Joe: Love at First Sight

Her name was Mary, of course. She was a blue-eyed, smiling, long-legged, cool-looking girl--a trifle naive. A girl with class, he thought when he first saw her, but young. A bus seems an awful place for things to start, but there was she on a bus going to church and planning to have a chocolate ice cream cone with sprinkelettes. He was going to church too, but she sat in back of him and that was that.

He said hello to her that afternoon or more likely she said hello to him. Again nothing happened--there are lots of shapely girls in blue bathing suits at a lake summer resort. The summer resort was one of those let’s-be-one’big-happy-family sort of places--it even had a social director and a social directrix.

Naturally one afternoon there was a baseball game in which all the boys and girls (in those places they’re all boys and girls even if the boys and girls have big boys and girls of their own) were to participate. Well this particular boy and girl were antisocial or mutually social. They sat out the ball game on a raft. Long afterward he learned her reason why she was there but being a romantic still doesn’t believe it.

They talked about prosaic things--families and schools; after all he was a shy young man. She wasn’t. Maybe that is why he was sure it happened then. That’s the trouble with shy young men: they are not used to openhearted friendliness. He never knew what she saw in him, but for the rest of the week they were summer friends. He struggled a little bit--an inherent male instinct. Why one rainy afternoon they went to a Bing Crosby movie in separate groups. They had only a week, not even a full one.

However, this time it did happen on a bus. They had made some sort of plan to ride back to New York on the same bus. He from the summer resort, she from Albany where she was visiting. He was positive. She says it couldn’t haven happened then--that soon.

He didn’t know the proper method of courting a girl, not a beautiful one like her. Oh he was quite proper. The movies he took her to were always approved for adults and children. A baseball game, a few football games, a little bowling--that was about all. He didn’t have much time, altogether three months. He then went away as did twelve million other men young and old. Oh yes, he finally kissed her once. He was very proper and very shy and afraid she would say no.

He did have a secret weapon. His job had been writing letters under constricting rules. He now could write letters without rules. She claims it was all platonic yet her first letter to him was a sixteen-page affair. Looking back he is smiling at the strategy of the salutation of his letter. First it was a proper Dear Mary--it’s possible to write the same two words so they are less proper but more warm. She should have realized what his plans were right from the very beginning. The first thing he did was change her name,, he first name that is. How could he ever have written letters beginning Dear Marie.

Three months of seeing her, three months of exchanging letters and she was sure too. A little later--less than a year after they first met, it was properly formalized. She got a ring (It was not in a car; it was outside on the sidewalk in front of her house). The ratio was changed. One kiss in three months to how many kisses in two weeks? Not enough, there will never be enough. His heart was just too full--that time was a blur to him. Did it happen to her as it did to him? There was no beginning. It just always was. Just two he and she.

Of course they were going to be engaged for a long time, and it was a long time. Six months and twenty-six days. One could say he was respoinsible. Too much of his heart got into one of his letters and now slipped in. But she was more direct and she knew her hussyness. She met his train and before they got home it was all decided. And then for a week they didn’t see each other, well hardly at all. A girl has a lot to do before here wedding. Some girls take months and months. This girl did it all in a week.

Married on Monday. What plain words. Rainbow isn’t a fancy word either. Nor sunrise,nor moonlight. Love and sacrement--a sacrament of love. "For this cause shall a man leave father and mother and shall cleave to his wife, and they two shall be in one flesh. Therefore now they are not two but one flesh."

Mary: Two Months Pregnant

My lucky steak ended today because I've been feeling sickish all day. I hate to miss Communion on Sunday, but I did this morning.. After all my talking last night, I didn't go to Wisdom (her alma mater) this afternoon anyway. I was afraid I might get sick on the bus or something. So I spent most of the afternoon sleeping and about 5 I got up feeling much better.

Let's buy the baby something for Christmas. If you're lucky enough to get a 5 -day pass, we can go shopping next Saturday. Otherwise I'll buy a baby dress or sweater or something myself. After all, Mary Jo should have a hope chest too. [I never got a hopechest.]

No, I didn't do any talking in the doctor's office--I just listened. You didn't think it possible, did you? Remember my telling you I could be silent and subdued some times? No, darling, doctors never embarrass me. They're so impersonal anyway. Most of the time you are covered with a sheet anyway. It's silly to get excited about going to the doctor's. That's just part of having a baby....

...Being a mother is just about the best thing that could happen to anyone. Darling, I guess you feel the same way about being a father. Joe, I still can't believe it really. It seems too wonderful to be true.

aww...She really does seem so relaxed about everything. Confident. And reassuring to her nervous husband--sweet!

Ginny Kaczmarek

May 19, 2009 10:30 PM

So matter-of-fact and yet compellingly intimate. Can't wait for more.

Sally Swift

May 20, 2009 09

Mary: Pregnancy, November 1944

I am not posting these letters in chronological order. I haven't transcribed them that way. My daughters have been pregnant four times in the last two years. They loved my mom's day-by-day description of her pregnancy with me. Unfortunately, I only kept a journal when I was deciding to get pregnant with my first child. My mother announced her pregnacy earlier than anyone I have ever known. Of course she only got a few opportunities to make love with her true love.

November 1-- Darling I am quite convinced that we're going to be proud parents in July. Four days late and still no sign of my period. (Grandma, like me, was regular as clockwork.) I'm still waiting two weeks though before I'll be completely convinced. Oh hon, each day I feel more certain that Our Lady has given us another wonderful favor. This is the bestest favor of all--a child of our very own.

