Who Was KILROY?

[Bonger]

KILROY WAS HERE!

In 1946 the American Transit Association, through its radio program, "Speak to America," sponsored a nationwide contest to find the REAL Kilroy, offering a prize of a real trolley car to the person who could prove himself to be the genuine article.

Almost 40 men stepped forward to make that claim, but only James Kilroy from Halifax, Massachusetts had evidence of his identity. Kilroy was a 46-year old shipyard worker during the war. He worked as a checker at the Fore River Shipyard in Quincy. His job was to go around and check on the number of rivets completed. Riveters were on piecework and got paid by the rivet.

Kilroy would count a block of rivets and put a check mark in semi-

waxed lumber chalk, so the rivets wouldn't be counted twice. When Kilroy went off duty, the riveters would erase the mark. Later on, an off-shift inspector would come through and count the rivets a second time, resulting in double pay for the riveters.

One day Kilroy's boss called him into his office. The foreman was

upset about all the wages being paid to riveters, and asked him to investigate. It was then that he realized what had been going on.

The tight spaces he had to crawl in to check the rivets didn't lend

themselves to lugging around a paint can and brush, so Kilroy decided to stick with the waxy chalk. He continued to put his checkmark on each job he inspected, but added KILROY WAS HERE in king-sized letters next to the check, and eventually added the sketch of the chap with the long nose peering over the fence and that became part of the Kilroy message. Once he did that, the riveters stopped trying to wipe away his marks.

Ordinarily the rivets and chalk marks would have been covered up with paint. With war on, however, ships were leaving the Quincy Yard so fast that there wa sn't time to paint them.

As a result, Kilroy's inspection "trademark" was seen by thousands of servicemen who boarded the troopships the yard produced. His message apparently rang a bell with the servicemen, because they picked it up and spread it all over Europe and the South Pacific. Before the war's end, "Kilroy" had been here, there, and everywhere on the long haul to Berlin and Tokyo.

To the unfortunate troops outbound in those ships, however, he was a complete mystery; all they knew for sure was that some jerk named Kilroy had "been there first." As a joke, U.S. servicemen began placing the graffiti wherever they landed, claiming it was already there when they arrived.

Kilroy became the U.S. super-GI who had always "already been"

wherever GIs went. It became a challenge to place the logo in the most unlikely places imaginable (it is said to be atop Mt. Everest, the Statue of Liberty, the underside of the Arch De Triumphe, and even scrawled in the dust on the moon.)

And as the war went on, the legend grew. Underwater demolition teams routinely sneaked ashore on Japanese-held islands in the Pacific to map the terrain for the coming invasions by U.S. troops (and thus, presumably, were the first GI's there). On one occasion, however, they reported seeing enemy troops painting over the Kilroy logo! In 1945, an outhouse was built for the exclusive use of Roosvelt, Stalin, and Churchill at the Potsdam conference. The first person inside was Stalin, who emerged and asked his aide (in Russian), "Who is Kilroy?".

To help prove his authenticity in 1946, James Kilroy brought along officials from the shipyard and some of the riveters. He won the trolley car, which he gave it to his nine children as a Christmas gift and set it up as a playhouse in the Kilroy front yard in

Halifax, Massachusetts.

I always wondered were that came from.

Bonger

[JensenPark]

I thought he was the character from that classic Styx song...

Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto,

Mata ah-oo hima de

Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto,

Himitsu wo shiri tai

You're wondering who I am-machine or mannequin

With parts made in Japan, I am the modren man

I've got a secret I've been hiding under my skin

My heart is human, my blood is boiling, my brain I.B.M.

So if you see me acting strangely, don't be surprised

I'm just a man who needed someone, and somewhere to hide

To keep me alive-just keep me alive

Somewhere to hide to keep me alive

I'm not a robot without emotions-I'm not what you see

I've come to help you with your problems, so we can be free

I'm not a hero, I'm not a saviour, forget what you know

I'm just a man whose circumstances went beyond his control

Beyond my control-we all need control

I need control-we all need control

I am the modren man, who hides behind a mask

So no one else can see my true identity

Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto, domo...domo

Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto, domo...domo

Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto, domo...domo

Thank you very much, Mr. Roboto

For doing the jobs that nobody wants to

And thank you very much, Mr. Roboto

For helping me escape just when I needed to

Thank you-thank you, thank you

I want to thank you, please, thank you

The problem's plain to see: too much technology

Machines to save our lives. Machines dehumanize.

The time has come at last

To throw away this mask

So everyone can see

My true identity...

I'm Kilroy! Kilroy! Kilroy! Kilroy!

[Cold_Gambler]

Excellent piece of WW2 trivia! Thanks

[DD_Bucky]

Excellent story sir....can't believe the other guy typed out the whole song..lol

[Tonar]

Nice,

I new it came from the war, but didn't know how.

[JensenPark]

admit it...you're all singing the song now...

[Rattler]

They're coming to Red Deer soon with Chilliwack......don't know if that's a good sign or not......