December 14, 1942 – Pre-flight School, Radio, and a Writing Secretary

Monday Evening

Dear Mom + Dad,

If I ever get this letter written it will be a miracle as things are sure in a dither. The boys are all packing up getting ready to move over to the pre-flight school. Yes little Bobby is on the list to move to Kelly Field for pre-flight too. We move over across the road to really start my training as an aviation cadet. I have my bags all packed an am ready to move over at 7:30AM tomorrow morning.

Sitting on the table before me is something that I really think is wonderful. Yes my radio arrived today and believe me I think it is really swell. It is a marvelous little set and I know it will bring me many hours of entertainment. I hope you don’t mind my using my Christmas present ahead of time. Thank you very much, it is one of the nicest presents I’ve ever had. I just can’t get over it. It sure is a nice set. It is just the right size and everything. I’m tickled pink with it. Thank you again!

Also this noon I received another thing that pleased me very much to(sic). I got a letter and a present from Mr + Mrs Keefe, Russ’s parents. They sent me a very nice writing secretary. It sure is nice to receive things like that as I feel that it shows they think something of you. I appreciate it tremendously. Russ has moved from Hawaii to, Mrs Keefe thinks, Australia. They haven’t heard from him since Nov. 6 but he hinted that he was moving there but she isn’t sure just where he is.

All in all it has been a busy and exciting day, several nice things have happened all at once. I now go into the tough part of my training the breaking in part. I know I’m going in for some rough days but when it is all over it will probably be worth it. So tomorrow morning I have to start being on the ball. I don’t really mind as I want to go through with this if I can. I don’t know if I will be able to write often as they claim once you get over there you don’t have time for anything. So if letters are few and far between you’ll understand why. I’m going to write as often as I possibly can. As soon as I find out what my address is I’ll mail it to you. My mail, of course will be forwarded to me as I’m only moving two or 3 hundred yards away from here. It will be the shortest jump I’ve ever made in the army.

I was going to send you money home when I was in town but I just didn’t get around to it. I don’t think I’ll be able to find time to send it now so I’ll hang on to it for awhile. I really hate to carry it around but I guess it will be all right. It’s always better to have a little to spare in case of an emergency so everything will be all right I guess.

I’m enclosing some pictures I took a week ago. There are pretty good. I’ll have more at various times so hang on to these for me.

Well that’s it for now! I’m listening to the telephone hour on my new radio and they just said not to call on Xmas day. I don’t think I’ll be off to do it anyway so I’ll telegraph. Thank you again for the radio. I’ll write tomorrow.

Love
Bob