Frank's oldest brother, Will, had always the most serious of the three Gartz boys. As the eldest in the family, he was motivated to be "good," especially because he had to compete, with an upstart younger brother, my dad, born when Will was just twelve months old. As you might expect, my dad had to carve out his own persona, radically different from his older brother's.
Corps Cadet, navigator-in-training, Frank Ebner writes to a former high school buddy, Ted Symon. Using his familiar humor, colorful language, and self-deprecation, common in the letters to his buddies, Frank highlights the intellectual rigor he's exposed to in his courses of study.
Frank's twentieth birthday is coming up on May 14th, and his family wants to know what gift he would like. He's practical, and asks for "sun tans," the light-weight uniform cadets wore in warm weather. Again, it appears each cadet had to pay not only for toilet paper, but his own uniform!
Below are two letters, written within a day of one another, by Frank to my dad and mother and the second one, just to my mother, Lil.
My mother, Lillian, writes this chummy letter to youngest brother-in-law, communicating with spunky joy. Marjorie, the girl met in California, again comes into the conversation.