June 26, 1945

San Marcos Field

June 26, 1945

Dear Mother:

I have had several letters from Stoneham in the last few days so I will write one for a change.

This is the last of the paper for at least of the envelopes.  It has lasted quite a while.  If you remember I bought it up in Lincoln right near the end of our stay there.  I guess it has lasted longer than any paper I have had.  Maybe I haven't written enough but really it was quite a lot of paper.

I got the clipping last week that came out of Press and everyone got quite a kick out of it.  I will keep it until I get home and then whoever can get his or her hands on it can have it.  That is the first time I have ever seen that particular pose.  I think it is the better of the two.  Anyway the boys thought it was good.

Samput got himself a girl in Austin and so I went on a blind date last Friday night.  She was one of these college girls who goes to a co-educational school to study campusology and for the social contacts.  We had a lot of fun dancing but she didn't act the age she was trying to make out to be.  She wished she were 21 but was only 17.  Tell Mary I am a little disgusted with the 17 year olds also.  It's not that we didn't have fun but that she was trying to impress me with what she knew and talking about all her dates and such stuff.  She had a date Saturday so I don't feel that I have to see her again even though I probably will because Samput wants me to go on a date with  him to Dallas next week when they both will be there.

Saturday was a quiet day with nothing special to do except entertain ourselves.  We went to Austin early and went from one air conditioned theater to the next in an attempt to keep cool.  There wasn't much doing in town so it was a rather weary day.

Sunday I went out to Bergstrom Field, near Austin, which is a troop carrier air base.  They have C46s out there and I went to eat dinner and look around.  I finally wandered down to the flight line and looked over the C46's.  They are one of the largest ships I have ever been in.  They are cargo and troop carrier planes but are often used to tow gliders.  They have enough room in them to transport 44 men with full equipment or 10 tons of supplies.  They can put whole airplanes in them if they find the need.  When I got back to town a young lady stopped me to buy a War Bond but instead she got a date.  She and another girl and sold $4,000 worth of bonds.  They took another fellow and I home and cooked us a meal and topped it off with a peach pie.  We had quite a lot of fun getting the meal which we finally ate at about 11:00 PM.  We all had to be up early Monday so had to leave early.

I started this letter last night but didn't have the energy of finish it.  It is so hot around here I just spend about all the time I can resting or trying to keep cool.  If I had a job to do I am sure I could muster enough strength to do something but as it is I have just about enough energy to get up in the morning .  As Ernie Pyle said, when you have anything to do and it is hot the Air Corp makes a lazy man of you.  We have so little on our mind I doubt if I could ever take a job again. 

Ernie Pyle, war correspondent

Most every day I go swimming at a place called Rio Vista Park in town.  They have a fairly good pool and the water is very clean.  It is spring water and cool.  One of the fellows has a pair of swim fins to put on your feet which are a lot of fun to play with.  You can paddle your feet and not have to use your arms.  However when you use your arms you can really move.  You can do all sorts of things with those fins.  I think I will buy a pair even though they cost $9.00.  I think I can have 9 dollars worth of fun with them.

I have some good news.  I am coming home on leave on the 6th July.  I am going to leave here on the 6th and drive with a buddy as far as possible.  We may get only as far as Dallas or Okla. City but may get to Chicago.  From there I will have to take the train.  Therefore I should be home on the 8th.  That will give me 10 days at home I hope.  It all depends on how long it will take to travel.  Most of the the transportation in Texas is so bad that it could take a day to get out of the state and then 2 more days to get home.  I am hoping to et a ride on an airline but that is almost out of the question.  So you can make all the plans you want.  I only hope we can schedule a few days where I can feel some good cool sea breezes.  Hint, Hint.

Well we are supposed to fly that darn double breasted sparrow this afternoon.  It is going to be a very boring 4 hours which will get me nothing more than flying pay for this month.  Boy this sure is a heck of a life.  I am getting rather tired of it.

Well I have to get to go eat dinner now.  I am not hungry because it is too hot but if I don't eat I might not get home pretty soon.

With love

Austin

June 20, 1945

San Marcos Field

June 20, 1945

Dear A.P.

I keep getting mail post marked the 3rd of June and earlier. The mail so marked has been to Ardmore and then sent down here.  They must keep it up in Ardmore for a week or so and then send it down here.  This mail down here sure comes the long way and sometimes I believe it gets lost by mistake.

I guess it is about time I wrote to you.  You write very regularly and I on the other hand do not do such a good job.  We have all kinds of spare time but I just don't seem to get around to writing.

I kind of wish I were selling Real Estate rather than spinning my wheels down here.  Our navigation course is going ahead rather uncertainly and I feel that I could do just as much at home as here.  I just wish they would send us home on detached service until they need me and then I could really get somewhere.

