Staff Sergeant Otis E. Lee remembered his time with the 95th Engineering Regiment on the Alaska Highway Project succinctly and pungently. A black soldier, Sgt Lee did not enjoy his time in British Columbia.
In charge of first platoon he supervised transportation—trucks, tanks (armored personnel carriers, actually), tractors, road graders… His men drove it, operated it and maintained it. After the road “holed through” in September, Lee’s regiment remained in country to maintain it. Lee remembered keeping the snow off…
The managed to get blades for the trucks—sand and snow blades. But they had no salt. The mission, to keep one-third of the highway open, could not have been more difficult.
One of Lee’s drivers drove his truck off the side of a mountain and died. Three others tried to walk back to camp from their disabled truck and froze to death.
Sergeant Lee sums up his experience this way, “The only good day I had was the day I left. That was on Easter Sunday. The snow was three feet deep and it was still snowing.”
And, perhaps the saddest memory? “I saw only one woman in the eleven months I was up there.”