March 17 & 20, 1944. Anna writes two letters to her brothers. Mama is finally getting her false teeth made, Easter is on its way, the upstairs renters are moving out, and Anna is facing the prospect that Eddie may be drafted as a result of new laws under consideration.
Anna writes that “mama has made her long awaited trip to the dentist. He took some X-rays and made a few molds. …The teeth will cost $150.00 and they are the plastic kind, very light and they feel almost like your own in your mouth like they say. Mama keeps lamenting how bad it will be with false molars but I told her that she should be glad that she lives in times like today when you can find a substitute…”
With Easter coming, the baby got a new pair of white shoes. It seems the baby is excited about the shoes too. “When we got home she kept on looking at them and then she would bend down and touch them and look up and smile. Now we ask her where her shoes or ‘trzewiczki’ are and she right away bends over and looks at them.”
The baby will also be hitting the seventeen month mark later in the week. Anna writes that Terry “is starting to repeat words after us and she can remember them.” Apparently the baby has developed a fondness for soda. As Anna tells it “…when she sees it standing on the floor by the kitchen sink…she goes to it and tries to lift up the bottle and says soda just as plainly and then when we pour it in her cup she makes a glad noise and drinks it and when she is all done she comes asking for more…” The baby is also getting tall enough to reach the doorknobs in the house. “…she lifts herself upon tiptoe and turns the knob with her hands and when the door opens she pushes it aside and goes into the room. It looks like nothing is safe anymore.”
As far as the upstairs neighbors, they are moving out to an apartment on First Street. It seems they had a dispute with pop, saying that he should be putting new wallpaper up. Anna says that “Eddie found out from some friends of his who are on the ration boards and they told him no one could force daddy to put new wallpaper on if he didn’t want to as long as the place was livable. So as a result daddy refused…”
At one point, Anna thought that maybe she and Eddie could move into the upstairs apartment, “but now with that new draft law that is coming out for drafting of all men under 26 years of age I don’t see how I could manage on the money Eddie would send for support.” Additionally there is the question of what to do with the baby during the day if Anna got a job since mama “doesn’t feel up to par to do so much work”. So for now it seems that Anna will be staying put “until I am sure that Eddie won’t go to war and that means after the war sure as heck.”
Anna complains further and reflects the common wisdom of the time, “…every time I plan for something it goes wrong. Before they were giving occupational deferments and now when I want to move they make a new law stating that they will take all men under 26…and that they will no longer give any new deferments and when the ones in existence run out the guy will be drafted. …They can’t take all men because this country could never be run by all women. They just aren’t for that and their place is in the home where they should say home and mind their own business.”
The front page of The Elmira Sun Gazette from February 26, 1944. The top banner headline refers to the possibility that deferments will be modified. This would place Anna’s husband Eddie at risk of being drafted. Also of note is the headline reporting the attacks on Germany. Unknown to anyone in the family at the time, the 401st Bomb Group to which Stanley was attached took part in the raid on the aircraft assembly plant in Augsburg. Newspaper archive credit: www.fultonhistory.com