War Bonds

Since my grandfather was head of the New York State War Bond drive during WWII, I was expected to contribute to it. My weekly allowance was 25 cents – a goodly sum in those days – I thought maybe 5 cents would be a reasonable amount. No, my parents thought I should allocate at least 10 cents to the war effort. That would leave me 15 cents to spend on what ever I might desire, which turned out to be a comic book for ten cents and a candy bar for five cents. If I wanted to forgo one of those luxuries, I could put some of it in my ‘piggy bank’. The china pig bank had been ‘robbed’ long ago, so now I had a tin can nailed to the shoe-rest built into my closet for my saved change. Ten cents would buy me a special stamp that I could paste in a booklet about the size of today’s pocket calendar. When the booklet was filled, I could exchange it for a War Bond. I only had to paste in about $18.50 worth of stamps, I think, and I would get $25.00 when the bond matured. I believe the maturity was of a short duration as I remember buying my first radio with the proceeds and the war was still going on. At last I could listen to all my favorite soap operas – like Ma Perkins and Our Gal Sunday plus adventure stories such as Tom Mix, Superman and The Green Hornet. I could even sneak in some spookier programs, such as I love a Mystery after my parents thought I had gone to sleep. I still remember that first radio I bought with my own money. It was a Philco table model in brown, about the size and shape of a shoebox. It brought me many hours of entertainment during my pre-teen years. I guess its demise was a faulty tube – often the end of the early radios.