April 16, 1943, Tempe, Arizona, Thursday Night

Tom’s fever has gone and he’s feeling much better. He’s not worried about missing his classes while he was out sick, because the classes are primarily a place to keep people until pilot training positions open up. He describes the physical conditioning and his pay. He is issued a navigation computer.

Thurs. night.

April 16, 1943, Tempe, Arizona, Thursday Night, Page 1
April 16, 1943, Tempe, Arizona, Thursday Night, Page 1

Dear Folks,

Here it is eight o’clock and I haven’t done a thing all day. I didn’t have any temp this morning but the doctor thought I had better rest one more day and then he would send me over to have my teeth fixed. I really feel like a goldbricker having my meals brought to me and sleeping inbetween times. However, if you are confined to quarters you are not to leave the barracks even if you do feel like it. Besides these rest periods don’t come very often so you might as well make the best of them while you can, and the sleep doesn’t hurt you.

April 16, 1943, Tempe, Arizona, Thursday Night, Page 2
April 16, 1943, Tempe, Arizona, Thursday Night, Page 2

As far as missing any school work goes you would have to stay out along time. Navigation is really the only course that they are really covering very thoughly. It seems that this is a replacement place till they have room for us and that they are trying to make the best of the time. The physical conditioning program really seems to be doing us all alot of good. They were giving it to us alittle too hard there for awhile just to see how much we could take. Now it is alittle more broken up. One day we will play football the next volleyball, basketball, baseball, however, we have about 30 min. of calesthenics before we play games. They have several chinning bars that we work out on first, then we run a half a mile, then have calesthenics, and run an other half a mile. By the time we finish this none of us are as anxious to play games as we were at the beginning. After this we have about a half hour to get a shower and get dressed for retreat.

Unless you are confined to quarters there isn’t any resting to be done between 5:15 and 10:00 at night. I got thinking today when we got paid that there is alot of difference between working eight hours a day for seventy cents and hour and our seventeen hours a day for fifty a month. We got paid sixty dollars today and should get about forty more the end of this month.

April 16, 1943, Tempe, Arizona, Thursday Night, Page 3
April 16, 1943, Tempe, Arizona, Thursday Night, Page 3

All the fellows were pretty happy after getting paid. They pay us all in cash and the way all these fellows were going around you would think they were millionairs. I hope everyone can trust every one else. I will send you some of the money when I see how much I am going to need I have to get another overseas hat when I go to Phoenix and some pictures.

To those taking Navigation they issued us navigation cumputers. They cost five dollars and are plenty nice. They do every thing but write down the answer, however, they are pretty complicated.

E-6B Dead Reckoning Computer. A refinement of the Dalton Mark VII Dead Reckoning Computer, the E-6B remains the most successful flight computer ever made. Hundreds of thousands have been produced through the present day. (Smithsonian Image)
E-6B Dead Reckoning Computer. A refinement of the Dalton Mark VII Dead Reckoning Computer, the E-6B remains the most successful flight computer ever made. Hundreds of thousands have been produced through the present day. (Smithsonian Image)

Well this was mainly a letter to let you know that I am O.K.

Love, Tom.

April 16, 1943, Tempe, Arizona, Thursday Night
April 16, 1943, Tempe, Arizona, Thursday Night

A Young Man Went Off to War