Frank Brink to principal of Bloomsburg State Normal School (Dr. D. J. Waller), September 15, 1918, Letter.

Transcript: September 15, 1918. My dear Dr. Waller: If I am correctly informed, the Normal School opened up again the 9th of this month. I thought of you and the school in general that day and was just wishing I could step in a few minutes. I almost had a perfect image of what everyone was doing during the day. I could see the loads of students and trunks going up Normal Hill, the hustle and bustle of the students as they were furnishing their rooms. I could hear the tapping of the hammers as the students laid the carpet on the floor, and the low murmurings of words, not learned in Sunday school as one perchance hit his or her thumb. Although very busy with my work here, all these things came back to my mind very vividly on that particular day. Now, if you don’t mind I will give you a little of my history since I joined the army. On the 28th of June at 8:30 P.M., twenty-four of us left Berwick for Camp Lee, Va. We came through Sunbury, Harrisburg, Baltimore, Washington, Richmond, Fredericksburg, Petersburg, and thence to Camp Lee, which is four miles from Petersburg. We crossed the James and Potomac rivers. At Washington, I saw the Capitol, Washington Monument, and that large wireless station, the strongest wireless station in the world, so I am told. We reached camp the next day at 11:30 A.M. and marched to our barracks. We were in camp but a few hours until we began to realize that army life was a different proposition than had ever confronted us before. Among the things that we were unaccustomed to are: Get up in the morning at 5:30, “Line up” for everything you get, make your own bed, eat from a Mess Kit; wash your own clothes; “police up” around the barracks and obey every command to the letter. “Policing” in the army means cleaning and arranging everything neatly. It is the job that everyone abhors. Outside, it means picking up cigarette butts (we call them "Snipes"), burnt matches, paper, sticks, pieces of straw and quids of tobacco. Wow, yes, with our hands! They tell us their is lots of water to wash with. Kitchen Police is the worst of all because it lasts so long, (we call it K.P.). You have heard the song about “Katy” haven’t you? Well here is our parody: “K,-K-K-K-P, horrible K.P., you’re the w-w-w-work that I abhor, when the m-m-m-moon shines over the Mess Hall, I’ll be mopping up the K-K-K-Kitchen floor.” You can see by the song about what the fellows think of that kind of work. The work was to be done, we all did it, we all lived through it, and we are all better men for having done it, but there comes a time when the tables turn for those who work faithfully and deserve it. Officers and non-commissioned officers do no policing. After being in the Depot Brigade three weeks we were transferred to the replacement camp. Upon entering that place, I was made Sergeant, then I had a chance to get revenge, on the “Police work”, but I remembered how I hated it so I was as easy on the privates as I could possibly be and get the work done. We were in the replacement camp three weeks and the company I belonged to was sent “over there”, about twenty five of us kept as training cadre, two days later I was sent here to the Central Officers Training School, have been here just a month. The course here is four months long, at the end of that time, if we are deserving we get our diplomas and with them get our Commissions as Lieutenants in the Army of the United States. I think that is worth striving for and believe me I am putting in some long hours in the effort to attain the Commission. Our actual working hours here are from 5:30 A.M. to 8:40 P.M. and as much longer as you want to work. They use the very best methods of teaching here to my mind, we get the theory by studying books, then go out on the field and put the theory in actual practice. Here is where a person is tested and tried out. They try to find out what stuff a person is made of, how much he can stand, etc. They put you thru the mill and if they find any yellow streaks in you, out you go. We are fed well here; just came from mess now, our menu was: bread, butter, mashed sweet potatoes, sliced tomatoes, chicken, dumplings, ice cream and cake, and ice cold lemonade. Doesn’t that make your mouth water? Of course it is not always that good, once in a while we have seventeen different kinds of meat. Hash! But we can’t complain much about our chow. Just tell the students, for me, that they should not growl and complain of conditions at the school, they do not know what inconveniences, hardships, roughing it, and obeying orders are, they should thank God that they are, where they are. Don’t get the idea from that, that I don’t like the army for I do, there is a charm about it that just simply holds one, and I wouldn’t leave it now if I had a chance. If our class is treated as former classes, when we graduate, we will all get a ten day furlough, then if time permits I want to visit the Normal School again before departing for France. I will close by wishing the faculty and every individual student of the school all the luck and success in the world and hoping that each one has found the way of doing his or her bit toward helping us boys lick the Kaiser and his host of infernal Huns. Sincerely yours, Sgt. Jay Frank Brink. P.S. my address is: 18th company, C.O.T.S. Camp Lee, Va. Tell the students I would be very glad to hear from any of them, and will try to answer all the letters I get. Brink '17