Right: Never short
on creativity, Paul
Wieser sent the
message, “I Love
You” to his girlfriend
— and later wife
— Jean Coddington,
sketched in
semaphore flags. The
two were married
in August 1944
(above, courtesy of
the Battleship North
Carolina).
26
WBM february 2012
600 Letters Home
Paul Anthony Wieser, who served as
a boatswain’s mate first class on the USS
North Carolina during World War II,
wrote about 600 letters, all of which
were donated to the archives. They were
sent to his girlfriend and later wife, Jean
Coddington, a childhood neighbor in
Linden, New Jersey.
Wieser’s letters bring to life a different
era, as he writes about his high school gang
— the Batch — roller skating, ice skating
and popular radio music, including the
first time he heard a famous holiday tune.
“I had a chance to listen to the Hit
Parade yesterday it was swell,” he writes
in a letter to his sweetheart in November
1942. “Third place was ‘My Devotion,’
second ‘Praise the Lord and Pass the
Ammunition.’ Do you know (where) that
title came from, a chaplain said it on
Dec 7 at Pearl Harbor, the hoist broke
The museum has a cache of World War I-era letters, Valentine’s
Day cards, sweetheart pillow covers and wedding memorabilia in
its archives. These keepsakes offer insight into the past, insight
into the lives of the young men living aboard the North Carolina
and insight into the women they loved and had to leave behind.