"Have
you wondered what has happened to me?
I'm a civilian now -- and have been since about noon last Friday -- but
there has been no time to write until now....
“Last
Friday at 6 A.M. Walt Brunhumer came by my room to awaken me. After a hearty
breakfast we still managed to get to the discharge center behind only Jim
Spillane and Phil Walker--two Boulder men.
By the time they unlocked the center (7:45) a sizeable crowd was
gathered. We were early enough to go
through with the first group. After
filling out many forms and hearing a number of instructive lectures, 23
signatures and five finger printings later -- we had our discharge buttons and
certificates in our possession. The
center had a congenial staff--the old medical captain with his amusing quips:
'Were you nervous in the service, son?' and 'Don't you know that you were too
old to have measles?' the personnel man who gave us a lot of angles on GI
benefits which we hadn't thought about--some of which might evade the spirit of
the laws, and the athletic-minded chaplain with his anecdotes about football:
'Even though the football season is over keep in there pitching for the old
school'--this he applied to our case by substituting the words 'country' and
'war'....
"My
plans call for a trip up to Chicago tomorrow to see John. Aunt Nell thinks it would be nice if I stop
here on the way back through since Uncle Orville's Aunt Frances, and Joyce will
be here--so I'll be around for the family dinner Sunday--and I may stay on
until Tuesday since Aunt Nell thinks it would be a good idea. Also, I plan to stop over in Missouri -- so I
don't know exactly what day I'll be back home."
--Letter
from my father, Decatur, Illinois, to his family, Bloomington, Kans., Tuesday,
July 30, 1946.
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