Late October - A Letter From Ellen Upton Hall

A 2nd letter from Ellen arrived before month's end.

Letter - Page 1 

"October 27, 1943

Dearest Sis and family,

Grandma1 sent me your letter and got it Monday.  She sure is a sweet little person.  I really believe she was even more disappointed than we were at not getting to go.  I sure hope we get t go even yet.  He - Grover - says he thinks we can go sometime after the first of Nov., but I'm not going to count on it this time.

Glad to hear you folks (sic) going back to Eugene2.  I know both sets of folks will be tickled to death to have you 'home'.  Sure be glad to get to go home on a visit myself.  Mother Burks thinks we ought..."

Letter - Page 2

"...to make the trip home this time but neither one of us see it that way.  It wouldn't be any vacation for us at all cause we would be travelling nearly the whole time.  And travelling isn't exactly my idea of a good time.

I surely haven't been seeing much of my hubby this week.  Nor will I until after the 3rd.  He has to be at camp at 7A.M.  In order to get him there in time we have to get up at 4:30 - that is lots of fun (my foot).  He has to walk over a mile to catch a bus in order to get there in..."

Letter - Page 3

"...time.  He has to go to Aircraft Identification School until 9:30 at night.  The girls at the office made me mad.  They said I spoiled him cause I got up and got breakfast for him (sic) of a morning, but personally I think he would have a poor wife indeed if I didn't beside I like to have that much time with him.  This week-end - Friday night until 6p.m. Sunday - the 15th RCD is going on 'Biv Wac' (sp?)  I'm so afraid it is going to rain too.  Grover says it will probably just wait until they start.  This other will last through the third - they say we can save our furlough then but I'm not going to believe it until I..."

Letter - Page 4

"...am on the way.  I imagine we will be getting into plenty of cold weather up there too.  If we see any snow it will be all we will see this year unless we leave Georgia before this winter is over.

10-29-43
Well, today is the folks' Thirtieth Wedding Anniversary.3  Wish us kids could all be there for dinner this evening.  Remember their 25th?

Poor Grover Wednesday eve. I felt so sorry for him.  I had to go register for my Ration Book #4.  Incidentally I registered at the Boys Catholic High School and it..." 

Letter - Page 5

"...was one of the spookiest places I have ever been it.  Anyway after I registered I went to see 'We've never Been Licked'4 and met Grover at 9P.M.  He got off real early, forgot about meeting me and went clear home.  Grady and Gertrude had gone to the show too and so the house was all locked up and he couldn't get in.  He made the trip clear back to town and met me.  Poor child he was absolutely frozen.

This gum is for Barbie.  It is all I have handy.  If it is as hard to get gum there as it is here it is almost impossible but Grover gets it for me out at camp.

I really must get to work now.  Write soon.

Love,
Grover and Ellen" 

1 Grandma - Ellen and Margaret's maternal grandmother Nellie (Ellen) Carter Upton. 
2 By June 1944 the Waning family had returned to Eugene, OR.
3 Otto Upton and Elsie Greenwell married the 29th of October 1913.
4 'We've Never Been Licked' - WWII morale film for Texas A&M graduates fighting overseas. Young Brad Craig (Langton) enters the military school with a chip on his shoulder which Robert Mitchum and other upperclassmen quickly knock off. Once adjusted, Craig falls in love with a professor's beautiful daughter, only to find she is in love with his roommate, played by Noah Beery. In the meantime, Craig associates with Japanese spies (including William Frawley of "I Love Lucy") bent on stealing a secret chemical compound being worked on a the University. But is he one of them, or a double agent for his country?