Joe, I am sure it's true. I certainly haven't been feeling exactly normal. I can't say that I've really been nauseous, but I seem to have something very close to it. Maybe that accounts for my steady tired feeling too. All in all though, I feel fine, and I'm sure I'll have a normal pregnancy. Hon, it seems funny to talk about my being pregnant. Isn't it super?

November 8 , 1942-- Today I''m feeling quite chipper 'cause I talked with my husband last night. Dear, it was so exciting to share our secret. I like being a future mother awfully much. I love Mary-Jo's future daddy just millions of billions of times. [Somehow they knew I was a girl. I have never had to worry they wished I were a boy.] I love you more than all the babies that were born this year. Just think hon, ours will be one of the babies who'll be born next year.

It's really too soon to tell anyone yet though [two days later Mary told her mother].I wonder how the doctor will figure. I understand that they estimate one week after the first day of your last period and then say it'll be nine months from then. Which means that he'd probably say sometime around July 8th. My guess is about the 15th though. I've decided I'll wait until the 26th of Nov., which would normally be my next period and then if nothing happens, I'll arrange to go to the doctor the following week. I think I'll call Dr. Schanno and ask him to recommend me to someone.

November 10, 1944-- I told my mother she's going to be a grandmother and she wasn't even the least bit surprised. She said that it's really not necessary to go to the doctors until the end of the second month because he couldn't tell my anything until then anyway. It's fun being able to talk about it to mom though.

November 14, 1944--I haven't starting eating crackers in bed because I really haven't been too nauseous in the early morning. I usually feel worse about 10 or 11 o'clock.

Our secret is still a three-way secret although I don't know how I held back last night. Ginnie and Peg apparently thought that nothing happened [on her last visit] because I didn't say anything. They were teasing me that I'd have my last chance to make good when you get your 5-day pass. Ha, Ha, little do they know that our baby is a month old already.

Thanks for the post. My daughter is pregnant and expecting her first, and I'll pass this on to her.

john guzlowski

May 18, 2009 04:41 PM

John, I was blessed that my mom gave me such an entirely positive view of childbirth. When they showed us a film in senior year of high school on natural childbirth, some girls fainted, and I simply could not understand their reaction. My mom has a similar "no big deal" attitude toward her labor and delivery.

Mary Jo Koch

May 19, 2009 06:31 AM

More, more! These are fascinating on both a personal level and a historical one. It's so fun to read how the feelings and symptoms of pregnancy are so much the same across generations, even as the vernacular is different ("super" and "chipper" are so cute!). And love her relaxed, positive attitude. Can't wait to read more.

Ginny Kaczmarek

May 19, 2009 12:43 PM

You mom was right about your sex and your name -- Was she right about your birthday? Can't wait to find out!

Faith Paulsen

May 19, 2009 03:26 PM

Well my then two year old daughter was right about her sister's sex and birthday. The day Michelle was born, Anne announced that she was coming today. Once upon a time, an exciting time, we didn't know the sex of the baby.

Mary Jo Koch

May 19, 2009 07:12 PM

Joe: Army Life

I recall that on one Sunday afternoon, about five hundred years ago, someone told me how the army made a friend of theirs so much bolder. I hope you're not drawing a parallel. If you had higher mathematics at Queens college, you show know that, according to Riemannian geometry, there are no parallels. It's not the army, Mary; it's the fountain pen for a mighty man with pen and ink, am I. In all these years it's been a hidden talent.

Since one Nolan at least is interested in the army, I should begin by describing the process of Uptonizing. The prospective soldiers arrive in Camp Upton (I can't tell you how since that is a troop movement and troop movements are military secrets) late in the afternoon , and the balance of the day and night is spent in being acclimated. This involves standing out in the open, swept by cold winds (and rain if there is any) until the body temperature is about 40 degrees, and then marched into a building to thaw out. Just so this time is not wasted, they dish out either a meal or a test.

I was lucky because my first day ended at 11 pm; if my name began with a "z" it probably would have concluded at about 4 am. The next day the process is repeated beginning at 5 am--it is dark at this unearthly hour . However, after breakfast and after the inevitable standing around being counted and recounted , we were marched into the processing unit. I entered one door as a civilian and came out a fully uniformed soldier (in fact, carrying three other complete uniforms in a large canvas bag), possessing an insurance policy, and bearing the imprints of typhoid, anti-tetanus, and smallpox innoculations. After that the entire group is marched to the cinema to see a double feature entitled, "What Every Young Soldier Should Know." Thus ends the process and the solider is usually sent to some other camp for basic training.

But you are probably saying to yourself, Joe must be still at Camp Upton because the envelope says so. Yes I am still out here in the woods. It seems that I'm on a special detail; the requirements for which seem to (1) that you wear glasses, and (2) that you pass the intelligence test (I got 151 but I always knew I was a genius). After working for a week I don't think the second requirement is at all necessary. On the whole work is rather easy--just routine clerical work handling the records of the incoming soldiers ,but there is certainly enough of it.

Because of our work we live in a special row of tents. I'm sleeping in a 6 man tent and believe it or not, my principal complaint is that it is too hot. One of the soldiers in my tent was formerly a fireman on a Coast Guard rum chaser during prohibition days: he has appinted himself chief of the tent stove and he keeps it red hot night and day. Even on the windiest days the temperature inside our tent is about 85. We use coal so we're not affected by oil rationing. Heh, Heh.

You can almost hear his voice.

