The following was written by my late wife Elaine. She wrote a long book, a diary really, from which this is one passage:
The Days and Nights on Kianlud Mountain
Dave took many black and white pictures in the Philippines, and colored slides, and alot are of his pet monkey who was his “snake alarm.” Perched on Dave’s shoulder, the monkey chattered whenever he saw snakes. Lots of pictures are of birds he shot for food, killed with a pistol we sent him from Detroit. Toward the end of his tour of duty, He was assigned to the top of Kianlud Mountain on Mindanao, waiting a fog-free night so he and his survey crew could get a bearing on the signal light from a USGS survey station many miles away. The eighteen months in the Philippines, especially the time on Kianlud, should be written up by Dave; it was an important period, deeply influencing him to review and consider some of his life’s important beliefs.
Our Box of Letters
On the top shelf of our living room closet is the box of all those letters we wrote, tied up in string. He brought all my letters home with him, and I saved all his letters to me. They amount to a diary of the lives of a teenaged working girl in Detroit and her 20-year-old boyfriend in the Philippines, separated by the Korean War. They’d tell an interesting story about devotion and faithfulness through separation in time and distance, and Dave’s unusual jungle experiences which included killing whatever was possible to use for food: hornbills (birds), doves, pigeons, water birds of different kinds.
A couple years ago, Nancy Reagan wrote a book about her life with Ronald Reagan before and after he was President, using just their letters to each other. Dave and I don’t want to revisit our letters yet; we don’t know why. It’s already been about 50 years … so I don’t know if we’ll ever read them again.
To our children and maybe our grandchildren (note: one is already 12 years old, just 5 years behind the age I was when I wrote the first of the letters!) … You-all should read ’em … some are pretty juicy! Maybe one of you will assemble a “book” made up of these letters … I would guess that tons of books are around that are a lot less interesting than our letters.
To be continued…
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About the Author: RD Blakeslee is a nonagenarian in West Virginia who built his net worth by only investing in that which can be enjoyed during acquisition and throughout life, as opposed to papers in a drawer, like stocks and bonds. You can read more about him here.
Photos: Courtesy of the Blakeslee Family
Like so many things out of the past, much of what Elaine and I shared will not survive. I don’t mourn that, though. She and I have done what we could here, to preserve some of it.
Ironically, even some of that is lost. The ink on our letters has faded and they are now illegible.
Sad! I was just going to ask you if we could see those.
There’s new hope – see comment # 5
Thank you for sharing. The stories from long ago are like an interesting novel.
I have a feeling that what she called “juicy” would not be “juicy” today. The days of well behaved people seem to be long gone.
I laugh when I remember the retired mailman scaring the preacher to prove the new covers for the stain glass windows would protect them.
Thank you for sharing that too.
You’re welcome, Bill.
I (Dave’s Youngest Son) am in possession of those letters. During my ARMY career I spent a great deal of time away from my wife and children, so I can relate to them at a level I assume many non-military folks could. So, that is not “lost”… I have that part of your lives safely tucked away and read them from time to time.
Erik,
If you can somehow force a block of your time loose, making those letters into a book (on Amazon?) would be much appreciated by your father, and the rest of the family.
I know this, because I did the same idea for my mother’s 90th birthday. She died later that same year. You can see my version here:
https://www.amazon.com/Andys-WWII-Journal-Pacific-Anderson/dp/149752301X/
That’s a welcome surprise, Erik! Hope you can decipher the letters for me and your sibs, before the letters and me fade out completely.