Author Description

“I probably will stay in school, but I am just telling you to be prepared in case Uncle Sam calls.” William "Alex" Hatcher was eighteen when he left his parents and five younger brothers to enter the University of Tennessee in 1941. Within a year, the country was at war, and the course of his life would be altered forever. Dear Folks is a collection of the letters he wrote to his family back on the farm, beginning in the summer of '42 and continuing through his military service, including his year stationed on Guam with the 314th Bombardment Wing of the 20th Air Force. From his accounts of mundane daily life, to meeting his future wife, to flying over Hiroshima after the war’s end, his letters present a portrait of a young man from Tennessee discovering a world beyond farm and family. An additional chapter presents a retrospective of Alex’s life, in his own words, written at the age of 78.