Faith Paulsen

May 19, 2009 03:22 P

Mary: Childhood Memories

Three years before she died, my mom emailed Her family some childhood memories, particularly about her dad.

As the oldest of my parent’s children I should share a few memories. My dad was very special for me. He took me everywhere with him since he liked to go for drives in the car, and not everyone wanted to go. I always asked if we would stop for food along the way, and he almost always obliged. However we did go on family trips. Once I remember going to Montreal. We always went out on Long Island in the summer, renting a bungalow usually for a month. In fact he wanted to buy a place, but my mom was reluctant. Remember, there were very few amenities then, just old fashioned ice boxes and poor stoves. He would commute to the city often and come out on weekends.

One summer he when I was 12, I want to camp out there. I remember getting a letter telling me that he bought a book that even I couldn’t finish in one night - Gone with the Wind. -He knew that I sneaked into the bathroom at night to read after I was supposed to be in bed for the night. His law office in N.Y. was just across from City Hall and he often took me there when there was going to be a parade to welcome a celebrity to City Hall. I vaguely remember when I was a young kid going to see Lindberg’s celebration in 1927.

My dad was a lawyer who took pity on poor people. During the depression he had many clients who couldn’t pay him. When he died ,my mom found a file cabinet filled with unpaid bills from people he had helped. Fortunately, he did have people who paid so we were not too destitute during the 30’s. He was a Democrat and was a Roosevelt man, but I remember his coming home one day proclaiming , “He closed the banks.” As a family we talked politics. My parents supported FDR and his New Deal. That is probably the reason why I became an FDR supporter , casting my first vote for Roosevelt.

Unfortunately, long before doctors had the modern medicines that control high blood pressure , my dad had very high blood pressure thatcaused him many health problems During the last years of his life he was in the hospital many times. My mom was 12 years younger than my dad and still in her child bearing years. Around the time each of my youngest brothers was born she also had a sick husband to care for. Since I was in my teens I used to take care of them when she would be at the hospital

My dad died in January 1939 at age 52, leaving my mom a widow with 7 children at age 40, the youngest less than 2. Because my dad was an independent lawyer he had no pension; due to his health conditions he had been unable to get much insurance. My mom was left with limited income except for the low rent from some old houses my dad owned in Brooklyn. My older half-brother Jim was in law school at this point, and I was entering my senior year at high school, expecting to go to college when I graduated. I remember well my father’s brother Bill saying to my mom: “Well you’re lucky, Mary is a girl so she doesn’t need to go to college." I remember thinkin , maybe not now, but certainly some day.

Mary: December 7, 1942

Or should I begin--dear #32636308? Writing to a number is a unique experience but not half so strange I suppose as being one. Are you expected to startle everyone you meet by announcing that you are #----etc?

All joking aide for a moment, I was ever so glad to hear from you Joe and more than a little amazed at the length of your letter. Just goes to prove that it can be done. Now that you've spoiled me, I hope you intend to continue entertaining me in the future with such newsy and amusing letters. Already I can hear you muttering, "never again."

As you probably have already guessed tonight is Monday and my night to spend poring over volumes of school books. But of course writing letters is decidedly more pleasant than dashing off a term paper for English. Any excuse to get out of work you know. Incidentally I haven't as yet decided on my topic and the first few hundred words are due tomorrow--Happy day.

After reading your tale of the poor little rain soaked draftees, I'm inclined to choose a phase of army life for my paper, but then again what would I use for a bibliography. Or is J.J. Koch an accepted reference?

Your experiences have certainly been numerous as well as varied. No doubt they were both amusing and sad. At any rate there has probably not been a dull moment.

Of course it's to be expected that you would have a "soft" job. Everyone else goes out to Upton and slaves in the kitchen doing KP duty for a week, but Pvt. Koch sits at a desk for a few hours a day. How many days do you have off each week Joe: don't tell me you work on Monday morning and Wednesday afternoons. Well I suppose if I graduate from college and bring up my IQ to 151, I too could get a similar job with the Army. Before obtaining such a job though if I have to qualify to the above conditions, I quit. I was glad to hear though that my suspicions concerning you were based on facts and that you are a genius. Tell me were you ever a quiz kid? Again to be serious--I'm happy to see that they realized that here is a fellow who knows something.

The day you left for camp I saw by the papers (OK it was the LI Daily Press) that your draft board had been bombed. At least the bomb was just about ready to explore when Johnny Policeman dashed to the rescue. You weren't up to any Red Skeleton tricks before leaving, were you Joseph? To be truthful I was a trifle suspicious. At any rate by this time they've no doubt nabbed the culprit.

Jim really is having trouble with his draft board. As was expected he been reclassified 1A. Nothing much has happened on his application for v2 (?) so he's a bit edgy these days regarding his fate. Do you have any extra beds in that nice warm tent? In view of the President's little proclamation of yesterday, enlisting has become a thing of the past. Think of all the trouble you'd have saved. Oh but then there would have been that many more days to work.

Speaking of working do you miss answering letters of complaint? Had I realized sooner I could have done a bit of complaining. As a mater of fact I think I will. My teasing you about getting up early on Saturday morning was all in vain. LPG (her company) had something special to take care of and asked one M.N. to please come in one Saturday. Said M.N. worked until 5:30. I'm more convinced now that I should join the army or something.

By the way Joe I both resent and appreciate your remarks concerning that little garden spot of L.I--Queens Village. We do have sidewalks--so there too.

I decided not to send out the medal (with the long chain) until I am sure you are going to be at Upton for a while. It's really too bad that visitors are no longer permitted because I would love to travel out in the woods to see the number one reception center of the country. But perhaps you'll be around for Chrstimas and can wrangle a day or two off. Write soon again Joe, as I want to hear from you.

