PBA Galleries

6 Autograph Letters Signed. Army Air Bases in Sioux Falls, South Dakota and Drew Field, Florida. Oct. 23, 1943; Nov. 18, 1944, Feb. 22, Mar. 13 and Apr. 9, 1945, 7pp. total, plus original mailing envelopes. With a pictorial Chinese Christmas Card (illustration by Ching-Chin Yee) postmarked December 18, 1944, signed by Wong in both English and  Chinese. 

All sent to an Army Air Force friend stationed in Miami Beach and Sioux Falls, South Dakota.  The 21 year-old Wong immigrated to the US from China just before the War and settled in New York’s Chinatown. When he wrote these letters, he was a “sad and miserable” technician, working 12 hour-shifts with five other men to service the radio equipment on 72 Flying Fortress bombers. Aside from mentioning the joy of a furlough that brought him home to celebrate Chinese New Year’s, Wong writes nothing about any racial problems he may have encountered in the service - complaining only of his exhaustion and disgust with unbending Army routine: “It’s not the work, but G.I. shit that kills.” Ironically, his only pastime was trying to speak halting German to the Nazi Prisoners of War working in the Air base kitchen.