August 28, 1945

Aug 28 1945

Dear Mother:

Saturday I got your letter from Maine post marked the 14th.  It had taken 10 days to find me.  That doesn't say much for postal service.  I don't know if any more letters will come that way or not but I will look for them.

When you wrote about that camping trip I just wished I could have been there.  Boy I would have had more fun getting wet and then dry again.  I would have been just one more male to run you ragged but I would have had a lot of fun.  When you go camping you have to run into a little rain or something or else it takes all the fun out of getting soaked.  But I guess my point of view is not quite like mine on such matters.  I wish you would write some more about the trip because I got quite a kick out of picturing the thing and I am getting a vivid imagination.  Anyway Pop must have enjoyed relaxing for a day or two.

I suppose you are all wondering just when I get out of the army and all.  Well to tell you the truth no one around here knows very much about us and information is rather hard to find.  They have three lists of men to be discharged in the next 6 weeks but they are from groups A and B which the army has set up.  I am in Group H which will be the last bunch to get a choice.  Last Friday we signed a statement as to our preference and I indicated that the earlier the better but that may be many moths away.  We don't fly B29s anymore but get our time in the AT6's which makes me very happy.  We get 4 hours of ground school now on the B29 and cruise control of the B29 but it is just to keep us busy and have no great value to me.  They are continuing training principally for the fellows who have indicated their wish to stay in the post-war Air Corp and there seems to have been quite a few who wish to stay in.  Financially $240 a mos is a lot more than any of us will be making of a good many years.  However the longer you stay in the longer it will take to get started over again.

Mary writes once or twice a week and to me it seems that everything is all peaches and cream.  I guess she has been taken into a society much to her liking.  I am really so glad that she is happy away from home for a while.  Maybe you feel that you have lost a daughter now but never fear because home always looks good.  Even I after 2 yrs look at Stoneham as the place for me and as soon as I am free again I will make tracks for 15 Wilson Rd.  It is too bad William and Esther can't drag themselves away for awhile and see how the rest of the world lives.  Maybe you don't like the idea but remember you were away from home for a year when you went to school.

We have had the most wonderful weather down here for the past few days.  Starting last week it got really cool, enough so that we slept under blankets or sheets.  It rained a couple of times and then we began to get warnings of the tropical storm headed this way.  The storm never got this far but we were in the area of strong winds and it has just been swell.  We have had a cool breeze all day and the nights have been wonderful.  It is too bad you and Mary could not have been here to see what Texas can be like when it tries.  In fact I am a little surprised myself.  I had no idea it could be so nice and cool.  I hope it stays this way for awhile.

Yesterday I looked at a chart that gave distances from one place to the next and noticed that I am aprox 2010 miles from Boston.  That is a lot farther than I had thought.  But when I get travel pay home it will amount to about $160 plus meals etc.  Not a bad price just to see some more country.

This is an early morning letter.  I got up special so I wouldn't have to write last night.

With love

Austin

August 23, 1945

Aug 23, 1945

Dear A.P.

I am in a writing mood now and have loads of time on my hands, and I got your letter of the 19th today so I guess I have an excuse to write on to you.

First let me get something straight about the last war.  It is over and so far as the Army is concerned they have enough B29 operators right now so my prospects of getting another ride in one of those crates is about as slim as the shadow of a moonbeam.  I am not sorry because from a tax-payers point of view they just aren't worth putting in the air.  Men can get time in PT 17s or A-6 which can't cost more than $25 an hour rather than in the big iron bird where the gasoline alone costs around $100 - $150 at the least.  Yes for my money they can leave the "Queen of the Ramp" on the ramp and let her stay.

How I wish I had a lot of money and could buy all the things I could use in my spare time.  It sure would be nice to have a car but they cost $1000 right now for any car and I can't afford such a price.  Then I would like to have one of these Army Primary Trainers they are selling to the public.  They only cost $875 and use about 10 gal. of gas an hour.  The maintenance is rather high but then you can sell time in them for $16 an hour which is more than double what it costs.  All you have to do is sell 3 hundred hours and the airplane has paid for itself.

I sure wish I could have been in Maine with you a couple of weeks ago.  I'll bet that all you really needed was not time but some one interested to walk around the country-side with you.  I have a pair of real comfortable shoes that could stand more than I can and I am sure we could have found a very interesting walk.  Boy I would really have loved that.  It would have been a swell chance to relax and enjoy life in the quiet where airplane engines don't roar all day.

Yes, I have $240 a month but where it goes I have never found out.  I should keep track of it for one month but it might prove rather embarrassing a few years from now.  Of course too much goes into pleasures but it seems that when you have money you can afford to buy what you want at any price.  It's just like when you get a raise in pay or make a big deal you try to keep up with Jones's and they try to keep up with you.  If you go out to a party and everyone is spending money you can't just sit and watch.  You have to contribute to the fun and it costs money.  Hotel rooms cost and meals in the city cost especially on weekends when you have a date and you pay for 2 (you should know about paying for more than yourself) and taxi fares and bus fares, movies and such all mounts up.  Anyway as of today I have last month's check and $200 sides which will come home next pay day; or the remains of which because we have a big weekend coming up.  Anyway I think I will start out next month on my check and see just what it costs.

