lead.  Good leaders, specifically those who are humble and grounded, facilitate a spirit of service and commitment to the “other” in the communities in which they’re embedded.  There’s just something in the water.

Some of my readers will recall that James Davison Hunter refers to this as the practice of faithful presence in his book, To Change the World.  He argues that this practice “…generates relationships and institutions that are fundamentally covenantal in character, the ends of which are the fostering of meaning, purpose, truth, beauty, belonging, and fairness (263).”  He’s talking about places like North Platte, Nebraska.

As I mentioned, Mayor Dwight Livingston stood at the door and shook every soldier’s hand as they came into the event center.  What I neglected to mention was that Mr. Livingston served in the Air Force during the Vietnam War and, like the veterans of his era, came home to no words of thanks.  As he shook the hands of these new soldiers, he reflected, “I don’t know whether these moments are more important for them, or for me.”

I suggest that these moments are important to all of us.  Thank you, North Platte, for showing us the way.