Miss Mildred Hamilton, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. John Hamilton of Union township, who has for the past year been employed as a spot welding inspector at the Solar Aircraft plant in Des Moines, enlisted in the WAVES Oct. 6, and last week reported at Hunger College, the Bronx, New York City, for her basic training. Miss Hamilton writes that she was one of a group of 308 girls leaving Chicago and 48 of them had started from Des Moines.
Source: LeMars Globe-Post, October 28, 1943
WAVE Mildred Hamilton Reports Big Demand For G-P
Navy Finds It’s Excellent To Prevent Tracking On Decks
(Letter from Mildred Hamilton, a Navy WAVE)
To the Globe-Post: I want to thank you for your service to the boys and girls in the Service. All of us in general and I in particular, appreciate getting the home town news.
You might not appreciate this particular idea, but my 49 bunkmates do—we have what we call captain’s inspection every Saturday at noon. Everything must be shipshape and when we have to walk on the deck we do have some trouble keeping it trackless. The handiest thing to grab is newspaper, spread it on the deck and prevent tracking. Newspapers being scarce hereabouts, we hoard every one we get ahold of—consequently after the hometown paper is read and reread, it serves as a doormat for Uncle Sam’s Navy WAVES. O.K. uh?
The author of the verse on the back of this sheet is unknown. I thought you might like to read it. It was printed and passed around here at school to keep us from feeling sorry for ourselves if we didn’t get liberty at the holidays.
As you’ve probably noticed by the address, I’m stationed at a school where we’re taught to repair flight instruments. There are many kinds of them, but altimeters, magnetic compasses, and air-speed indicators are the most familiar to layman.
Well, end of the sheet, end of letter. Sincerely, Mildred Hamilton S2/c
A WAVE’S CHRISTMAS
The radio’s just been playing
That “Dream of a White Christmas” tune
And lovely and all as the melody is
For my part, I’d just as soon
Not listen to it if I were a lad
Far off on some tropic shore
Who yearned for the snowy Christmas eves
He knew in the days of yore.
I think were I one of those boys out there
And that tune came tender and low
“And the treetops glisten and children listen
To hear the sleigh bells in the snow.”
It would do things to me that should never be done,
To any brave soldier lad.
And I harbor the fear that a tear would be near
At that lyric so poignantly sad.
Picture a boy in some desolate spot
Who hears with the fading light
“May your days be merry and bright
And all your Christmases be white.”
I can’t say just why, but it seems to me
I’d forget all the valor part,
And, remembering Christmas eves back home
That music would break my heart!
Source: LeMars Globe-Post, December 20, 1943
