Bobbie Hickman

After the Boat came into Charleston, I began to meet quite a few of the other wives, not all of them came to Charleston, those who had children in school stayed behind in Key West, but most of the others came.

There is a famous story among ‘Submariners’ about Bobbie Hickman and her trip up to Charleston. As I told you before she was one of life’s greatest characters, and that’s a fact! 

Spartan Similar to theirs

She and Milton lived in a 38 ft Spartan. She had overload springs on her car anyway because she was a hefty little booger; her weight ranged 375 lbs to 425 lbs consistently.

She hooked it up and pulled it up alone! During World War II she had been a truck driver, and when she & Milton got married she owned eleven rigs of her own. So it was not a big deal for her at all.

She was a well educated woman from the upper crust of Cleveland Society. She was also very well read, and she had the vocabulary of a truck driver and a submarine sailor combined, and she never met a stranger!

As she was passing through Georgia, and was just a short distance from the South Carolina border maybe a couple of miles. She had to pass through a speed trap in the last little town in Georgia that was a sneeze in the road, and she got pulled over by the police. There was a small service station on the right just up ahead and that was where she pulled in and stopped.

There were two policemen in the car, a big tall guy and a short guy. The big cop was the one who came over to talk with her, he told her because she was passing through if she didn't want to have to go to court the fine would be $50.00 cash. She could cry at the drop of a hat too; and they were not crocodile tears!

She began bawling, and gave him a big sob story about her husband in the Military and all the money she had in the world was $25.00. He was touched and swallowed her sob story, and she handed him the money. She got back in the car and cranked it up. The little guy yelled, “You wait up there, just hold on a minute?”

He came swaggering up to the side of the car, and spoke in a very stern manner, thumbs hooked in his belt, he said to her, “This won’t do, you owe us $50.00 that is the going price for speeding in Georgia, and you ain’t leaving without paying it, do you understand me?”

She looked at him horrified and answered, “Please don’t tell me that you want $50.00 too, I just gave the other guy the last $50 bucks that I had. You’ll have to take me to jail because I don’t have another dime.”

He said, “Lady are you telling me that you gave my partner $50.00?”

She said, “Hell yes I am, and if that ain’t enough you’ll just have to take me to jail, what did he tell you I gave him?”

He told her, “You just wait here while I settle this, I’ll be right back. “She put the car in gear and peeled out when he walked away; she said, “The last thing I saw in my rear-view mirror was the little cop had the big one backed up against the car with his finger in the guy’s face, and I knew I could out-run them to the line!”

She wrote the story up and published it in “Trailer Topics Magazine”. She received a lot of kudos from the guy’s on the Boats!  So many sailors over the years had been caught in that same speed trap.