Boot Camp Letters (November 1948)

My dad is 18 years-old and in his second month of boot camp for the Army. He shares his new experiences with the girl back home in rural Minnesota. This is a whole new world from the lumber camps he worked in as a teenager alongside his dad and uncle. He is sharing this adventure with his older brother and a couple of other guys from home.

This is the second in a series of articles sharing his letters.

Fort Riley Kansas November 1, 1948

Hi, Honey,

I received your very nice letter today. BOY was I glad to hear from you. It was the first letter I got since I’ve been here. It sort of gets a guy down when the others get two or three every day and you don’t get any at all.

We started our basic training today. All we did was listen to lectures. BOY does that get tiresome after a few hours of it. You can learn a lot from them if you can stay awake, but that’s hard to do.

I’m writing this letter at the service club. It’s a lot quieter here. At the barracks there is always a lot of guys rising cane, and they don’t give you a chance to do anything. This service club is a really nice place. They’ve got a balcony all around the dance floor. That’s where I am. It’s especially made for writing and stuff like that. They got writing tables all around it. There’s a room off to the side up here. There’s an electric record player in there and a big pile of records. Downstairs in another room they got pool tables and ping-pong sets, nickelodeon, and pinball machines. (That’s where Rex and Donald are now.)

Then, just outside the door they got a roller-skating rink. I spend a lot of time out there. I am getting so I can get along pretty good on those things. The only time I fell down was when a little devil named Donald Nelson pushed me. It wasn’t your brother either. [Her brother Don Nelson had joined the Army with my dad and other local guys.]

I guess Wes [another one of her brothers] got the best scores in his company in those tests. I guess there’s 240 in that company. If he keeps up the good marks, he’ll probably end up in officers’ training school right after basics. I probably could too if I would want to. But I don’t want to stay here and train drafters and RCT, even though it is better pay. I would rather go across. [Go to Europe.]

How’s your cold coming along? I hope you are getting over with it. I know what it’s like. I’ve had a pretty bad one myself the last few days. I think it’s from drilling in the rain. I got pretty damp and cold a couple of times.

About that picture in the camera, I didn’t snap it. Talking about pictures, how did those come out we took that day? Send me a couple if you can.

Well, I’ll have to close for tonight. There isn’t much more to write about. I’m looking forward to that furlough too. It seems a long way off, but time goes pretty fast at times here. I still do too much thinking about you. Today I got H_ _ _ for it. I was thinking about you and not paying attention to what the captain was saying.

With lots of love,

Paul

November 3, 1948

Dearest,

I received two letters from you today. I am not kicking about it either. I’d still look for more, even if I got 10 a day. It took just as long for the one with the Airmail stamp on as the with the regular one.

You make me hungry talking about that pie. I guess I’ll have to try and talk you into sending some of that mince or apple pie like you made last winter. That was really delicious.

Sunny is up here at the service club writing letters with me. I guess he is going to write you a letter. Nobody’s wrote to him since he’s been here, except a forwarded letter. I know how it feels. What’s the matter with Gwen L.? How come she don’t answer his letter? Or don’t she care to? Let me know what the deal is. Also, about the “guess who” business and “wonder what’s cooking,” I didn’t get what you were talking about.

What you said about me and Don knowing a few things about housekeeping don’t do us much good because there’s the right way of doing things and then there’s the Army way of doing things.

We haven’t got much of our waves left in our hair. Or maybe I should say, “What hair?” I don’t mind it though because you don’t have to worry about combing it.

To every hour we have marching or drilling, we have one in the classroom of instruction of how to do it right, mostly movies. Some of them get pretty dry and you have to keep pinching yourself to keep awake.

I thought my brother Don was going to catch heck today. He usually moves pretty slow when we are drilling. The captain asked him if he was waiting for Christmas, and he said, “Yes.” He was supposed to stand at attention and say, “Yes, Sir” when an officer speaks to him, but he just said, “Ya” and leaned on his rifle. He’s lucky he didn’t get a few days K.P. for it. I was on it one day, and boy, it wasn’t any fun. I washed greasy pans for 17 hours. I made it to bed and that’s all. I wasn’t there for punishment either, just taking my turn at it.

I got a letter from Mom. She said my dad was fixing up my car. Boy, I’m glad of that. I’m going to need a good car when I get home on furlough.

Well, I’ll have to close and head back to the barracks. You are probably getting tired of this junk anyway.

Well, so long Honey.

Paul

Read the October letters in the series and watch for the December letters article.