Typed letter signed "Hammett" in pencil, to Isadore Gottlieb. (APO Seattle). Dec. 28, 1944

1944. One page, 8 1/2 x 11 in Fine condition with envelope. On "Yank" Alaska edition letterhead. Writing to an Army friend in Detroit "Don't let this paper fool you....It only means I'm using Yank's office tonight and I'm going to stop it and take my trade elsewhere if they don't put darker ribbons in their typewriters....Last week I wound up on a four-month--some ten thousand miles in all--romp....Anything you want to know about Alaska and the Aleutians, just ask me. Yes, the Eskimo girls at Nome are often very pretty, usually very good-natured and practically always very diseased. No, there's no sense in trying to rig up a sea otter poaching racket on Amchitka, because, while you could angle it OK there, you couldn't peddle the skins anywere except, perhaps, in the London black market. Yes, Kodiak is a little gem, whether you want to shoot, fish, drink or futz around with dames...." Hammett continues for another paragraph with discussion of his future travel plans, closing "I'm going to...get something to eat before I go back to bed--and with a bottle, brother, always with a bottle here! Luck to you, keed...." This is the only letter to Gottlieb that was included in Selected Letters of Dashiell Hammett, ed. Layman, 2001.