November 30, 2001

Dear Mary Jo (Jack's sister),

It was with the greatest delight that I found your letter in my mail box and found who it was from. Innumerable reminiscences have been chasing their tails in my mind ever since. Many things bring those precious years alive again, such as every time a B-24 is mentioned or a picture of one is shown. We were indeed very close after we met at Withrow. We shared some classes and a girl friend, Ruth DeBeck. From there we both went to UC in the Chemical Engineering Dept. We both joined Sigma Alpha Epsilon and joined the U.S. Army Air Forces Enlisted Reserve Corps a year later. On March 8, 1943, we, along with Charles Fredrick and a trainload of others, went to San Antonio Aviation Cadet Center to learn to be flying officers. They made it through to become pilots but I got washed out due to chronic sinusitis, later becoming a radio operator in the Army Airways Communications System. I wound up in China on the famed Burma Road as a Staff Sargent. Mine was a very safe war. I got shot at (sort of) just once. I was a lucky guy. On January 2, 1946, my sister's birthday, I came home to the States at New York Harbor.

I went on to finish becoming a chemical engineer. Charlie switched to chemistry, then to the ministry, as you must know.

I finished my education with a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and went to work in research at Dow Chemical Co. in Midland, MI. By then I had married and had a baby on the way. We wound up with four kids, too. In 1988, my wife Elizabeth died and a year later I moved to California where three of them were living at the time. Only one, my daughter Emily, still lives here, but she lives only about five miles away, which is very nice. We have a standing date for dinner every Wednesday.

My sister, another Susan, lives in Madeira and we get together about once a year. Since you are still in Cincinnati, I shall certainly let you know the next time I visit her so we can renew our acquaintanceship. (I always thought you were a pretty little girl, but never did anything about it for fear of being labeled a cradle robber! Seven years! Golly!)

Well, Mary Jo Buxton Memke, I am surely glad you took the trouble to find me, and this will not be the only time you hear from me. I would surely enjoy seeing copies of any memorabilia and letters you would care to send.

Almost forgot to mention that I attended the sixtieth reunion this year of the Withrow class of 1941 and saw Charlie who gave the invocation at the banquet. More about that at a later time, involving the Minstrels where Jack sang "Invictus."

Let's keep in contact, second little sister of mine. You brought several tears to my eyes - good ones.

Remembering Jack with love,
Dick

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