September 17, 1944

Dear Mother:

Here are some more post cards which have very little meaning.  I bought them in Gila Bend but could find only scenes of Phoenix and the country none of Gila Bend.  I guess actually there is too little in the town worth photographing.  Anyway here is the story.  This is a picture of an AT-6 at sunset.  It is what we call a candy ship because of the color of it's nose.  You may wonder if the sunset is real and I must admit that we have many like it this time of year.  We are now getting clouds in the sky I guess the rainy season is at hand.

This is a picture taken on the "main drag". As you see the town is rather large and has lots of color and activity.  This picture was taken in front of the San Carlos Hotel and behind the picture up the street is the "Hotel Westward Ho".  You can see the Hotel Adams which by the way is one of the better hotels.  I doubt if you know what Phoenix is like even now.  {For a current view of this street, click here.}

This picture, as the card says, is taken from an original oil painting which is the case of 50% of the pictures you see stuck up around.  The walls of our mess hall at Gila Bend were lined with such pictures and many cowboy scenes with him doing his routine tasks.  They are all rather nice and definitely depict the country as it was 50 to 100 years ago.

I kind of like to contrast the scenes from cards 3 and 4 because of differences in the ground features.  This card is definitely Ariz. as I see it every day but the Indian seems to be riding in a country foreign to me.  Even so there are not too many trees and too much grass to make it unrealistic.  This desert card had to be included because after all this is Arizona.

With love

Austin