August means "Back to the Book"

Good "Weaver Wednesday" to all of you on the Family Trails.

So it's August…. where does the time go? The schools are getting ready to start and the children are getting "back to their books," so that is just what we will do here this month…get back to the book…The Scrapbook .

This is a fascinating article that Charles Sisson Weaver clipped and glued into his scrapbook of the late 1940's. It is from the Stars and Stripes Weekly Review, dated Sunday, November 16, 1947. Don't you just love the font used in this section…"LEE VAN ATTA'S Far East Vignettes?"

The photo is very blurry, but if I look very closely, it looks like a street scene in Japan with both Japanese and Americans on the street. 

Honestly, I have made several attempts to enlarge this photo and the article because I think you will all enjoy it. This is as large as this blog engine will allow. (That is why so many times in the past I have retyped articles and letters.) 

This article is about Mrs. Douglas MacArthur. I must retype it because it is very interesting. Why is it in my great-grandfather's scrapbook, you ask? My thought is this…. C. S. Weaver's granddaughter and her husband were stationed in Japan after World War II. Louis Armstrong served as a chaplain during this time, and there are a few articles and notes in this scrapbook that they sent to the Weavers while stationed overseas. 

This article is, among other things, very positive, very patriotic, and very informative, without all the tabloid innuendoes and scandals of much of today's media. 

So, here I go…retyping this long article. It is a bit long as you can see, so I thought it might be best to post it in 3 installments. Enjoy!

Love,

Mariellan

A visitor to Japan early this year described Mrs. Douglas MacArthur as the most gracious feminine envoy America has ever had abroad. 

The description is not only flattering but accurate. For (unreadable) Jean MacArthur is one of the most universally liked women in the world today; a lady of keen dignity and depth but one with a disarming sense of humor and penetrating, human understanding of human problems. 

Her slim figure is well known to almost everyone in Tokyo even as, during the war years, it was known to Australians, to Filipinos and to thousands of U.S. fighting troops in the Pacific. 

Perhaps the place she is least known , in fact, is her homeland. Jean MacArthur has not been in the United States since her marriage to the present Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers more than 10 years ago. 

She is anxious to return again: to see her family, to "do" the whole list of Broadway shows, to even visit a night club, to get the "feel" of home again. But when that will be she can't even guess. As with virtually everything else in her life, "It's up to the General."

Well, readers, I hate to keep you guessing, but this is a good place to stop. Come back next week to read more about Jean MacArthur and her life in the Far East. Until then, I think I will try to learn more about her.

See ya next week on our trail….

Love,

Mariellan