The Stars and Stripes, Vol. 1, No. 1, February 8, 1918: The American Soldiers' Newspaper of World War I, 1918-1919United States. Army. American Expeditionary Forces
History
The Stars and Stripes, Vol. 1, No. 1, February 8, 1918: The American Soldiers' Newspaper of World War I, 1918-1919
United States. Army. American Expeditionary Forces
World War, 1914-1918 -- Periodicals; World War, 1914-1918 -- United States -- Periodicals
The office telephone is on the wall, instead of on the Boss's desk, as
it ought to be. One has to take down receiver and transmitter all in the
same piece in order to use it. And it has the same old Ford-crank
attachment on the side that is common to phones in the rural free
delivery districts of the United States of America.
Why Hats Are Worn.
Instead of being lined with bright young men in knobby business suits
and white stiff collars, the office is lined with far brighter young men
in much more businesslike khaki. They keep their hats on while they work
for they know not when they may have to dash out again into the cold and
the wind and the rain. They keep their coats on for the same reason;
there are no shirt-sleeves and cuff protectors in this office, for the
simple reason that there are no cuffs to be protected and that
shirt-sleeves are "not military."
There is no office clock for the laggard to watch. Instead, there are
bugle calls, sounded from without. Or, again the hungry man puts the
forearm bearing his wrist watch in front of his face, as if to ward off
a blow, when he wants to know the time. Save for the clanking of spurs
and the thumping of rubber boots, it is a pretty quiet office,
singularly so, in fact, considering the work that is done in it.
Take it all in all, it's a strange kind of an office, isn't is? Well, it
ought to be, considering it's in a strange land. It's an army newspaper
office, that's what it is--an American sanctum in the heart of France.
----
TACTICS GET GOAT ACROSS.
----
Requirements Include Perfume, a
Sack, a Kit Bag and Cheers.
----
From the C.O. down to "Fuzzy," who would have rather taken court martial,
no one wanted to leave "Jazz" behind. So there was no end of indignation
when the order came at a certain American port that no animals (unless
useful) could go to France with the squadron.
"Jazz," being only a tender-hearted billy goat, could not claim
exemption from remaining in the U.S.A., for, as everybody agreed, he was
no earthly use, just "a poor, no-good goat." But "Jazz" did go aboard
the transport, later an English railway train, next another ship and
finally a French train until he arrived with the squadron at America's
biggest air post in France. There I saw him the other day appreciatively
licking devoted "Fuzzy's" hand.
It is not difficult to guess that "Jazz" is the mascot of "X" squadron,
accepted by pilots and mechanics alike as talisman for good at some
training camp back home. This office he has performed with exceptional
skill from the day "Fuzzy" permitted him to "butt in" at the mechanics'
mess.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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