X-rays and Code Words - 4/30/1918

 

Camp Sheridan

Montgomery, Ala.

Apr. 30, 1918

My Dear Dad: - 

Marion's letter of Apr 27th received. I don't believe I mentioned rec. Mother's & Marion's letter which came while I was on the hike.

It rained nearly all day today. This morning I hauled several quarters of beef, and about 800 lbs of ice for the Amb. Co's & this afternoon all the camp infirmaries hauled hay. 

I am enclosing the X-ray of my jaws. Keep it for me. Also see if you can't get Jim to make a couple prints of them. If he can I would like to have a print of each. I shall send the teeth the next time I send a pkg. home. 

Tell Marion to send all the fridge & cake she wants to. It will always be welcome. 

I am coming out fine with my jaws. They are as good as ever.

Well, there is no more news to tell you, so I will close.

Love to All,

Howard

Thepapersaythatthereisahellofawaroveracrosstheatlantic. It may be so but - Thereisahellofahotsunincampsheridanalabama.

After a hiatus, I'm baaaaaack (and so is Howard). We moved houses since you last heard from me, and I'm a bit afraid that I may have temporarily misplaced a few months' worth of letters. You'll note that this letter is almost three months after the last one. My hope is that I stopped updating this blog knowing that there was a break in the letters and just never started back up again. Then again, the next time I do a deep clean, you may get three months' worth of bonus letters! I'm hoping the most exciting thing that I missed in that three months was the deterioration of Howard's dental health. UPDATE: I took a second look at a record I had saved in Ancestry, and it looks like his time at the Ambulance company was up on March 23, 1918, as far as I can tell. Not sure why he left, but I'm wondering if it might be all of this dental work that caused him to take a leave. At least that explains the gap between March 23 and April 30! 

It had only been 5 years since Kodak developed dental film, which contained a hand-wrapped, waxed, waterproof paper packet and two single-emulsion films. Commercial x-ray films and machines weren't even in use yet, so Howard was once again ahead of his time. I guess that explains why he was so excited by his x-rays that he wanted to make copies for all of his friends. 

Of course, the above image is not Howard and I can't be certain of the date but it was likely between 1905 and 1917. Notice no radiation protection for the patient and the high-voltage wire, which is not insulated.