August 16, 1945

August 16, 1945

949 W 12th St

San Pedro, Calif

Dear Father, Mother and the rest of the folks at home,

Ain’t it wonderful! I was never so happy before in all my life when the news came thru. I don’t know if it came in time to keep Vincent from going out, but it certainly means that he won’t be going into an area at war anyway. I don’t know also what it means as far as the draft is concerned, but I have an idea that Congress will put the end to that shortly after it convenes. There is unfortunately the in-between period when anything could happen.

The news came thru about 3:30 or 4 Tuesday afternoon out here. Everybody sort of stopped working and headed for home as had been announced previously. Shell Development has taken Wednesday and Thursday off also — in line with Pres. Truman’s proclamation altho they were not exactly bound to do so. I have an idea we may have VJ day off too, but I’m not sure. At any rate it has been nice having these days off.

Aside from a lot of driving around the honking of horns, the victory celebration in San Pedro did not amount to much. Up in L.A. I guess things really got turned upside down from the sound of news reports on the radio. By the time I got back to San Pedro Tuesday all the stores were closed except a few restaurants (some were already closed because of a retail clerks’ strike now in progress). Today both stores and banks will be open again.

Vincent left Monday morning after I had left to go to work. I haven’t heard how he fared goping back but he had all day ahead of him so it should have gone all right.

With love

C.P.