Joe: Professor Koch on Procrastination

It was my intent to begin this letter with a lecture on procrastination delivered in Prof. Koch's inimitable style. This is how I used to work it. In those days I got off at 4:30 so I would be home considerably before 6.

Since dinner would be ready at 6 it was hardly worthwhile to begin studying. So I would start reading the LI Daily Press. After supper it would be only a few minutes till Lowell Thomas comes on so I might as well wait. (Please excuse the shift of tenses to the narrative present.) Well, a fellow needs some amusement and what's fifteen minutes; so to WEAF for the Chesterfield program with Fred Waring. Time out to rest so now it's 7:30. The half hour from 7:30 to 8:00 was really the difficult time to waste. I usually couldn't think of a valid excuse for not studying. Since I wasn't a lawyer, I usually got by without one.

Of course, everyone knows that the good radio programs come on a 8 o'clock so I was saved. This was good for Monday and Tuesday nights. Wednesday was a tougher struggle for I knew if I could get by Wednesday, I was saved for the rest of the week. What would be the use of studying for the last two days of the week? Occasionally, though, I would lose on Wednesday nights and I would have to make some attempt at getting to work.

I usually got seated at my desk about 9 but I was still struggling. I could rearrange the papers on my desk for ten or fifteen minutes , but finally I would have to pick up my book. However, there was still life in the old procrastinator: instead of opening the textbook at the assigned chapter, I could skip a hundred pages or so and then begin reading there. If I was near the end of the book, there were always other ones to look over. At approximately 10:30 the struggle would be over. It always puzzled me why I felt so tired after studying for only three hours.

Joe: December 25, 1942

The eastern skies are a golden ocean that stretches from purple mountain to purple mountain. Over this glowing ocean, a halo of pale yellow reaches up until it is transmuted into the deepest blue. The shores of the golden sea are white sand, of course, but as they recede from the molten surf they become darker and grayer until a dull green color predominates. The cactus and yucca-studded beach stretches all the way to the brown mountains of the west which are roofed by the western sky trying to show that the Occident too is a colorful panorama. The blue-gray western clouds are blushing a genteel pink. Is it because they have seen the sun still beneath the eastern horizon or are they showing their anticipation of the home-coming moon--in all its white fullness sailing slowly serenely towards its western moorings?

The description is not so hot, but it is an attempt to show that despite the radio and the jukebox, a white Christmas is not the only kind. In fact, I’m pretty sure that the first Christmas was more like our New Mexico one than the wintry Christmases of Queens Village and points north. All right, the fact that I’m writing letters on Christmas shows which kind I prefer. I think that all twelve of us who came down from Camp Upton feel quite lonely and homesick today.

I myself can’t conceive of being 2800 miles away from you and the Koches. Next door the bugler is practicing, outside cactus is growing, and if I look out the window I can see the desert all around and yet I still think that all I have to do is catch that next bus at Parsons Blvd and have you help me play with the various games and toys of the Nolan younger trio until Frank says, “Whose Christmas presents do you think these are anyway?”

Beautiful. He's a poet. And letters like this one are treasures -- I hope you preserve them.

Faith Paulsen

New Years Day 1943

After making our beds and cleaning up the barracks, you can well realize why we don’t have to report for calisthenics until 8 o clock. The exercises are given out on the drill field and it certainly is cold out there because the sun has not cleared the mountains that early. For the first few days calisthenics were easy because the corporals giving the exercise would tire soon and we’d be through. Today, however, a new system was inaugurated--a shuft of four corporals put us through our paces. After briskly running about a hundred yards we then have to “police up” the company area (It’s now seven minutes to nine so this epistle will have to be continued tomorrow since we have lights out at nine. Oh well early to bed and early to....!)

Policing up consists of spreading out in a line and marching forward picking up stray bits of paper cigarettes etc. from the ground--street cleaning in other words. That is the theoretical aspect. Actually you walk along with your hands in your pockets studiously avoiding looking at the ground.

In My Grandmother's House

My daughter Katherine wrote this about the wartime letters:

In my grandmother's house, past a stone Mexican statue named Harry, up the front stairs and to the right there is a bedroom. In this bedroom there are a pea green carpet, a bed with yellow and orange flowered sheets, and a cracked blue dresser. This dresser, unlike every other bureau and closet in this house, does not contain any seventies-style ties, old scarves, or early feminist t-shirts. Instead every drawer is filled with letters.

Joe lived in Jamaica, Queens, with his parents and six younger sisters and brothers. His college yearbook said of him, "Even his own brilliance could not fathom the enigma that is Joe." Mary lived in Queens Village. She was the second child, and the oldest girl, in a family of seven. Her high school yearbook described her as, "Sincerity coupled with bubbling vivacity, scholastic excellence with literary talents, athletic prowess, sparkling wit." She would not have a college yearbook until many years later, because her father had died without much life insurance when she was seventeen years old. Her father's brother squeezed together the money for her older brother to continue school at St. John's, but Mary was just a girl.

Mary and Joe had met the summer of 1942, on a raft at Loon Lake in the Adirondacks. He was 28, she was 21. A week later, back in Queens, he took her to see Bambi. They saw each other often in the three months after Bambi became Prince of the forest, and before Joe was drafted. He kissed her for the first time on the day he left for the army.