Post War Aviation does take up some of my time whether folks at home think so or not.  Probably everyone feels that I am quite contented with my present flying but as it is it is so inadequate that my only hopes for enjoyable flying time will come after I get home on a civilian status.  Then I will be able to choose my own ship and fly it as I please.

However there is more to it than at once meets the eye.  Civilian flying has more to it than just take off and land.  The financial angle is what worries me the most, not that the initial cost will hold me back but maintenance costs and convenience of land.  Stoneham should have its own field but then again where would you suggest and just how could you get the small minded people you run into to consent to put up the money it would cost.  Air Fields eventually pay for themselves but the original outlay is rather large.

I read an article in a magazine which dealt along this problem.  It said that with the millions about to be put into Boston's Logan Field not a town with a light plane flying distance has made a step in the direction of furthering civilian aviation.  To me it seems too bad that people who can see Boston as the Air Terminal of the world can not also see that is also could be the center of private flying.  However I have seen enough of the country to believe that I don't have to come back to Stoneham to be happy.

Well so much for flying.  The weather around here is rather on the warm side.  It gets to 90 degrees every day except when a cold front goes through.  Then it gets cool for a couple of days.  I get to go swimming every day in town so I can keep cool.  After being here for a couple of weeks I think I am getting used to the weather.

They have a good swimming hole in town and I am getting pretty good.  Maybe I will surprise everyone when I get home.  In any event I am getting good exercise and a good sun tan.

It is about time to get back to class.  It starts t 2:00 PM and it's about time.  I guess I will write again a little sooner next time.

Love

Austin

June 14, 1945

San Marcos Field

June 14, 1945

Dear Mother:

I received your June 4th letter today.  2 days after the June 6th letter which gives the first letter about 8 days travel time.  It is rather hard to explain how such a thing happens but somewhere things get last.  It also seems rather funny to read some things that are explained in letters you received before.

I got my mail from the central mail room and read it in between classes.  Therefore I leave it all in the classroom.  I forget to bring it back to the barracks here so I can't answer many of the questions you ask.  However I will answer them as I think of them.

Today I am the fire guard in the barracks so I don't take PT this hour so this is a good time to write letters.  Each day one man has to stay in and watch things while everyone else is at P.T. I came up on the roster today.

The Samput's address in Dallas is:
Mrs. W. J. Samput Sr.
4420 Cole Ave.
Dallas Texas.

I am sure she would be glad to hear from you.  She could probably write you a long letter about our escapades up there.  Bill is engaged to a girl in California so is supposed to be behaving himself.  His mother doesn't know that we have dates when we go to Dallas.  Maybe you had better be very diplomatic with her.  Anyway she would be glad to hear glad to hear (my mind is wandering) from you.

Sometimes I wish I had some better transportation but with all the trouble you can have I am glad I can rely on my feet.  One of the fellows bought a 39 Chevrolet the other day and is having trouble already.  He stripped the gears last night and he figures it will cost $70 to get it fixed.  If some day I can find a good deal I might look into it but it will have to be good.  I might buy a motorcycle rather than a car.  But don't worry yet because I am just dreaming again I suppose.

I went to Austin again last night and met a fellow I knew from back in Advance.  He is stationed at a field in Austin and is flying C46's and C47's.  He is in the Troop Carrier command and makes most of his trips in the U.S. to the West or East Coast.  He says he doesn't like it but at least he is getting flying time which is more than we are.  He is the lucky one even though he doesn't think so.

Curtis C-46D Commando

Douglas C-47D Skytrain

This is really awful country to live in.  The bugs and all kinds of flying insects are just everywhere.  We have the biggest, most beautiful cockroaches you have ever seen.  We put down powder but they seem to just get fatter on it.  They don't have many mosquitoes but everything else.  Auto windshields just get plastered with bugs when you drive.  I guess they live well in the hot damp air.  At least we are not in a desert where nothing at all lives.

I have been having laundry troubles lately but I think I will have some clean clothes in a few days.  That is always the trouble when you move, you just have to live in dirty clothes while you wait for clean ones from the laundry.

If you can't read those last few letters it is because we have no writing facilities.

Well so long for a while.

With love
Austin

PS Is William actually getting interested in another girl???

June 11, 1945

San Marcos

June 11, 1945

Dear Mother:

I got your first letter addressed to San Marcos today.  It was the first piece of mail to this new address.

Yes I have received a lot of mail lately but mostly because they messed up my mail box.  They had been putting my mail in the wrong box or they had been reading off the wrong names and putting it in my box so that I wasn't getting the mail.  It finally got straightened out and then I had a whole raft of mail.

