1944
Bud writes home
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February 11
From Great Lakes Training Center, Ill.
"In only six more weeks I'll be crazy enough to be classified as a full fledged radioman."
February 24
"I saw Tommy Dorsey. I was a little disgusted. His band isn't half as good as it used to be."
March 6
"Only two more weekends in Chicago then maybe a little visit in Cleveland. I hope that I can manage about a week or something like that. Then after that maybe a trip to California, New York, Miami, only the Navy knows where."
April 3
From California
"At 8:30, the train pulled out of the station and many of us took our last look at the Chicago skyline."
May 1
First letter with Navy Censor stamp
"I should have quite a stack of mail if and when it ever catches up with me."
May 15
"...after weeks of wandering all over the U.S. and So. Pacific I've finally caught up with my new ship. She is the U.S.S. PRAIRIE."
May 17
"I'm in the small ships band here. At first I almost tried to change my rate to music, but decided to keep into radio."
May 24
To sister Mary
"I hope you are standing in good with your boss at the bomber plant. Put on that old glamour and you'll have a raise in no time."
May 26
"Say, maybe you'll have to get some of the sheep at Kiski to graze on the front yard now that the pro isn't there to cut the grass."
"No doubt you at home are as interested in the recent invasion of France as we are out here."
June 18
"Has Mary received a letter from Kemp - a shipmate of mine? When he heard she had promised to write any fellow 6 feet 1" or over and especially after seeing her picture, he became surprisingly anxious to write her."
June 24
"Thank the Lord I stuck to the Navy. It's not super, not even half super, but it's clean and is a lot better than a shell-torn, bullet-riddle, rut-run battlefield."
June 30
"I went on a beach party and had my first taste of dry land since coming out here..."
July 7
"I had forgotten it was July 4th - a holiday at home, until I walked into the chow hall and saw the dinner." Menu here.
July 26
"I'm still sleeping on deck ... It is cool enough at night but the compartments get none of the night breezes and are almost unbearable thus forcing almost all the men on the decks..."
July 27
"I saw 'The Navy Way' last night, the movie that Paramount made while I was in boot camp. I only got a fleeting glimpse of me but my company had a pretty good representation..."
Addressed to family's Canadian summer home
"By the date, I guess the folks are getting everything ready up at camp now ... without the brawn of some healthy man methinks I see some frail fraulein straggling up the hill to the kitchen porch with two dripping buckets of water."
August 13
"It's swell that you're having good weather this year after being plagued with pretty gruesome stuff the past expeditions..."
August 16
"I had quite a pleasant surprise yesterday. Tony Rondinelli my roommate in Chicago came over to see me. I almost passed out when he came up the ladder."
Letter from Anthony Rondinelli
"You all don't have to worry about him. There isn't anything in the world that can possibly happen to him."
August 19
"Yesterday I took a sunbath ... right now I could be served with salad and potatoes. The tropical sun is a little hotter than I had bargained for."
August 22
"... hearing so much code sometimes jammed with loud interference has played havoc to my ears."
August 25
"I realize now that had I sacrificed a good place in the Navy for the Army for two extra weeks leave, I might now be in a fox hole in France... "
September 7
"Mary's friend Alice wrote and I'm mustering courage to drop her a line..."
September 11
"I don't know, Mom, just what chances of getting back near the states are. No one ever knows from one minute to the next what's going to happen."
September 22
"Don't send anything valuable. In this heat and rain it would only come to a premature ending."
September 23
"Gosh September ... Hot in the day. Cool at night. Rain all the time. If anyone ever goes into ecstasies over the beautiful Pacific islands when I'm around, I swear I'll shoot him dead."
Doodling about family
Bud imagined the activities at the family's annual vacation in Canada in this full-page doodle in August 1944.
The cover of the ship's menu for Thanksgiving Day 1944.
"I'm so in hopes that Roosevelt and his gang get the outside of the White House this coming election, but Dewey doesn't seem to have the same amount of vigor or 'go' that made Wilkie so sensational."
October 24
Addressed to sister Dora (lots of doodles)
"Nine years ago I never thought I'd be writing a birthday letter somewhere in the Pacific, especially to a little sister ... Mom had promised me that I'd have a little brother and his name would be Charles William."
October 30
"Harriet Ann wrote and seemed quite proud of the fact that Lommy entertained Vice President Wallace. I hope her enthusiasm isn't an indication that she is becoming a Democrat."
November 8
Two weeks after Battle of Leyte Gulf
"It was with pride that we watched part of the fleet return ... some ships limped ... we dreamed of being part of a combat ship."
November 9
Birthday wishes addressed to his father
"A son can only hope that he can carry into life, pass on to his own son the citizenship, character and straight-forwardness handed down to him by his father."
November 18
"I haven't been ashore in five months and then bungle a swell opportunity -- grrr --"
November 28
"The Prairie may not be a glorious ship but she is a good one and I'm willing to stay with her as long as I have to stay out here."
December 8
"I guess we're out here till the final curtain now, may it fall quickly, but not one of us are over expectant and optimistic."
December 9
Doodles of a Christmas tree on the Prairie
"It caused quite a laugh, the scarf, arriving in climate like this."
December 14
"Today the finest gift that Santa could give to a sailor arrived ... the baseball wasn't in my hands for three seconds until some ball-crazy enthusiast greedily swooped upon it and was tossing it among the signalmen on the bridge."
December 20
"Even though Santa paid an early visit to the Pacific battlefronts the Prairie intends to celebrate on Christmas anyway with a party on the forecastle..."