The weekly times-record. (Valley City, N.D.) 1912-1922, 1918-09-12
LETTER FROM
CA. BERGMAN
Fort Sill, Okla, Sept. l., 1918.

Dear Brother: As the rumors here
are that we are to leave this place
soon decided to write a few lines this
evening about this camp and sur
rounding country. First of all though
I want to say that I miss our old
home at the Fargo A. c. college and
don't expect to be quartered in as good
place again until this war is over.
We sure had it fine up there in every
way and we were treated as good by
the officers at that place as any one
could expect in the army. I think
that all the boys that left there felt
satisfied that it was good home and
if they didn't they no doubt do by this
time if they are in a country like
I am now. This country reminds me
of a desert although one sees a tree
once in while, the ground is nothing
but black hills wherever you 60.
There is only one place here that l
have seen that looked good to me and
that's summer resort located about
seven miles from here. It is called
Medicine Park and is located between
some buttes and is pretty place.
They tell me here that they raise cot
ton, corn, etc., in this country but they
will have to show ME before l believe
it for l haven't seen anything except
ing dust, but plenty of that. The
roads are covered with about eight
inches of loose dry dust and sand.
The wind blows every day and the
dust flies like the snow in Dakota
snow storm. 1t is a very common
thing to see dust fly so bad that you
can't see across the street. There is
one thing I like about this country and
that is when we wash our clothes we
don't have to wait for them to dry for
it's so hot that they are about dry by
the time one can turn around. This is
a large camp and / guess they have
everything here in the line of mo. ..ern
warfare. The airoplanes are thicker
than mosquitoes above us all day
long and l suppose if one of them
should come down and light IN US we
would just brush it off and 60 about
our work, in other words we are too
busy to watch them. We are quar-
tered in open tents here and / have
slept where I could look up at the
stars at any time since I came here.
Some nights we have to cover our
heads to keep from choking from
dust but we feel none the worse when
we roll out at about 5 a. m. Rain
seems to be a thing of the past down
here an dthe earth under the dry dust
is as hard as:apaved street. We have
water pipe lines running up here from
a private owned power plant but the
water is almost as hot as your boi er
feed water at Valley City. picked
up sand bag the other day and one
Of those tarantulass crawled out from
underneath It. \. I should judge twas
about two inches in diameter; I2nev-
er knew there was any of them in
this country until l saw this one. I
understand they are the same as those
we call banana spiders up in Dakota:
This is far from what civil life is but
we get good grub and plenty of it so
we can't complain. We are in the
army now and take what is coming
without any grumbling. l don't be-
lieve would trade my present job
for my old job at that and at least
not until the kaiser is licked. 1t is
now getting pretty late so l will have
to close this letter so as to get in
before taps are blown. With regards
to folks and all friends at Valley
City.
Your brothr
C. A. BERGMAN.