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

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

May 24, 1945

Ardmore,

May 24, 1945

Dear A.P.

I neglect you too much considering the interesting letters you write so I shall answer one of them for a change.  Your letters like the Independent arrive every week and I miss them if they don't show up onto.  Please don't forget because it also will upset my routine.

I am glad to hear that Real Estate is making you so busy and apparently happy.  I guess like me, you too have averted to a war job which appeals and gives experience along a line which can be used to further an better, maybe, our post war occupations.  Your Real Estate experience may be just the thing to make you more successful building and my flying may be what I need to give me the job I will need after this is over.  We both seem to be happy which is also a good way to sweat out a war.

I am sorry to hear that the civilian radio broadcasting may be cut out.  However it may have been the incentive to further study and a real "ham" license.  I am sure that radio will have a place for me when I get home, either in the form of a ground station or maybe a small set in a plane of my own.  On airplane with a radio is most convenient and I almost believe that without one I would be lost.  We have so many in our plane that flying with none at all would leave me a little lost.

So you have an office girl who seems to know what she is doing.  She must also be rather interested in her work or I am sure she wouldn't satisfy you so readily, I have worked for you and know.  I wasn't too ready to cooperate at times and I guess it wasn't very hard to see that my thoughts were other places than on a plumb bob or a steel tape.  I would term Virginia in Army lingo as "eager".  We call some people "Eager Beavers" and some people who don't like their jobs have contempt for such people but I say more power to her.  Say, "hello", to her for me.

B17 nose

B17 nose after the war

To be able to fly a B17 looked like an impossible feat for me a couple of years ago but right now I believe it is no harder than driving a truck, and the similarities are many.  Of course you are in an element which makes improper operation dangerous but to any truck driver who can drive without accident, I say let him get the training and he too can sprout Silver Wings.

I would love to send a picture of a B17 to you if I can find a good one.  They are rather hard to find in a pose that shows off their beauty, and they are beautiful.  Like women they are beautiful when they have got smooth sailing but ugly as heck when twisted the wrong way.  Never push either too hard or sooner or later they explode in your face and it gets embarrassing what happens then.

I don't suppose I have to give you a lecture on B17s, but after all I have said about the crates I still have deep admiration for them.  There is not a ship in the world which can take all they can and still return home in condition, maybe for a crash landing but at least return home with a live crew.  All the other ships you can name go down and are lost to the war effort but the 17 can almost always be flown again.  That is why I hope they don't send me over in anything else.  Flying a 17 is life insurance I don't want to pass up if I can help it.

Since V.E. day my outlook at college has taken a turn for the better.  I must admit that before VE day I had no idea of going back to school partly because the realization of such a thing was so remote and out of this world.  I had the idea of being a professional soldier or a tramp or just anything which would take my worries and responsibility away.  I was looking for the easiest way to live I guess but right now I think that maybe college will turn out to be what I want.  It will be nice and quiet and lacking in hair raising excitement.  I will again be just another one and I believe that will just suit me fine for 4 years.  I may be bragging about my job but I still think that they are trying to make a man out of a kid and the responsibility is too much.  However I will bear up just to prove that I can to myself because after all is said and done I have to live with myself.  So long for now.

With love

Austin.

November 8, 1944

Roswell Field

Nov. 8, 1944

Dear A.P.

I have finally broken down and decided to write again.  Even though we are on a tough flying schedule we don't have too many ground school classes and get a pretty good chance to sleep in the morning.

We are getting an average of 2 1/2 hours a day lately and are going on a 5 hour a day schedule tomorrow.  It gets awful tiresome but at this rate we are now going we will finish ahead of schedule.

Tomorrow we get our instrument check so by the time you get this I will know if I am to be a pilot or a co-pilot.  If I don't get checkitis or something I will have it made.  It will be tough concentrating for 2 1/2 hours but I guess I can stand it.

I may even get home for Thanksgiving if I am lucky.  We are due 7 or more days at the end of our training here and the end should come up in a couple of weeks.  If it does I will make tracks for the first plane going East and there should be a lot of them.  We may have a great Thanksgiving even yet.

Mother has been sending a lot of clippings from the papers about the problem of making Boston the center of air activity after the war.  If Boston is made the stopover on flights across maybe fellows like me can have a chance to find a job in what we like after the war.  Even though the competition for flying jobs after the war will be stiff the further I go in this training the better my chances get.

I was glad to hear you got down to Bridgeton last week.  I hope everyone was well and from what you wrote Grandpa seems to be his old self alright.

We got Radio Tokyo on our Liaison Set today and got quite a kick out of their broadcast.  They really have a lot of propaganda but it doesn't seem convincing to me.  We get it on 13.5 megs if you have a set.  You might get a laugh out of it.  They have a lot of good music anyway.  

For a recording and more details about Tokyo Rose, click here.

Well this is a rather brief letter but I am out of paper.  Well have to write again soon I guess.

With love

Austin