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[[X (]]  Willie had an interesting story today about Ethel Yokes Ogden's one time "no good" brother who was kicked out of West Point back in the depression, and floated around for a long time and was the family's despair so I heard.  Today he is a Lt. Col. and a top man in the American Rangers in England, calls and knows Lord Louis Mountbatten as "Lord Louie," comes over here periodically to confer with Gen'l. Marshall [[)]] and is said to be one of the country's greatest authorities on certain types of boats (which he learned during the depression).  So there again is a case where adversity was a blessing in disguise for his knowledge of boats got him to the top.

[[X]] Had a talk with Clarence Jones on the train tonight and he showed me his first WPB "salary" check - for 17¢ covering the period to June 30, 1942 that he worked on Dollar a Year - accompanied by a letter from Donald Nelson thanking him for his services.

[[(]] As we pulled up the hill tonight and down the valley toward Waterford, there was the most beautifully brilliant scarlet sunset I have seen in a long time and the pools of melted snow in the fields were red and the bare black silouettes of the trees stood out against the bright sky - the sunset of late autumn, somehow promising the clean, cold cheery days of winter to come - like old times when war was far away and life was to be lived happily. [[)]]  And I knew that with such beauty as that on earth, the beauty that stays and charms peoples souls while wars and misery come and go and are forgotten, life is after all very much worth the living - and [[(]] one should not forget to try to live fully and beautifully and well in spite of all the hell that man can make for himself on this lovely earth of ours. [[)]]

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