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Too close for comfort

Veteran served co-op after WWII

David Malphrus at the Veterans Memorial dedication in Ridgeland Nov. 11.

David Malphrus knows better than most about close calls.

The Palmetto Electric Cooperative member, a retired farmer who worked as a lineman for the co-op after World War II, served as a combat military policeman and fought alongside the infantry from Normandy to Belgium, Holland, France, Germany and Austria. His closest scrape came, oddly enough, while scouting a serene path in the woods.

"Four of us had walked down this path and were coming back," says the uncle of PEC Board Chair Deborah Malphrus. "My corporal saw he had a tripwire [to a bomb] on top of his boot. I don't know how we avoided it coming in, but we were very lucky he saw it in time or we'd have all been killed."

Palmetto Electric Cooperative retiree and Ridgeland native Mary Smith Cope was in eighth grade when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, but even then she knew she was going to serve if she got the opportunity.

After graduation, she went to work as a civilian switchboard operator at Fort Stewart, Ga., for two years as thousands of soldiers completed training before heading to the European and Pacific theaters.

"The troop trains were right there by our office," says Cope, 86. "We could see them leaving out and it was so sad, seeing people running alongside the trains telling their loved ones goodbye, maybe for the last time."

Unlike men, women had to wait until they turned 20 before they could enlist, and like so many, at 19 she altered her birth certificate to join the U.S. Navy through its W.A.V.E. (Women Accepted into Volunteer Emergency Service) program. Cope boarded a train from Atlanta to New York for basic training on June 14, 1945, and from there she went to work as a telephone operator for the duration of the war in Miami.

It was in Miami that she witnessed not only the jubilation of the end of the war but also survived a hurricane.

"I was also on duty one night when a hurricane came through," Cope says. "I was working the switchboard, and I was talking to another switchboard operator, and she said she could see the roof lifting off my hotel." For as scary as the hurricane was, what scared her most was the raucous celebration following Japan's surrender on Aug. 15, 1945.

"After we dropped the bomb and they surrendered, everyone in Miami went wild," Cope says. "They were turning over buses, and cars were on fire in celebration, and it scared me half to death! I stayed right there where I lived in the hotel and didn't go out it was so crazy."

Cope left Miami in December 1945, transitioning to the Charleston Naval Yard for two months before getting discharged in Washington in February 1946. She returned home and got her pilot's license shortly after, thanks to the G.I. Bill, and after working for various phone companies, in 1977 she went to work for Palmetto Electric Cooperative, serving as office manager until she retired in 1991.

"When I started, there were 1,000 meters on Hilton Head," Cope recalls. "And now, there are more than 34,000. I really enjoyed working there and the people, and I'm very proud of the role women play in the military. Every time I see a woman in uniform, I try to talk to them because it makes me proud of what we did."

Honor Flight of South Carolina is seeking World War II veteransto join a co-op-sponsored Honor Flight on April 11, 2012. Veterans of the Greatest Generation will be treated to a one-day, all-expenses-paid trip to Washington, D.C., to visit the World War II Memorial in honor of their service. Please submit your application by March 1, 2012.