They will get engaged the night before her 22nd birthday in August 1943 and will marry the next March. The wedding will not be fancy, since it was planned in about four days and no one had much money anyway. The reception will be in Mary's backyard. Joe will go off to war in Europe, though his bad vision will ensure that he never faces combat. They will have their first child while he is away. There will be short letters to Baby Mary Jo, my mother, enclosed with the longer ones to Mary. Then in 1946, when Mary Jo is eight months old, Joe will finally come home and the letters will end.

They will have five more children, and the children will have fourteen kids of their own. Joe will die of Alzheimer's disease in May of 1987. Mary will become a lobbyist and counselor for victims of the disease and their families. She will become even more involved with her church,
and even more of a rock for her distressingly heathen children and grandchildren. Mary will die in April 2004 of Progressive Supranuclear Palsy.

My grandparents' generation has been called "The Greatest Generation." They survived the depression, they fought Hitler. Yes, they did, but many of them also contributed to horrible racial inustice, and a few of them dropped the bomb. I suppose that talking about our parents' and grandparents' moral superiority is an improvement over not trusting them because they're over forty, but it's not much of an improvement. It would be far more honest to say that they did some very good things, and some very bad things. They had fewer toys, and certainly they wrote better love letters, but they were more or less just like us.

To put it another way, generation schmeneration. I'm not going to even try to judge. Instead I will sit here and read these letters. I will learn that my mother's mother is more than the grandma who babysat for us almost every week for ten years, and who is always inappropriately freezing things. I will learn that my mother's father was far more than the sick, confused old man I remember.

In My Grandmother's House

My daughter Katherine wrote this about the wartime letters:

In my grandmother's house, past a stone Mexican statue named Harry, up the front stairs and to the right there is a bedroom. In this bedroom there are a pea green carpet, a bed with yellow and orange flowered sheets, and a cracked blue dresser. This dresser, unlike every other bureau and closet in this house, does not contain any seventies-style ties, old scarves, or early feminist t-shirts. Instead every drawer is filled with letters.

Joe lived in Jamaica, Queens, with his parents and six younger sisters and brothers. His college yearbook said of him, "Even his own brilliance could not fathom the enigma that is Joe." Mary lived in Queens Village. She was the second child, and the oldest girl, in a family of seven. Her high school yearbook described her as, "Sincerity coupled with bubbling vivacity, scholastic excellence with literary talents, athletic prowess, sparkling wit." She would not have a college yearbook until many years later, because her father had died without much life insurance when she was seventeen years old. Her father's brother squeezed together the money for her older brother to continue school at St. John's, but Mary was just a girl.

Mary and Joe had met the summer of 1942, on a raft at Loon Lake in the Adirondacks. He was 28, she was 21. A week later, back in Queens, he took her to see Bambi. They saw each other often in the three months after Bambi became Prince of the forest, and before Joe was drafted. He kissed her for the first time on the day he left for the army.

They will get engaged the night before her 22nd birthday in August 1943 and will marry the next March. The wedding will not be fancy, since it was planned in about four days and no one had much money anyway. The reception will be in Mary's backyard. Joe will go off to war in Europe, though his bad vision will ensure that he never faces combat. They will have their first child while he is away. There will be short letters to Baby Mary Jo, my mother, enclosed with the longer ones to Mary. Then in 1946, when Mary Jo is eight months old, Joe will finally come home and the letters will end.

They will have five more children, and the children will have fourteen kids of their own. Joe will die of Alzheimer's disease in May of 1987. Mary will become a lobbyist and counselor for victims of the disease and their families. She will become even more involved with her church,
and even more of a rock for her distressingly heathen children and grandchildren. Mary will die in April 2004 of Progressive Supranuclear Palsy.

My grandparents' generation has been called "The Greatest Generation." They survived the depression, they fought Hitler. Yes, they did, but many of them also contributed to horrible racial inustice, and a few of them dropped the bomb. I suppose that talking about our parents' and grandparents' moral superiority is an improvement over not trusting them because they're over forty, but it's not much of an improvement. It would be far more honest to say that they did some very good things, and some very bad things. They had fewer toys, and certainly they wrote better love letters, but they were more or less just like us.

To put it another way, generation schmeneration. I'm not going to even try to judge. Instead I will sit here and read these letters. I will learn that my mother's mother is more than the grandma who babysat for us almost every week for ten years, and who is always inappropriately freezing things. I will learn that my mother's father was far more than the sick, confused old man I remember.

Joe's Yearbook Profile

No problem, riddle, or formula seems to be beyond his ken. He is the outstanding scientist of St. Francis College; he is the winner of the coveted Smith Memorial Medal for excellence in Science. Yet even his own brilliance could not fathom the enigma of Joe Koch. In many ways Joe is a walking paradox. He seldom laughs outright; in fact his picture would lead one to believe that he is a sombre pessimist. Yet it is his nimble wit that makes him a distinctive personality. His humor is never loud; rather it is whimsical and epigrammatic.

To be the leading scholar of the college it is necessary to do more work than the average. A student who is desirous of attaining official recognition must sit at home and do extra assignments. That is the normal procedure. But is that the form fol owed by our human riddle? Certainly not! He is actually scrupulous about not doing more than the assignment requires. He does exactly what he is demanded to do and not one jot more. What he does, however, is of such undeniable excellence that he was one of the first men picked for the Duns Scotus Honor Society.

With regards to one trait, however, Joe appears to contain no contradictions. That is his quality of intense loyalty to his friends.

