10/19/2018

History paused, or ...waiting for preservation

Sis, we were one of the Div. who stayed with the 9th Army last winter. It was mighty shaky too, our lines were spread mighty thin. By the way, the slide rule that didn't get home was probably a victim of the "Bulge." They picked off a lot of mail. You also remember how late it was during that time.

It's typical that Private Mastalir, (soon to be Tech Sgt. Mastalir), would attempt to mail a slide rule home to Nebraska for his sister to use in high school math class. That he posted it during the "Battle of the Bulge" was unfortunate, as it never got to perform calculations in Pierce.

Dad loved slide rules, and I remember how excited he was to bestow one on me in high school. Sadly, I have no idea how to use one any more, and no idea what those calculus algorithms were all about anyway! Still I remember sitting with him at the dining table long after supper while Dad demonstrated the slide rule's magic precision, efficiency, and cool design. Soon we would enter that ugly teenage daughter/square disapproving father dynamic, but at that slide rule moment we were still a team.

My WWII project has been paused while looking into storage and preservation options for the letters, photographs, clippings, and even ephemera! My order of archival sleeves will arrive any day now. "Ephemera tipped in" is probably my very favorite MARC field 500 general cataloging note ever:

EPHEMERA Printed material of passing interest in every day life (e.g.: advertising, ticket stubs, photos, postcards, programs, some booklets and pamphlets, etc.). Of interest to collectors because they are often the only record of many quotidian events.

TIPPED IN Paper, photograph, or print glued down by only a narrow strip.

The 1965 movie "Battle of the Bulge" was viewed sitting on the cold, hard linoleum squares of the next door neighbor's dark basement close enough to the t.v. to make us blind. It joins the "Outer Limits," the "Twilight Zone," some "Alfred Hitchcock Presents," and occasional "Wonderful World of Disney," viewed in this venue. The "Battle of the Bulge" had lots of tanks, but no intergalactic giant ants as far as I can recall.

Dad's letter from July 1945 referring to the Bulge and the slide rule sent me to the mildewed booklet, 102 Thru Germany. Dad and the 102d were not in the Ardennes region during the "Bulge." His cookies and letters from home were slowed, but still reaching him along the Roer with the 9th Army for Christmas 1944 and New Year's 1945. His letters from that time took 4-6 weeks to reach Nebraska, and I can imagine the agony this delay was for his mother, aunts, and sister.

I was so glad to find 102 Thru Germany already available online at Lonely Sentry. Dad's copy is full of stains and mildew. The 406th of the 102nd was defending the Wurm River between the towns of Wurm and Barmen at Christmas 1944, although the letters just say "somewhere in Germany." By July 1945 Howard could give more locations in his letters.


Had another one of those heart breaking letters from a brother (a Lt. in the Pacific) of one of my buddies who was killed. I had written the boy's wife and this letter was a thank you for what comfort that gave them and also a request for more information. They are so hard to write.





© 2013-2018 Nancy L. Ruder

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