World Warr II broke out in 1941, and the Department of Defense built an installation about three miles out of Lordsburg for holding prisoners of war (POWs) and housing a complement of military personnel. The installation needed barracks for the soldiers with a commissary, PX, and a theatre. They needed electricians, plumbers, and carpenters to build the camp. Daddy applied for a job as an electrician, but did not have an electrician’s license. No problem for him—he went to Las Cruces and took the electrician’s test and got his license. He worked there until the jobs played out.

Sometime during his employment at the POW camp, my dad and Uncle Charlie Walters (Aunt Ena’s husband) went into the mining business. With the war going on, the ore that was mined at the Walrich mine ("Wal" for Walters & "rich" for Richins) was vital to the war effort. They built a small mill that processed the ore before shipping it to El Paso. It was really an interesting process. The ore was first crushed by a large ball mill (which was bought in the Silver City mining area and hauled down to the mine). Once they got the ball mill set into place, I remember Aunt Ena, Uncle Charlie, Mother and Daddy inside this huge (ball mill) rock crusher, chipping out all the pieces of gold embedded in it. They removed enough gold from it to pay for the ball mill.

After being crushed, the ore was filtered through several processes of floatation machines and classifiers to separate the different ores: lead, copper, zinc, silver, gold, etc. As little kids it was a neat place to go and see all the different procedures. During this time my brother Billy was in the Army Air Corps, as were all the young men at that time. The mine contributed to the war effort, whih allowed them to receive a “C” ration for gasoline, a commodity that was rationed. Most people received an “A” sticker on their vehicle. I don’t remember how much gas you were entitled to, but it was not very much. However, I remember that with the 3 large trucks that the mine owned, and the amount of gas we were allotted, we seemed to fare better than most. There were many things that were rationed, and everyone had to be very conservative during the war. Some restricted items I remember, other than gas, were shoes, sugar, tires, and meat. You couldn’t even buy cars at that time.