Bill continues training at Van Dorn. Back in Ohio, Ruth Banis Nance graduates from high school. She is the second member of the family to do so. Eva was the first.
While serving in the Civil Conservation Corps in 1940-41 Bill is usually located in small isolated camps. However, he is able to find and fall in love with a girl named Ardis Wright. Their relationship survives Bill’s wanderlust days in early 1942 while he moves from job to job throughout several western states. The last time they met is unknown, but it was likely to have been sometime in the spring or summer of 1942.
Ardis Wright also graduates in the spring of 1943. She remains in the west and finds work at a factory. At the peak of the war over 18 million women work in factories.
On the Home Front:
- Inventor Robert Hurley filed a patent application for the pocket protector, designed for carrying ink pens in shirt pockets.
- Ohio University student Paul Newman, who had enlisted in the U.S. Navy four days before his 18th birthday, was called up for active duty. The future Oscar-winning film actor, nicknamed “Gus” Newman, enrolled in the pilot training program but was soon kicked out because it was discovered that he was color blind.
- The first automatic payroll tax in the United States was implemented by the passage of the Current Tax Payment Act of 1943, which was signed into law the next day. Under the new procedure, employers deducted the taxes from the employees’ checks, then paid the equivalent amount to the federal government at the end of the month, replacing the system of employees paying taxes on their salaries at the end of each tax year.
- Detroit Riot of 1943: A fistfight at the crowded Belle Island park in Detroit, Michigan, erupted into a riot between white and black residents. Over three days, 34 people were killed and 760 injured, before federal troops were sent in to restore the peace.
- The Harvard Corporation rejected a recommendation, by the faculty of the Harvard Medical School, to admit women to the college’s M.D. program. The Corporation would allow the admission of women in 1944.
- The U.S. Senate passed the first, and thus far, only national child-care program, voting $20,000,000 to provide for federal care of children whose mothers were employed for the duration of World War II.
On the War Front:
- The Allies bomb Sicily and the Italian mainland, as signs increase of a forthcoming invasion.
- Operation Cartwheel opens with landings on New Georgia in the Solomon Islands, including at Rendova Island. It will not be secured until August.
- The Americans employ the strategy of driving up the Southwest Pacific by “Island Hopping”
June 20, 1943 — Camp Van Dorn, MS
Dear Mom:
Just a note to say hello and to tell you that I received your letter & dad’s card. Tell him I said thanks for it. He’s a pretty swell pal even if he won’t admit it. Say you really are getting some stock around the old place. Keep up the good work mom. We’ll have the old ball rolling before long. So the chickens tried to eat up your garden eh! Remember what we used to do mom. The next day we’d have chicken & vegetables for dinner .
Say tell Ed Quinn I said hello. Some of these days I’ll get around to writing a letter to him. I was sorry to hear you lost a calf & porky to. That sure takes away all the profit doesn’t it. By the way how much are chickens selling at now. Hope you get a good price for them. Say mom you know what I wish you would do for me some day this summer. Can some chicken like we used to do. Any way save me a drum stick for when I do get home again. … but if I do you can guess pretty close where I’m going. Say Mom this love is sort of a funny situation. It’s some thing you can’t figure out by your self. Remember when I used to say I wouldn’t ever fall for a woman. Well I’ve found that the old adage still goes, “Live & Learn” It took a lot of traveling around this old county to find out that I could fall just as hard as the next guy. And am I crazy about her. And I think she really loves me Mom.
Anyway she promised to marry me. We’ve planned to wait until I leave the Army before we do get hitched as these western people say. Boy you’d really love her mom. Right now she’s working in Salt Lake City and is making good money. And do I wish I were there.
Say I’ll bet dad sure looks great in a new suit. Here’s hoping you & dad put in a couple of words for me when you go to Ruth’s Graduation. Ardis graduated this spring. Well so Abe’s going on maneuvers is he. So am I some day now. Give him my regards I’ve worked like a dog all day Saturday & Sunday. So I’ll be getting to bed. I’m tired.
Bye now Lots of Love
Bill
PS Mom if I’d send a little money home each month would you put it in the bank for me. Let me know.
ww2letterproject 
I love the inclusion of the history!!! Fascinating!
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