Nisqually Valley News
What is the matter with the good people of Yelm? Here you have a chance to be in the army for two hours or more a week, without the fuss and bother that our boys go thru and you don’t do it. Our boys leave home, give up all their ordinary ways of life and stand ready to give their lives if necessary. We have a chance to cooperate with them, to do a job here at home that is vital for our own protection and necessary to help them do theirs and we fall down on it. We slack on it.
The observation post of the Air Raid Warning Service (A. R. W. S.) is a link in the chain of the Army’s defense of our country. It is a vital link and if it breaks down the whole chain is weakened.. The observer on duty is literally in the Army while standing his watch. He is relieving many soldiers for combat duty. It is estimated by the Army officers of the A. R. W. S. that each one of these posts does work that it would take as many as sixteen airplanes to do on patrol duty. To man the posts as we should be manning them would require an entire division of soldier. If that many soldiers could have been in the Philippines we would have held them.
When a person is sworn in as a volunteer in the Civilian Defense Corps, they are eligible for compensation if they should be injured while on duty at the observation post. If they are serving regularly they may obtain extra gasoline to use in driving to and fro the post. The War Department considers this service absolutely necessary and has called for voluntary aid in performing it.
Because of the number of people involved, which would cut deeply into our combat forces if done by soldiers, they are depending on civilian volunteers for this military duty.
Standing two hour shifts twenty four hours a day, it takes only eighty four people a week to ran (sic) our post. Within walking distance of our post there are , probably three hundred people or over, and yet there are some people having to stand watches of six and eight hours each and every week. There are very people in Yelm that are doing such important work that they cannot arrange their schedules so that they could do their share of this essential duty.
The captains of the different crews report that when they ask some people of help, these individuals reply that they are busy and as, “Why don’t you get rid of these women around town who don’t have anything to do?” Is there anyone around town that answers that description? We haven’t seen anyone yet.
Two hours a week is not much to do to help our armed forces guard our homes. There should be more than enough volunteers to man the post without anyone having to serve more than two hours a week. Do your share good people of Yelm, donate two hours a week of your life to helping in this way to win the war. O. L. Montgomery is Chief Observer; Mr. Mosman, at his office.
Mrs. L. L. Hahn, at the school, will take your registrations and swear you in; Mr. Williams, at the Puget Sound Power will accept your offer of help and so that you get where you are needed. Call or communicate with any of these people, or with any of the captains you may know, and come through with two hours for your Old Uncle. He needs you for this comparatively small part of your life.
Get into the Army now.