Because I want to keep things lively on my blog I have decided to enhance my blog posts with letters. So starting today I am going to be transcribing old family letters. I will post only one at a time. Some might be boring, some cute, some short, some long. Either way I thought it would be a fun way to add interest to the old blog. This will generally be in addition to my regular weekly posts, or occasionally the post for the week. Although I think if there is a dearth of family gossip to post about I will share several letters in a given week.

I am going to start this week off with Dick and Dad’s letters. The earliest ones we have are those that my grandfather wrote in the early 1940s just after he had signed up in the military and was finishing up his school.

This particular letter has no exact date, it it believed to have been written in about 1942.

Corrections from readers are always welcome. Also I will be transcribing the letters as read –  including no punctuation, comma’s etc, as best as I am able; sometime habit makes it hard to deliberately make mistakes.

Pvt. William A. Shepard
Flight 404D
592 S. S.
Keesler Field, Miss.

Hello Mom,

Cant telephone here right now so Ill write if Lois is at home around there somewhere get in touch with her & tell here where I am. I am writing her at Dayton. You can see where I am & what I am in by the address. Ill write and tell you next wk whether Ill be flying bombing or in the ground crew. I sure was a surprise to me because I thought I would be in the signal corps but here I am in the air corps. Right on the gulf of mexico by Biloxi, Miss. Time is short so you spread the word around for me I have to go to bed. Write you Sunday. This is Friday.

Your son
Bill