They are now trying to make navigators out of us.  We are going through the regular course down here.  We are going to get another pair of wings if we complete the course.  We are not going to get very much time in the AT-7 except in studying navigation.  There is nothing in AT-7 training that can be very beneficial except that I have never flown a twin engine ship.  It will be good experience for me but for a lot of others it means nothing.  Our training in Ardmore was considered completed when we left so this is not extended training or anything like that.  It is just a navigation course because they have nothing better for us to do.

They have a very large pool here of pilots and navigators.  Most all are combat crews such as I and they are here "spinning their wheels" waiting to be sent to B29s or B24s or anything which will eventually lead to overseas.  We are permanently stationed on this field  to take this course which may mean most anything.  Anyway this course is not appreciated so it is not doing much good.  We are just going over stuff we have had before and no one is very serious about it.  No one wants to be a navigator so do not try to do the work.  I just wish they would give me a flying job so I could work everyday and then I would be happy.  I have no desire to go to school anymore.

Bill Sampert and I went to Dallas Sat and got back this morning at 1200.  Of course we stayed with his folks and they were swell to me.  They try to stuff me and fill me up so much that I can hardly see.  We went swimming and Bill hit his lip on his knee and cut it open so much so that it took 3 stitches to put him together.  His poor mother broke down when she saw him and almost had a fit.  She is much too nervous and worries too much about her one and only.  I believe if he ever gets married and leaves home his mother will have an awful hard time.  When I compare mothers I am awful glad that you don't worry too much and are not so nervous.  At least I hope you don't get as upset as Mrs. S. got over such a trivial thing.

I suppose I could write a lot more but I want to write to Mary so you can read her letter too and get all the latest news.  I guess really I haven't a lot to say except that I could tell you about this field but even that hasn't much of interest.  It is just another training field but a little worse because it is in the training command.

Well I have a letter to C. Davies to get off so I will try to do that now if I can.  I have heard a couple of "POPs" on the radio lately and they are very good.

With love

Austin

June 2, 1945

Austin Texas

Juen 2, 1945

Dear Mother:

I guess you know by now that "there have been some changes made."  We are in Austin the state capital for a weekend but are stationed at San Marcus, another hole in the ground.  

Well I just can see everyone and hera everyone asking questions but there is really a lot of information.  We left Ardmore last Tuesday on a troop train and had layovers in Forth Worth and a little town called Milana. The trip itself would never take more than 12 hours but the way we went it took 30 but we don't kick because we had a lot of fun at each stop.  Sampert knows people all over this state and we went to see a girl who never knew him.  As it turned out she was married and gone away a year ago.  We went galavanting all over the country between stops and almost missed the train because we had trouble getting a ride.  But we got to San Marcos all right in good order and in fine spirits.

I am now minus a crew.  We are now all split up and everyone has gone to the 4 corners of the South. They have sent us here to a pool because they have nothing better for us to do.  We are destined to get our flying time in AT.7s which is a ship they fly student navigators in.  We will be co-pilots no less until we get time enough or until we go through AT-7 transition.  We are all ready for the airfares and now back in the training command, what a lousy life.

We are enjoying the weekend here in the beautiful capital of Texas.  We took off from the base and will not show up till Monday, we left Friday morning at 10:00 and are making a big weekend of it.  This is all the home of Texas State University and Sam and I are trying to get involved in something.  As luck has it we are not making too much headway except in wearing out our shoes and spending nickels and beating on doors and stuff like that there.  Anyway we are having fun and seeing what there is to see in the town.

Now my new address in San Marcos is 

St. __ L.__ 0-784076

Officers Section                              > It's Easy.

S.M.A.A.F.

San Marcos Texas

Please tell the Independent and everyone what sends mail from town.  Even though I have all the time in the world I may forget someone.  I have too much time on my hands to tell everyone.

This state sure is hot.  I have been all wet as long as I have been here.  Clouds blow over all the time but the sun shines enough to make me wish I were in N.E. where you have rain to cool things off.

I am writing from the Hotel Stephen F. Austin which is of course one of the very best in the city.  It is air conditioned and very cool.  It almost feels comfortable in here.  Our room is on the top floor (16th) and we can see the whole city.  It is rather expensive but we are having the first real vacation in a long time at least it seems that way.  It will probably be one big vacation for awhile now.

The only trouble is that we are back in the Training Command and they are rather strict about regulations.  We all need a little brushing up I guess but it's rather hard to take.  We don't have a colored orderly anymore to clean up so things are really rough.

I suppose everything is rather hum drum with Mary working again and the house empty.  I wish I could come home but there doesn't seem to be much chance of such a thing now. I think I will wait anyway and see what happens.  Maybe I can get a good leave rather than a couple of days.

With love

Austin