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dc.creatorHays, Joseph Warren
dc.date.accessioned2020-09-02T18:22:14Z
dc.date.available2020-09-02T18:22:14Z
dc.date.issued1943-10-02
dc.identifier.urihttps://repository.tcu.edu/handle/116099117/40464
dc.descriptionHays is an upperclassman now.
dc.format.mediumpaper
dc.languageen_US
dc.relationJoseph Warren Hays Papers (MS 159)
dc.rightsPrior written permission from TCU Special Collections required to use any file.
dc.sourceSeries I, Box 1, Folder 1
dc.subjectWorld War II
dc.subjectUnited States Army
dc.subjectUnited States Army Air Corps
dc.titleHays letter to family
dc.typeDocument
dc.description.transcription10-2-43Dear Folks,“Mama, in reply to your letters post marked Sept 26-28-and 30. If you haven’t gotten a letter from me, something is the matter because I have written two sincethe “Spring Time in the Rockies” one. I sent them Freeand not by airmail, so maybe something happened to them. I also sent you a copy of Pre-Flight magazine Class 44D. I have also written Jack Cameron a letter in the meantime so don’t think that I have been dreadfully overworked or that I have been mistreating you. The only thing that was important in either one of the letters was for you to tell Ruth & Dub “good luck” for me because I wouldn’t have time to write and that I, and a tooth have parted company. It was an upper left, first one behind my eye tooth. I am telling you this again, just in case you haven’t received my letters yet. If you never do get them or the magazine jump on the postman because your son has been writing occasionally.Now for “what’s new.” I am getting open post tonight for the first time in about 6 weeks. In your last letter you said,“I hope you are making everything fine and are too busy to get into “devilment” and I am of the opinion you are doing that very thing.” Unquote. That is a misleading statement. I don’t know whether you meant that you believedI was too busy to get into devilment, or whether you believedI was getting into devilment. Any how up to now the former has been the truth but tonight the latter might be. There is no telling what I’ll do upon being liberated for the first time in 5 weeks. Carl and I are going to take care of each other so don’t worry too much, we’ll behave.Today, I am an upper-classman. Allthe class of 44D are gone off to Primary so my class of 44E are the old boys now and the new class of 44F are the underclassmen.Its an unending cycle until the job is finally done.My new classes will consist of Naval Identification in place of aircraft identification. Physics in place of math. Those are the two major changes,but they keep running in little new main courses on usallthe time as they complete other little minor courses. The little minor courses that I speak of are such things as Chemical Warfare, ground forces, maps and charts, First Aid, Safeguarding military information, War Department Publications, Military Sanitation, Camouflaging, etc. As to what I have accomplished here, the spectacular things consist of my being able to identify any British or American plane from any angle at a 1/25 of a second flash and my being able to take code at the rate of 6 words per minute. This will be increased to 11 W.P.M. during the next month. I have also learned how to plat a course for an airplane from anywhere to anywhere. All I need is a chart, a protractor, and an estimated wind speed and direction. Of course,this navigation stuff is as hard to master as being a pilot, but I could make out in a tight. I could get approximately where I was going if the occasion demanded it. I’ve learned a million other things too,but these are the most outstanding.This will be all for this time as classes are about to start. If you don’t get this one,I’m just going to stop writing. All my love that you didn’t get in the other letters.A/C Hays, J.W.


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  • Joseph Warren Hays Papers [162]
    The collection includes a complete set of letters written by Joseph Warren Hays to his family while serving in the Army Air Corps during World War II. The letters detail his aviation training across the United States and his service in Europe toward the end of the war. In his later years, Mr. Hays wrote recollections of his missions over Europe. The collection also includes printed publications, newspaper clippings, a scrapbook, a photograph of Hays, and ephemera.

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