March 6, 1944

My mother's younger brother, Warren, then 10, describes the wedding:
All hell broke loose. This Koch guy was coming home on furlough, and was going to get hitched to my sister. It was Four Koch sisters riotously descended on our 220th Street home, seeking to turn it into a wedding palace - Agnes, Peggy, Mary and Jane! After them, D-Day was a letdown! In preparation for the great day, Frank, Ken and I, now nearly 10, 8 and 12, were sent out across the neighborhood on a foraging mission, a kind of loaves and fishes expedition, to find red ration coupons so there could be meat served at the wedding feast.

March 6th was a brilliantly sunny, crisp day, more spring than winter. At the wedding, my big shot Xavier brother Robert, with his fancy blue uniform and white gloves, got to give away the bride, subbing for Jim who was in the Pacific. At the 220th Street reception, I have a strong memory of being impressed that our pastor, Father Herchenroder, was actually standing in our backyard, in a black leather jacket, talking just like a regular person. After the reception, my sister took off somewhere with Corporal Koch, and we kids went across the street to the more serious business of shooting marbles.

Mary: January 16, 1943

Dear Joe, Saturday morning in the office is as usual very dull--not that you'd know about such things, having loafed all your life on the seventh day of the week--so I'm free to steal a few minutes to say hello to you. Then too, since most of my time this weekend will be divided between the books and hot coffee, I'll probably not have another chance to write.

Due to the paper shortage you'll note that I'm typing single space, although all the best secretarial books insist that you should use double space for personal letters. While in the midst of licenses and priorities, I'd like to inform you that we do not sell them--the Government does that. On the contrary we have to obtain them, and it's a hard job getting them. If you've been reading your newspapers lately (or maybe the El Paso Times isn't up to date), you'd know that there are innumerable forms to be completed before Washington will even consider granting priorities, allocations, and licenses. I hope now that you realize that procuring licenses is not as simple as persuading poor unsuspecting individuals to buy insurance policies.

This morning promised to be just another dull dreary Saturday, but soddenly the old sun has appeared and changed the whole outlook. To herald the appearance of Mr. Sol is the air-raid whistle which means noon time has come; I'm glad because hunger is gnawing at my stomach. You know army life would never do for me if the meals are as bad as you say. In no time though you'll probably become adept at dragging the available supply of food from those Texans, just as you were in obtaining subway seats from helpless women. Well, I guess I'll have to interrupt this letter anyway to get my mail out before closing time. See you later.

In a few short hours spring has come! How do I know? Well, when you can use a porch which has no heat, then it's spring, isn't it? Yes, it's the first time since November that we've even stayed on the porch more than two minutes. Usually we just consider that a part of the great outdoors. Of course you will probably pick me up on the above and remark something about my being on the porch for a whole hour one night. But why do I let my thoughts stray like that. To get back to spring--after work I walked down Fifth Avenue to the 42nd St. entrance to the subway just so that I might enjoy the warm sunny day. You see you're not the only one who takes 16 mile hikes.

Our coats were tossed open; thermostats were shoved down to 60, the solid earth became soft and muddy, and the world seemed to be whistling a tune of spring. Yet the other sure signs of spring were missing--there were no cheery songs of the birds or the first green buds on the trees--so I guess it isn't here yet. How I wish it were; then I'd have an excuse for this sudden attack of spring fever.

Mother insists that the cold blustery winter has just begun; rather she hopes so because we just bought a new grate for the fireplace which burns coal and we haven't yet experimented with it. By the way when dashing through RHM on Monday, I happened to see your sister Jane. However as I was rather late and anxious to get back form lunch on time, I didn't take time to stop. Besides she seemed to be persuading a reluctant costumier to buy some little do-dad.

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Joe: January 14, 1943

Mary, Mary,
Don’t you know that you’re not supposed to upset the equanimity of privates in the United States army by writing letters at two o clock on the morning? Why, just to list some of the effects: Last night I had planned to write a letter to Leroy A Lincoln, President ye dear old Metropolitan thanking him for his letter of Christmas greetings and for the wallet which “my friends and associates of Mother Met” had sent as a Christmas remembrance. No letter for Leroy last night nor tonight and after all he was my boss and will be at some time in the future. Then there is the physiological effect of just 4 1/2 hours of sleep last night. Being systematic I usually budget my time: I just think of you, Mary, during the daytime hours; from 9 to 6:30 is reserved for Morpheus. But not last night, I couldn’t fall asleep until after midnight and I was wide awake at 4:30, back in Queens Village. Evidently the red bus no longer is running in the early hours of the morning because of the gasoline situation.

Twenty four hours later I’m in no better condition. I read the NY Daily News of Jan. 6, 7, and 8 and all the drippy stories in the January American to try to get back into a semblance of my phlegmatic self. All to no avail.

If it were anyone else but you, Mary, I could dismiss it as an example of sleep-writing. But not Mary Nolan--her vivacity is at its zenith at the time “is it tonight or tomorrow morning.” Just seven weeks ago tonight we said goodbye, Mary--they must have been Biblical weeks--I’ll have to stop this because by Jan. 23 I’m supposed to be a full-fledged soldier having then finished my basic training. It wouldn’t do when the Sgt. gives the command Cadence Count for me to suddenly shout out twice a four word phrase which my heart drums out continually like a bolero instead of the usual 1-2-3-4 1-2-3-4. I’m afraid to think of the possibility that the seven weeks may become 7 times seven weeks--Halt, Private Koch.

