Spiky Bugger
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Jan 5, 2014
- Messages
- 6,227
Long Version
My grandfather was drafted...I have the telegram...into World War I. He went to what was then Camp Kearney in San Diego County, CA. And eventually to France.
His family spoke Spanish, but his "formal education," (through maybe sixth or eighth grade) was English only. This makes reading his letters a real challenge, because he mostly applied English spelling rules to Spanish words. As in...because a Spanish "ll" is pronounced like the "y" in "you" or "yellow," he'd use a "y." So,what should have looked like "Pollo Loco," (a western US chain) looks like "Poyo Loco." Reading his Spanish requires staring at the word, then trying out a couple of pronunciations. He came from a family of butchers and also worked in silver mines in AZ before escaping to CA.
He was a very social animal and always good at finding "connections." I'm not quite sure how he did it, but he had a bit of a part-time job at a Spanish restaurant in France during the war. He brought in a lot of American business because he could translate for the other soldiers. That skill, plus meat cutting experience, meant that even during a war, he had a second job and he ate well. Lol
Anyway, every year, on "Armistice Day," he'd hang his army uniform on the patio, stare at it and drink too much. (He also drank too much on days that ended in "y," but this day had a uniform to go with it.)
Well, dammit, MY army uniform is packed where I can't easily get to it. And I'm on way too many opioids to get drunk.
But I do have several letters he wrote to his parents and a few other people. (I wonder if he just went around asking for the letters back after the war??) And a cannabis vape pen I could dust off.
Short Version
I think it's way cool that I have one hundred year old letters, written by my grandfather, from a war.
My grandfather was drafted...I have the telegram...into World War I. He went to what was then Camp Kearney in San Diego County, CA. And eventually to France.
His family spoke Spanish, but his "formal education," (through maybe sixth or eighth grade) was English only. This makes reading his letters a real challenge, because he mostly applied English spelling rules to Spanish words. As in...because a Spanish "ll" is pronounced like the "y" in "you" or "yellow," he'd use a "y." So,what should have looked like "Pollo Loco," (a western US chain) looks like "Poyo Loco." Reading his Spanish requires staring at the word, then trying out a couple of pronunciations. He came from a family of butchers and also worked in silver mines in AZ before escaping to CA.
He was a very social animal and always good at finding "connections." I'm not quite sure how he did it, but he had a bit of a part-time job at a Spanish restaurant in France during the war. He brought in a lot of American business because he could translate for the other soldiers. That skill, plus meat cutting experience, meant that even during a war, he had a second job and he ate well. Lol
Anyway, every year, on "Armistice Day," he'd hang his army uniform on the patio, stare at it and drink too much. (He also drank too much on days that ended in "y," but this day had a uniform to go with it.)
Well, dammit, MY army uniform is packed where I can't easily get to it. And I'm on way too many opioids to get drunk.
But I do have several letters he wrote to his parents and a few other people. (I wonder if he just went around asking for the letters back after the war??) And a cannabis vape pen I could dust off.
Short Version
I think it's way cool that I have one hundred year old letters, written by my grandfather, from a war.
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