Yes I expect the people will feel rather cool towards the army very soon but I hardly blame them.  The army is a rather rowdy outfit.  People stood it while the war was in full swing but soon they will have the feeling that all the neighbors boys and the good boys from the neighborhood are home and only the no-goods who couldn't hold a civilian job anyway are the only ones left.  And as long as we no longer need an army it is just one more thing to make the taxes high.  No I will never blame people for having a cool viewpoint toward the army because I feel I have seen about all there is to see this side of the water.

I really wonder just what my future holds.  Prospects of getting out are not good at present and I am not too sure I want to get out.  I can't start school this year because it is getting late.  The army has no real need for me but they have me in H classification and they are only screening A and B now.  So it will be some time before they get to us.  By then they will have all the men they need and probably wouldn't consider a reenlistment for less than 5 years.  School doesn't seem to be the answer if I do get out but I am sure of one thing.  I haven't yet had enough flying to make me stay on the ground, I don't want my wings clipped yet.

I guess I have written enough. I sure enjoy your letters.  Wish you could write a little oftener.

Love

Austin

August 16, 1945

Aug 16, 1945

Dear Mother:

I don't have much on my mind so don't be surprised if this is a short letter.  I will just write until I run out of words and that will be the end.

Tuesday night about 1930 we got that news that Japan had accepted our terms.  Just what those terms are or how they will affect me is beyond my knowledge but everyone seems to think that it calls for a celebration so that is what 90% of the people did.  As for me I didn't see any discharge papers in view right away and seeing how the schedule starts again tomorrow I see no reason to go out and spend all my money making a lot of noise and making someone else rich.  Maybe I should of at least gone into San Antonio to see the rest of the people lose their heads but instead I just stayed on the base, went swimming and got a swell sun burn and saved my money.

Times Square

San Diego

Times Square

Navy Yard Hospital

Oak Ridge, Tennessee

Times Square

Paris, France

So for the last 48 hours I have been sleeping, eating and swimming and going to movies.  Boy it sure is a rough life to have nothing in the world you have to do but instead you really have to rack your brain trying to find something.  This army is making a lazy man out of me.

Tomorrow ends the big 2 day holiday.  The engines of the 29s have come to life again in preparation for flying tomorrow and the ground crews are again on the ramps repairing engines under huge lamps which lights things up like day.  I suppose the only reason we are starting again is because orders from higher up haven't yet been received to halt the program.  The thing is moving so fast that it will be hard to stop all at once.  We will probably have school for some time to come after official VJ day.  I don't care one way or the other so let them do as they please.  I only wish I could get home again before Summer is over and gone.

I am beginning to wonder just what is to be our fate.  It goes without saying that the army doesn't want all the men it has trained to fly in fact it doesn't need all the men who would like to stay in.  I for one would like to stay in a little longer and see how things are going to work out.  I also would like to go back to school but can hardly imagine myself doing accounting.  Maybe I can bring myself to it but I am sure the social side of college will be to me a lot more alluring.  What a change in the last 2 years.

I got Pop's card Tuesday.  That sure is a big potato on the front.  I really don't believe they grow them that big but you still have to believe 1/2 of what you see.

Well I guess that kind of winds things up.  I hope you aren't bored with the preceding 2 pages.

With love

Austin

what a life

August 14, 1945

Aug. 14, 1945

Dear A.P.

I haven't had any letters from Stoneham in several days so I guess you all did get off on the trip to Maine.  When I first heard the idea I kind of had my doubts whether you could get everyone agreed on it but you seem to have.  I hope everyone had a good time; you are all probably home right now.  I only wish I could have gone along and I could have if I hadn't come here to Randolph.

Well we flew in that big bird the B29 yesterday but had to get up at 0300 in the morning to do it.  Our crew was a kind of observatory crew and didn't do any flying.  We just went along to be checked out as scanners.

Special photo of Air Force bombers from the 1930s through the late 1940s. A Douglas B-18 "Bolo"; a Boeing B-17 "Flying Fortress"; a Boeing "B-29 Superfortress" and the B-36 "Peacemaker" dominating the group photo with a 230-foot wingspan. Taken at Carswell AFB after receipt of the first B-36 in 1948. 

If you have ever seen pictures of a 29 you will see in the waist a blister window.  A scanner sits in each one of those windows and reports the movements of the flaps, wheels and anything else that moves.  It is just a check on the instruments in the cockpit and a safety measure.  For the first 14 hours we co-pilots will have to sit there and observe.

Blister window directly to the left of star.

When they take these planes up for instruction rides they have 2 crews aboard.  The two pilots ride in the cockpit and learn to land the ship and the 2 copilots ride in back and scan.  After 14 hours they start crew coordination and the pilot and c o-pilot ride in the front while the other crew rides as scanners.

