Another Senior Moment
From V-Mail To E-Mail
By Jim Sponseller

For today’s young folks, it’s probably no big thing. But for most of us living in the Silver Citizen world, it’s absolutely astounding.

I’m talking about our troops stationed in Iraq, Afghanistan and our other military bases and ships around the world who now use computers and telephones to communicate with their friends and family back home. Had a rough day patrolling the highways of Iraq? Returning to camp, the GI can get on the Internet or pick up a phone and chat about it with the folks back in Michigan some 6,500 miles away.

I’m told that not all units offer access to satellite phone service or the Internet, but most of them do, even though they’re in a remote location. The phone calls aren’t free but service men and women can now buy pre-paid calling cards or their families can buy them at home and send the cards to them. And just like home, “instant messaging” is available for chatting away on the Internet.

A few weeks ago I learned that soldiers and sailors have even produced “blogging” web sites. That’s the name given to Internet web sites where participants write a diary of their lives or create essays about whatever is on their mind. Anyone in the world with an Internet connection can read them. Most are extremely well written. The military “bloggers” not only write about their experiences in the war zones, but with a digital camera can post photos to go along with the words. If you’d like to check out one site on your computer, the address is: http://thunder6.typepad.com.

The reason why old timers like me find all of this so astounding is because many of us still vividly recall the weeks and even months it took during World War II days to move mail to and from our military people serving overseas. Some of it never arrived. Units moved too fast. Mail-carrying ships and planes were sometimes sunk or shot down. Yet, most of it eventually made it through.

Turning back the calendar some 60 years, I could be found sitting in a tent erected in the jungle of a newly-recaptured small island in the Philippines. Our Navy Seabee battalion was setting up a camp here from where we will be sending out task forces to take part in island invasions in the eastern Pacific. I’m writing a letter home. The Lord only knows when it will even find its way off this island. Mom and Dad will be anxious to hear from me since it’s been over a month since our troop ship was in a spot where mail could be dropped off. It may be another month or more before it arrives home. Meanwhile, those letters and packages sent to me from home are taking one to three months to arrive… if the FPO (Fleet post office) has done its job in keeping track of us.

Because of strict censorship, the letters we write can have no mention of where we are, where we are going or what or our battalion is doing. This leaves almost nothing of importance to write about. We write about the weather, the food, what we do in our spare time and usually finish with “I am well and don’t worry.”

The censoring job is performed by our own officers. They hate it. When there is an offending word or sentence, the censor either cuts it out with a razor blade or obliterates it with ink. To play safe, you’d better write on one side of the page in case it ends up with a hole in it. Censors also looked for signs of diminishing morale of their enlisted men.

In some instances, the program doesn’t work fairly. Many immigrant families back home can’t read or write English so the serviceman’s letters are written in their native language. Most officers cannot read foreign languages, so the letters are never sent. Usually the writer isn’t told of this. And who censored the officers’ mail? They were mostly self-censored although occasionally a higher officer might perform some random checks.

After the war, I returned home to find that every one of my letters had been neatly saved in a shoe box. I recently read some of them. Without being able to identify our location or anything specific about what we were doing, I was amazed how much I did write about nothing. And indeed, some of them did have holes neatly cutting out words here and there or blotted out with ink. If the censor found too much had to be removed, the letter would be confiscated. The letter was not returned nor was the writer notified that his letter was likely destroyed. Repeat offenders would be called on to explain.

World War II certainly had no Internet or phone calls from home, but there was one “high-tech” advancement that speeded up the mails. It was called V-Mail. (“V” for victory, of course.)

Using a form provided by the government, the message was written and then folded to create an envelope with the address written on the outside. It first went to the censor for his stamp of approval and then forwarded to the closest Fleet or Army Post Office processing center. Here it would be reduced to thumb-nail size on microfilm. Bags of the microfilm in rolls were flown to labs back in the states. In one of the state-side labs, the film was developed and reproduced on cheap photo paper at a quarter of their original size (4 X 5 inch). Finally, the V-Mails were mailed out to the recipient.

Meanwhile, the friends and families back home could go to a dime store or post office to buy V-Mail forms and the mailing process would be reversed to reach the servicemen. Only one page could be written in a V-Mail letter. Because of its greatly reduced size, it was best to limit your writing to two or three dozen words to keep it readable. V-Mail ensured that thousands of tons of more shipping space could be utilized for war materials. It would take 37 mailbags to carry 150,000 regular one-page letters but that number of V-Mails could be sent in a single mail sack. Weight was reduced by 98 percent. Best of all, delivery of V-Mail letters could take as little as 12 days if it went by air.

Although newspaper ads and posters urged use of V-Mail, regular mail still remained the most popular since letters could be many pages long. Mail sent by overseas servicemen was free but the folks back home had to pay the usual rate - 3 cents for a normal letter. Between June 1942 and April 1945, more than a billion V-Mails were sent.

Indeed, we have witnessed incredible advancements in the wartime communications between our military women and men abroad and their loved ones at home. One wonders when the advancements will come in learning how to avoid wars in the first place.

Jim can be emailed at sponcom@ameritech.net.