Joe: January 5, 1943

Since you have seen fit to comment on my writing ability (was it some Nolan blarney or some Hunter satire?) I feel brash enough to give you a short lesson in mathematics. To wit, 3 x 4 =12. Simple, isn’t it? You are probably wondering what prompted this pedagogical outburst and I should let you guess, Mary. But just writing your name, Mary, makes me softhearted so I’ll tell you. Well along in your last letter (on page 9 to be exact) you stated and I quote, “here I am on my third booklet.” Yet on the last page of that very same booklet in a P.S. you wanted me to note that your letter was only 15 3/4 pages. You know, Mary, that sooner or later the Hunter Math dept. will get you for at least one course and where will you be? I think I’ll have the Koches ship my calculus book to Queens Village. After all, if your wishes for an end to World War Ii during 1943 are fulfilled, I’ll need an assistant mathematician to help me with my actuarial examination.

I notice that you glibly mention our letters crossing in the mails. It’s my belief that one has to master the intricacies of Einsteinian Time-Space in order to keep our correspondence straight. Look at the following diagram:

Do I hear Mary Nolan saying, “Yes, he fills up his letter with charts and diagrams so he can boast of his extended epistles; if I did that I wouldn’t have to make mistakes in arithmetic.”? Oh, I forgot you’re still a Home Eco. major--at least until the new semester--so you won’t have to answer that question. While we’re on the subject of home economics, I think it’s mean, Mary, to mention your prowess (is that a bit too strong?) as a cook when I’m some 2500 miles away from your kitchen. I’ll get even, though. In my next letter home I’ll tell my mother; for over thirty years she’s been looking for someone to cook Sunday dinner for the Koches. In that time she got a number of additional Koches but no cooks. That’s a German pun, and like all German jokes, lousy.

Joe: January 27, 1943

I’m closing my ears and getting back to a most important subject--correction; to me the most important subject--you, Mary dearest. I’m still puzzled by the outcome of a decision to go to McAveighs instead of Loon Lake Colony because the latter place seemed to be a little too sophisticated for a simple minded guy like Joe Koch. I just remembered the connotation attached to simple minded--but just one moron joke mary. I’ve gone along for a good many years carefree, rather self-complacent and then--I remember seven days at McAveighs, a bus ride from Albany to New York, Bambi, a Brooklyn-Philly game, some shows, a few movies, a couple of football games featuring Fordham--luck Fordham-- a ballet, a rodeo--what I’m trying to say is that I remember only Mary, Mary dear, dearest Mary, lovely blue-eyed Mary, mary pretending to be asleep on the red bus, Mary so alive, Mary bowling, Mary and her Hobokens, talkative Mary, the Mary who says she is silent and subdued, the Mary who says she isn’t naive just because she has principles, the Mary who puts stamps upside down on letters to new Mexico, Mary the student, Mary the only girl--just Mary.Then I count on my fingers that it’s just for five months that I’ve known her--and for two of those months I haven’t seen her--It upsets all my theories and a theoritician who finds his theories upset is a dangerous man, darling Mary. He finds his fountain pen to no avail, so he’s thinking of and loving you, Mary dear, across 2500 miles and hoping that Queens Village is tuned in by telepathy. With all my love, Mary, love that must be real because it is so incoherent, I love you, Mary, and will always and always.

Joe: January 17, 1943

Sunday Afternoon--All is quiet and peaceful--three hard-working soldiers are enjoying a siesta--inaudibly, thanks be, correction four; one is studying a dictionary--a victim of three new words-a-day disease, probably; another is painfully writing a letter--not me, I enjoy writing letters which begin Mary dear.

The only sound is the humming of the fan in one of the barracks’ as it blows out warm currents of desert air. Fortunately, my mind is miles and miles away. watching a dark head buried in a book of scientific lore; otherwise there would be five siesta-ers. A pair of blue eyes looks up from the heavy book, which I can now observe to be entitled Physiology for Students of Home Economics, but resolutely look down again on page 47--only 281 more. Alongside the printed book is another--a notebook which, at last, is completed; although, here and there, its contents are not clear--I wish that Peggy wrote clearer but borrowers can’t be choosers and only he last three quarters is copied. What is this? The diagrams in the notebook are but black and white--no crayon colored charts.

If it were but a picture all would be still. But no, I can hear the sound of grinding teeth--do I have to interpolate that they are white and were noticed by me in that period from August to November--as the ideal cell battles with a sarcolena with a lonely neuron looking on. Wait, another sound can be heard. A voice--yes it’s Kenneth’s--is saying, “Mary, Mary, did you hear how a moron powders her nose. No? There were five morons and they all ordered Coca-Cola, the other one ordered milk.” Another sterner voice is heard: “Frank, stop marching around, your sister Mary is studying. Sit still,; here’s a new Superman book to read.”

What is the focus point of all this solicitude doing? She’s making progress: a page is turned over, eyes race over page 48 and reach halfway down the next page. They stop then, puzzled--how did that New Mexican jackrabbit get tangled up in the carotid artery? Back to page 47 and ye old physiology textbook is turned face down and a hand--a left hand reaches for the notebook. This time the eyes are resolute; they ignore a bracelet whose blue stones are earnestly trying to reflect the glory of its owners eyes. Page after page is flipped by--ah here it is, the circulatory system. “The heart is a wonderful instrument: it pumps thirty billion times during the allotted span of three score and ten years...” The owner of these studious blue eyes pauses to absorb into her mind all this concentrated knowledge about the heart. Alas, that pause was fatal--her mind leaps to a consideration of other facts about hearts which are not contained in any textbook.

