World War II Artifacts

We are going to take a historical detour today.  These items were discovered amongst old papers belonging to my grandfather, who served in the Navy in World War II.  The first item of interest is a letter, dated 1943.  The content isn't as important as the amazing artwork on the letterhead (in fact, my grandfather had no idea who either party mentioned in the letter even was, or why he had it)!

Here is the letter in its entirety.  It appears to be a bit of an inside joke, but the exact impact has been lost to the ages:

And now we move to the real mind-blowing find...this is a daily newsletter from the ship my grandfather served on, crudely printed on some sort of offset printing-press.  It starts out innocently enough, with a schedule for the day:

And then there is a "Notes" section, where "need to know" items of interest are pointed out to the sailors, especially those about to head out for some leave time.  Note 4 says this [Warning, delicate wartime cultural and ethnic troubles ahead; hide the children]:

And continues on the entire second side of this legal-sized page:

There's nothing I can add to THAT, is there? On the one hand, you would think this was something that had to be pointed out to a rabid group of 18-year-old-and-above young sailors, and after all, it wasn't ever intended for public consumption.  On the other hand, well, let's just say I'm thankful to be living in a free country, and that we are friends with Japan, because they are pretty much awesome.

You may now resume normal blog activity....