Betty Lou Gore: The telegram from the war department instructed me to report to Arlington Hall, Virginia on September 1, 1943, at 0800 hours. I kissed my teaching job good-bye and packed my bags.
Arlington Hall had been a small college just outside Washington, D.C., which during WWII was converted into a Signal Corps Army Post. I was assigned to the unit that was attempting to break the Japanese code and became a cryptographic specialist.
Living in our nation’s capital during the war years was exciting! Many world-shaking events occurred and it was exhilarating merely being there and being a part of it.
One of the most memorable occasions for me was the night I met Eleanor Roosevelt. I was invited to a reception given in her honor. I found her warn and friendly when I shook her hand that evening. I saw her again at a dance I attended at Shoreham Hotel where she was a guest speaker.
I was in the welcoming crowd when President Franklin Roosevelt returned to Washington from Hyde Park, victorious in yet another election, starting his fourth term of office. He was in a big open car, smiling and waving at the onlookers but it was apparent that he was very tired. A new reporter, going through the mom, stopping occasionally to question viewers, asked me if I thought Roosevelt would seek a fifth term of office. Remebering the ashen look on his face, I replied that I hoped he would be able to complete the present one.
A few months later a friend and I were walking down Constitution Avenue when she suddenly stopped talking in the middle of a sentence and said, “Did you hear what the newsboy just shouted? He yelled out that Roosevelt was dead!”
But it was true, and once again Roosevelt was returned to Washington, this time on a train from the Little White House in Georgia, where he had drawn his last breath. Soon afterwards there was a long and unforgettable cortege taking him to his final resting place.