November 10, 2023
Joyce B. Clapp Collection

This Saturday is Veterans Day!  There will be a ceremony honoring veterans that will take place November 11, 2023, at 11am at Veterans Memorial Park located at 575 Pleasant Valley Road in South Windsor. (Please note that they are replacing the bridge on Pleasant Valley Road near the park so you may need to take the detour to the park entrance.)

Do you know a South Windsor veteran that you would like to honor? The Patriotic Commission is selling bricks that are inscribed with a veteran's name, military branch, and years of service. Any town resident or business may purchase a brick to show their patriotism and support. After the bricks have been inscribed, they are added to the Veterans Memorial Park Monument Walk twice yearly, for Memorial Day and Veterans Day. Details are available here.

The Joyce B. Clapp Collection
(ID#: 1992.09)

The Joyce B. Clapp papers contain a series of letters published in The Vermonter magazine from February through July 1945. These letters were written while she was on duty with the United States Army Nurse Corp in France during World War II.  They were written to various family members and are dated between October 1944 and May 1945.

Lieutenant Joyce B. Clapp was the daughter of Dudley Fox Clapp and Lucy Margaret (Barber) Clapp. She was an East Windsor Hill native, one of eight siblings, four of which served in the army during World War II. Pictured below is the Clapp family Man-in-Service flag along with images of each of the Clapp family members who served in WWII.  Clockwise from top left; Sgt. Talcott I. Clapp, 1st Lieut. Joyce B. Clapp, S/Sgt. Herbert B. Clapp, Pfc. Charles S. Clapp
 
According to the Smithsonian website, "The Man-in-Service Flag was used in both World War I and World War II. It is also known as the Blue Star Flag. Each family was entitled to hang a small Man-in-Service Flag in a window to signify they had a family member, or in this case four family members, in service. The flag was about a foot long and was hung vertically. The blue star was covered with a gold (actually yellow) star if the family member died in action."

Joyce's WWII Letters Home dated
October 14, 25, and 27, 1944 and November 5, 1944

This Musings from Main contains images of just a few of the letters from the collection. The first set of letters highlighted, Joyce wrote upon her arrival in France in 1944, and describe her initial impressions.  The final letter spotlighted in this Musing was written on May 7, 1945, right after Joyce had heard that the war was over.

We are currently working on getting all of the letters in the collection up online so that they can be explored and enjoyed by all of our patrons.

The "War is Over" letter written to her sister Clara dated
May 7, 1945

These are just a few of the letters that make up the Joyce B. Clapp collection. They are currently available for the patrons to explore in person by appointment.  We hope to make them all available online soon. For a list of more primary source research materials available to patrons, search our online collections database and new online research library catalog.