Mary! What is the use of my being in Queens Village this Sunday afternoon when you persist in wandering to a warmer Sunday afternoon out in the desert. I’ve glided from the New Mexican plateau to the lowlands of Long Island so you could study. After all, it’s only two days until the 19th and well you know Monday and Tuesday will be the two busiest days for the priorities and export license department; Pete will probably keep you working overtime Monday night; it always happens that way. Well, I’ve done my best, Mary--New Mexico it is.

Joe: January 8, 1943

Your appeal for pulse rate readings has appealed to the scientist in me.--stamps will not be accepted. You will understand that laboratory conditions are not ideal here at the Lordsburg Interment Camp so I will not be able to furnish exact figures on all the readings you need, Mary. However, here goes:
Sex: Male. (Thanks for placing me in the adult classification.)

Age: 29 years, 4 months, and 4 days--someone borrowed the latest issue of the astrology magazine
so I can’t verify this approximation. To find the exact number of hours and minutes up to this time (7:45 N.M. Mountain War Time) consult any astrology almanack for favorite time at which geniuses are born (I know the plural is genii but I don’t want you to receive the wrong impression.)

Pulse rate: All the following figures are at 15 second intervals.
1. Before meals: Too great a variation--the only meal that is worthy of being called a meal is breakfast and it’s too dark at seven o clock in the morning to take my pulse before breakfast. Since we’ve had stew for supper for the last seven days--stew consisting of everything left over from dinner all mixed together--any pulse reading before and after supper would be utterly unreliable: the before reading would merely show anticipated revulsion and the after one show you I’m tired of eating bread and apple butter for supper. Naturally this leaves dinner. However, I’m getting used to the dinners by this time and I’m afraid that if I observe scientifically any physiological reactions, it will disturb my digestion of the midday repast.
2. After meals: See remarks under “Before meals”.
3. Reclining: 18
4. Sitting: 17.
4a. Sitting but reading one letter from a certain individual who (as in all scientific treatises) will be nameless; besides I don’t want to make you overconfident regarding your literary prowess, Mary: 20.
5. Standing: 19.
6. After 1/2 min. of exercise: Well ignorance is a poor excuse for your snide remark about 1/2 minute exercise, but I accept it this time. I’ll have you understand, Physiologist Nolan, that even when I brush my teeth I undergo five minutes of very vigorous calisthenics. Since our formal calisthenics in the morning takes up a full half hour I’m afraid that this reading will be impossible to obtain. Besides it takes me more than half a minute to count my pulse beats for 1 seconds.
7. After a hot bath: Are you kidding? After a hot shower Pvt. Koch turns off the hot water and a forceful pray of icy cold water immediately cascades upon his manly physique. It takes a bettter man than me to count his heart beats under a cold shower--how do I know my watch is really waterproof; the jeweler didn’t say positively?

Please understand, Mary, that if I were using my own writing paper or even the U.S.O. letterhead, I wouldn’t clutter it up with tripe like the above. Insamuch as you own the prioroities and export licenses on this paper, Mary Nolan Inc., I suppose you can demand what you will....

This going to bed at nine o clock is getting me down especially on Friday nights, so last night I stayed awake in bed for over an hour philosophizing and poor you will have to bear the brunt of it. What started my mind gyrating was a jingle of Gertrude Stein’s which of course I don’t remember word for word--no one does--which goes something like this:
Jack and Jill went up the hill
Jack is Jack even though Jack is Jill, he’d still be Jack.
Somewhere in one of my philosophy courses I remember that the question of personality was brought up: “Why am I, I?” or “why are you, you?” I am not indulging in double talk. Well this was the starting point: I can’t remember any changes in myself since I graduated from grammar school--maybe beacuse I received a medical for general excellence at that time, I decided that I couldn’t be improved--even back in Jan. 1927 I was a pessimist. I wonder though, if my (illegible) had taken me out to the woods then, would I have recognized one Mary Nolan who was just then starting kindergarten? I doubt it for the twins were slightly less than four years old and Agnes was just about six so I looked upon all the younger fry as a great annoyance--especially the talkative ones. But I must have changed: now, when my thoughts turn to one youngster (of Gresheimer--classification of those who are neither children nor adults) the gleam in my eyes is definitely not one of annoyance; just for your information, mary, it’s one of longing--

I seemed to have wandered off track back in the previous paragraph--just shows I haven’t a one track mind. What I’m trying to get at is the fact that we do not recognize the process of evolution taking place within ourselved. We can look back at ourselves from the present time and recollect what we once were but we can’t point out any turning point. Probably growing older is a continuous process of accretion--we never lose ourselves, but just keep adding more thoughts, more emotions , and I trust more wisdom, not to mention such mundane things as(illegible), bad habits, etx. I’m not including you in the last category, but I already feel as if I knew you always, Mary. Yet I can remember a certain Sunday just one day less than twenty weks ago when I first met the Wisdom Alumnae Trio--well I was always warned that canoeing was a dangerous sport.

I promise you Mary, that in the future I’ll leave philosophy to the philosophers. How are the other Nolans--they can’t be in perfect condition if they let you cheat at Pick-Up-Sticks. I know that game and I also know that anyone that wins all the time does it by a crooked flip of the wrist as they let the sticks go....

Who Am I

I am the oldest daughter of Mary and Joe; that's why they named me Mary Jo. I was born at the end of World War II, July 17, 1945. My father was in France and did not see me until the following February.

I have always been fascinated by my parents' wartime love letters. I have many boxes of them, all in their original envelopes, all in careful chronological order. Now that they are both dead, I want to bring them to life again in this blog.