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Sgt Roman F. Klick 36620923
HS 1393 Engr APO 75
c/p SF Cal
25 Aug 45

Dear Aunty Clara,

Saturday

While I was typing the addresses on this sheet of V-mail, all sorts of thoughts were going through my mind as to how I would start off the first sentence tonight. As nothing of great significance occurred during the day I had a choice of several equally important (or unimportant) topics. And the result is that I began with a discussion of the subject. Do you ever find yourself in such a quandary?

One little matter which irks us a bit is the raw deal we are being handed on the Battalion Weekly Paper. It was not our idea to begin with since we were sick and tired of News Reporting after more than two years of it with the Bulldozer Staff. And when we parted company with Group Headquarters, we sincerely hoped that we had seen the end of such nonsense. But, now that the war is over, the Colonel had to pick up the idea from out of the blue and detail Jack and I as editors. Since we are not going to be doing it on our own time, it is just taking up great big gobs of time from the working day. Right now it isn't so bad as we have the time available to do it in, but when the rush days come along it will be a different story. They will expect us to do our work and get out a paper also. However, we were detailed to this job for which we had no relish to begin with and now we are going to be called on the carpet for its deficiencies. Monday morning at 0800 the entire Staff of the Scraper will have to report to Colonel Shubat himself for a calling down.

The reason undoubtedly is because there were flagrant errors in the composition of the paper as well as typographical. All told there were 18 inexcusable errors. When Jack was running the sheets off the mimeograph machine I picked one up to inspect and ended up by circling that many mistakes. Then the Colonel picked up a copy and he began checking on the context of the stories and making amendments. But we do not feel so greatly concerned over it because (1) the unimportance of the paper (2) the lack of cooperation we have been getting from all concerned. Our grievances may be itemized as follows: (1) Between Jack and myself, we wrote every single Battalion item excepting the A & C companies news write-ups. (2) Jack tried to get Smarrito off going to Orientation Friday to work on the Scraper and succeeded in so doing. However, no sooner is he excused when Headquarters took him over and put him to work typing up Guard Orders, (3) the Battalion Staff Artist, Tom Brogan, isn't around to do the art work so Jack has to do his less professional artistry on the stencils. And so it goes, it really amounts to three men putting out the paper by themselves and now I suppose we will add proof reading, authentication, re-writing and so forth to our duties.

The Daily Pacifican has been publishing disconcerting reports in regard to the Army plans for demobilization. One day they state flatly that 1 million men will be returned to the States from the Pacific areas within the next ten months. Then they come out with a statement that the "final" critical score for demobilization under the point system will be under 75. They don't say a good deal under which is where 54 is and you begin to wonder if that means continued service out here for an indefinite future. It also mixes fellows up because it seems as if the Army has two separate policies in regard to discharging men. I would consider it in this light: The army has a certain number of men to return home for demobilization and just so many facilities for doing so. They will move the men out as fast as the system and military needs enables them to do so and no faster. Therefore, it doesn't seem to matter much what they name as a critical score since sooner or later they will work down to your total. But when they come out with a statement about a "final" score, that indicates that when they discharge all the men down to and including that final critical score, the rest are in for a mighty long time. It makes one uncertain whether he will be home within a year or not. At the most I am willing to wait until July 5, 1946 when the end of those thousand days is up. Then I'll wait but be mighty mad about it, in case I'm still in the service.

It is too bad that the bad weather in the Tokyo area has delayed the arrival of our occupation forces by two days. That merely means the army remains in the service two days longer. Also interesting to note in the connection with occupation troops in the Pacific was the announcement over the radio this evening that the men are going to have to readjust their circulatory systems to the temperate climate once again. In order to further this readjustment, the army is preparing new types of clothing and also and indoctrination course in how to help yourself. They mentioned over the radio that it would be advisable to wear the barest minimum of clothing for the first several weeks in a temperate climate so that the body has every opportunity to open up new respiratory channels and so forth. It also is supposed to speed up the thickening of the blood from the thinned out condition induced by years in the tropics.

There was no mail today from you although I did receive three pieces of mail. One was a V-mail from my Dad and the other two were more clippings from Blumenfeld.

The work day was so-so once again. Late in the day I began working on next month's officer pay vouchers but since there is no particular rush with them, I was very slow about it and couldn't say I earned my pay today except for the boredom. Then, right at the very end of the day I had some work to do and didn't have time to finish it. However, later on this evening I'm going to have to get all the morning report information out and then tomorrow I am CQ all day long from seven in the morning to nine at night along with the co-Charge of Quarters, Garriss, Company Clerk of Company B.

We were given a free issue of Coca Cola again today and instead of giving mine away to the rum drinkers for a mix as I did last week, I downed the two bottles immediately. The reason we are getting our Cokes for free is because the Company Fund has grown so huge and there is such a limited amount of items that can be purchased, we spend it this way.

Sackett and Mersing are both "sweating it out" as they feel sure their orders for return to the US for Temporary Duty for Rest and Recuperation should not be far away since the man in B Company with a lower priority rating than they have, already has received his orders. With Sackett going home on TDY instead of for discharge on points, it makes the job of taking over Pers Sgt Major a bit unenviable since the rating of T/Sgt will be held open by him as long as he remains a member of the unit and the job will be performed at no increase in pay. In one man's case who went home in April, we held his rating open until this month when we received official word that he had been discharged on VE day.

I've made up my mind definitely that it is back to work at Rathborne - playing that job for all it is worth, hoping to get up into the higher pay brackets within a few years - and at the same time going to school for a two fold purpose (1) continued study along the business line and (2) branching off into a secondary occupation. And in the meantime the quest for business opportunities continues. I mentioned this last week in a letter but perhaps I did not emphasize it. I believe that the best opportunities come in places where you are already in on the ground floor, so to speak. Although it never was my intention to work in the business field, I've been in business administration for the last six years and I might as well figure on staying in it - until opportunity knocks elsewhere.

While Jack and I still don't carry on conversations in the tent, at chow or when we see each other on the street, we have become mighty loquacious down in the office where the ever present topic of the newspaper keeps coming up and it is necessary for us to work in close harmony. He came up to me just now (he was CQ this evening) and showed me some arguments he was typing up to confront the Colonel with when he queries us on the paper.

Hey, the Chicago Cubs shouldn't do what they did today. They lost to the Cardinals and thereby reduced their lead by a full game and are now down to a mere 4½ ahead.

So-long,   /s/ Roman   Roman