Scanning isn't so bad but it can get boring.  They have a chair back there for you to sit in but it faces the wrong way so we devised our own chair which when we got through looked more like a bed.  I took several parachutes and filled up the seat until it was as high as eh blister and then laid the seat cushions on top which made a bed high enough to look out the window.  It made it very comfortable. Besides that I had a magazine which I hadn't read so I was well entertained for the 5 hours we were up. Just the same I had to be on my toes all of the time.  Anyway it wasn't so bad.

The newspapers have announced that Japan has accepted our terms.  Whatever that means I have no idea but I can tell you that here on Randolph it means not a thing, classes go on as usual.  I would not surprise me to see us finish our training and then go overseas on patrol missions.  I suppose all the civilians of the country are out having a celebration tonight but I will be in class until 2200 which is not my idea of a celebration.  However I have nothing special to celebrate.  In fact if they asked for men to go home I would not raise my hand because I want to finish 3 years before going home.  It will mean a lot in getting a commission in the Reserve.  Also I wouldn't be able to get home for a month or so and then some time to get straightened out so I wouldn't be able to go back to school this year.  If I should wait till next June I will have a better idea what the civilian army will be like and might even consider staying in but if I got out next June I would have time for a good vacation and to get straightened out before going to school.

The Army is the best job I have ever had and probably will be the best I will have for a long time.  Very few fellows my age can make $240 a month and have as few expenses.  The army has taken good care of me and paid me well at the cost of my freedom to do as I want.  If the war is over things won't be the same but the ones who are qualified to stay in will have a very good deal.  Randolph Field is a permanent base and before the war all married officers had their own homes which cost them no more that $45 a month for everything including heating lighting and water.  Tell me where you can get a modern 6 room house for that.  Of course it is never ours but as long as you are on the field it is and no one can put you out.

Well so much for the Army.  It has its advantages but then there is the other side.  I haven't yet heard from anyone at home since I got here and that was 10 days ago.  I'll be looking for a letter soon.

With love

Austin.

August 7, 1945

Aug. 7, 1945

Dear Mother:

Well here I am at the "West Point of the Air", in fact this is my second day here.  Yesterday we cleared on to the post and got processed but today we have had it relatively easy.

I guess you kind of wondered what happened to me last week.  Well it was a rather busy week with clearing the post and all but mostly we went to Austin every day and went flying.  I have been checked out in most of the light planes now so I can give anyone a ride on my commercial license now.

Friday I flew a PT 19 which is one of the planes the army has sold to civilian when they closed all of the primary schools.  It has been rebuilt and was in very good order.  My buddies "Skip" and I took it up for an hour and did acrobatics most of the time.  It sure was swell to get upside down after a year of straight and level.  We did loops, clover leafs, Cuban 8s, slow rolls, barrel rolls, and everything in the book.  It cost $16 an hour so it was rather expensive amusement!

Training video for Army Air Corps Acrobatics

Then I took Addie Mae for a ride in a Stinson 105 which wasn't so expensive but it all mounted up.  We did the same thing for 4 days in a row so you can see we lived like a couple of play boys.  Of course we laid down the law to the ladies and went to the movies afterwards and ate hamburgers instead of steaks.

This B29 sure looks like a lot of airplane to me.  Seeing we are to be the lowly co-pilot we don't have to worry about the responsibility of it but still it looks like a lot of work.  We are all kind of disgusted with the way they picked he first pilots.  Instead of picking them for 4 engine time as they suggest should be done we all have pilots who have 105 hours in 4 (2?) engines and all of them time in low horse-power training planes.  Most of our time is in 4 engine planes but we have to be their co-pilots.  They don't know much about 4 engine planes and that is all we know.  They will probably give me a bad time but I don't care.  If they think I am going to take the bums rust for them and they take it easy I am sure they have another think coming because none of us like the deal.

Randolph Field

Randolph Field was really a cadet heaven.  We are living in cadet barracks and they are just like modern hotel rooms, hot and cold running water in every room.  All the buildings are stone and built 3 stories high.  They also have houses for the permanent personnel right on the post.  They look like these modern homes that were built before the war, ultra modern.  They have green grass and trees everywhere.  Really it is a modern town and industrial center, with its schools and churches right near home.  The student officer's area looks like a huge college campus.  They have ivy on the walls with Evergreen's and palms around the buildings.  It is really beautiful.  In fact I am a little amazed at what I see.  It must have cost millions of dollars.

Tomorrow we start going to school.  We are scheduled for 6 hours a day in 3 hour shifts.  I am scheduled for a class in preventative maintenance, and what that will be I have no idea.  Probably it is an engineering class.  For the next 8 days we are scheduled for 6 hours a day plus ground school which will be quite a long day but not so bad I don't think.  However some classes start at 6 in the morning and end at 9 at night and I am bound to get some of the night classes.  However after we get going we will get every 4th day off and will get to go to town and see what San Antonio looks like.

I suppose you all have had a nice cool vacation up in Maine.  I am sure wish I were there to enjoy the water and sunshine with you.  It would have been nice to have all of us together again.

Well it is time to quit and write another letter.  Please inform eh papers of my change of address.  That will save a lot of trouble.  Notice I have a box number which is rather important.

With love
Austin