European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - April 13, 1945, Darmstadt, Hesse                                By Knox Burger Day a month or so ago i was sitting under a pyramidal with a former inmate of the Bronx named John he was talking about new York and what a great place it and How hed like to be there putting away a few in Border or at Martins Over on Webster where they used to sell it for 15 cents a these poignant memories were apparently brought on by a letter he had just gotten from a Friend of his who used to be stationed at 39 Whitehall he had just been shipped out to fort As Duffy told he clenched a fist and i took Basic training in new i said probably at Nicks in the said i started i was stationed at grand Central the induction us and i suppose you asked for a trans Fer to the i never thought of it that but i suppose that what it amounted just sit Duffy got to going after the Squadron Well get you a Strait wait a me Tell you How it says you the people in charge of the located conveniently on Lexington Avenue be tween 46th and 47th what the psychiatrists referred Between their As a mass inferiority which they took out As Best they could on it want exactly the Ideal atmosphere in which to build but you had to give them a certain amount of credit for for somebody got the prodigious idea that the entrances to the building ought to be guarded at after the place loosely military installation who some 4f might try to sneak in and get inducted on the there were Only four doors to so naturally they larded the Interior of the place with on each that guard mount would look like it made you feel like something less than a Silver Star Winner to have to Call up the Little wench saturday night and Tell her you were watching some Eye charts for the government and you  keep that Date at one fabulous they instituted the Basic training thirty or 40 Guys were relieved from duty for a month in order that they might Lead the hard life Between the hours of 0800 and 1630 daily except a line lieutenant winding up at the if 1 May is riot unlike an elephant being ushered to the elephants graveyard and tactfully Page 16 left among the we had a first and a Sec Ond whose duty twas to March with full Field Down third Avenue and then Over to the armory at 33d Street and where we they never marched us Down Park or even i suppose it was just As All things broke in the Dames might have thought you were hiking Down to the banana boat and messed up the formation trying to kiss you goodbye or matter of More than once we had cigarettes thrown at us from upstairs that must have been a Long time said but that particular stretch of third had been an old hangout of and it evoked fond Harvey fish the White Rose at 34th it turned out that i want the Only one of that Little band of Curbstone warriors who was familiar with the one noon we used to March Back to the Palace for lunch a civilian tottered out of a bar As we went he shouted no one an swered Jimmy forget your old friends the lieutenant at the head of the column you want so High hat when you was a cop on this the Man was muttering As we passed Down the once inside the we did Clos order it would so that the girls who worked in the Underwood Elliott Fisher typewriter offices across the Street could Giggle at us As we marched past the we took turns giving one time a t4 was marching us straight towards a Covey of folding it was his first and the lieutenants had their eyes on the t4 got right by he finally blurted after an hour or so we were seated in a Corner of the Hall to watch training or be killed and stuff like who led the rest of us Back orders in an accent so Southern that no one really knew what language he was sometimes with red lights we had to take the initiative i remember one afternoon Young Jeff Davis was looking Over his evidently counting cadence at when he walked into a Crotch High fire hydrant at 120 paces he took a taxi the rest of the Lucky he want doing said crossing his legs the next stride we made toward being sol Diers consisted of a trip to fort the Fleet of trucks that pulled away from the Palace that Rainy morning was carrying Many of the lads farther away from Home than they had Ever been this was we crawled under machine gun scouted the streets of a deserted ate cold creations and got like in the As one Young urine analyst put As the Day Drew to a the officer in out of uniform but imposing in a lavish sheepskin flying climbed up on a Rock and inhaled today weve had a Chance to get outside and clean the Carbon out of our there were furtive and i fingered my Trachea i want you to it More Lay off the bars and movies for a get Over to the y and work get out in the get rid of that grand Central he paused while the  laughed he was in the midst of Outlin ing a crippling it program to be enacted each who worked in the typewriter offices across the Street giggled As we marched kill or be killed where asked in the subway Rush there were no training films on How to get second helpings at the stage door or How to beat the theater ticket line at 99 Park those things we had to learn the hard the hard he said marching Back from the we were usually minus a few men who had ducked out and taken the the second lieutenant morning on the Concrete floor by our bunks when i decided the hell with they could take their combat subway ans badge and you went the whole didst you interrupted gazing out at the Bright White in the just then the air raid Siren sounded and we sauntered out to the everybody to his own i thought i heard him but the a guns were slamming so loudly by then i want