The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love

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In this May 31, 1971 letter, my mom Sarah takes us on an emotional ride: from laughter and sarcasm to loneliness and back again.

She starts the letter lightheartedly—listing all the things she and Joy somehow convinced someone to buy during a furniture shopping spree. But then the deeper truth emerges: she’s been struggling. She’s tried calling my dad in Vietnam nearly every night. The lines are always busy. And it’s been wearing on her. She writes, “I feel like I spent more time crying than anything else.”

But then—relief. A breakthrough. A voice.

She writes, “Oh baby—God, it was so good hearing your voice.”

It’s the first time she truly exhales in the letter, and you can feel it. That call steadies her, reconnects her to him, and brings her back into the comfort of their love—even from thousands of miles apart.

As with a few recent episodes, this letter was found after I had completed Chapter 1. It had been misfiled, and I found it while preparing the June stack. That will likely happen again—letters surfacing late, arriving when they’re ready. Thank you for being patient with the process, and for helping me honor this love story one letter at a time.

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The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love is a personal podcast project based on real letters exchanged between Capt. Richard Allgood and Capt. Sarah Allgood during the Vietnam War. Photos of the original letters, family snapshots, and behind-the-scenes commentary are available for supporters.

Support the show:

https://buymeacoffee.com/theallgoodslove

Visit the official website: https://www.theallgoodslove.com

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In this May 31, 1971 letter, my father Dick writes to my mother Sarah from Vietnam. He’s on alert but has a quiet day—one of those rare moments in a war zone where nothing happens, and the waiting becomes the hardest part. But he fills that space with devotion.

He buys cassette tapes and begins preparing to record messages she can play back when the letters aren’t enough. He jokes about sun tanning and bikini lines, but the tone of the letter quickly shifts into something deeper.

He writes, “My thoughts are with you even if I can’t be there to hold you so. I am actually holding you in a different way.”

This episode is about emotional presence, about how love can stretch through space and still feel real. It’s also a reminder of the emotional labor soldiers carried—not just in surviving the war, but in maintaining the relationships that gave their lives meaning.

There are hundreds more letters to come, and reading them isn’t easy. But this one is a reminder of why I keep going. If he could write with this much tenderness from a place like that, I can read with the same kind of commitment.

Thank you for listening, and for helping me hold space for their love—one letter at a time.

Support the show

The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love is a personal podcast project based on real letters exchanged between Capt. Richard Allgood and Capt. Sarah Allgood during the Vietnam War. Photos of the original letters, family snapshots, and behind-the-scenes commentary are available for supporters.

Support the show:

https://buymeacoffee.com/theallgoodslove

Visit the official website: https://www.theallgoodslove.com

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It’s May 28, 1971, and my mother Sarah is “seepy,” early in her pregnancy, and missing my father with every fiber of her being. In this letter, she shares the small details of her day: breakfast with Joy, a quiet trip to the BX, and the joy of finding a surprise she plans to send him.

She writes about the baby they’re already imagining—guessing it might be a boy, but saying all that matters is that “it’s healthy.” She’s barely smoking, too tired for the club, and already dreaming about baby clothes.

But it’s not just the physical symptoms of pregnancy that fill this letter—it’s the emotional gravity of distance. She admits to talking out loud, hoping he can somehow hear her. It’s a beautiful and almost mystical moment, a reminder that love finds a way to travel beyond time zones and war zones.

In these early episodes, I want to be transparent—this is a long and emotional journey. There are over 1,500 letters, and I’ll be reading them one day at a time, just as they wrote them. Some days it feels impossible. But then I remember: if they had the courage to write to each other every day, I can have the courage to keep going.

Thank you for listening. This letter may seem small—but to me, it’s a lifeline between generations.

Support the show

The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love is a personal podcast project based on real letters exchanged between Capt. Richard Allgood and Capt. Sarah Allgood during the Vietnam War. Photos of the original letters, family snapshots, and behind-the-scenes commentary are available for supporters.

Support the show:

https://buymeacoffee.com/theallgoodslove

Visit the official website: https://www.theallgoodslove.com

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After 47 letters exchanged between April 27 and May 30, 1971, this recap looks back on the first month of separation between Captains Dick and Sarah Allgood—newlyweds, both serving in the U.S. Air Force, and already holding onto something much bigger than distance.

In this special episode, their daughter reflects on the powerful truths uncovered in these early letters:

that she was wanted and chosen after a heartbreaking miscarriage,

that her parents were actively trying to conceive 

and that love—true, handwritten love—was stronger than silence, war, or time.

She also shares insights from her father’s military history, including his time flying the C-141 Starlifter, and how he once found an airstrip in Alaska by the grace of God after losing all his instruments mid-flight. He was calm, reliable, and later known as “The Eagle.”

Her mother was a firecracker—magnetic, warm, and beloved by everyone she met.

This episode marks the end of Chapter One.

These aren’t just love letters. They’re proof of a life built across pages,

and a daughter learning who her parents really were—together and apart.

Support the show

The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love is a personal podcast project based on real letters exchanged between Capt. Richard Allgood and Capt. Sarah Allgood during the Vietnam War. Photos of the original letters, family snapshots, and behind-the-scenes commentary are available for supporters.

Support the show:

https://buymeacoffee.com/theallgoodslove

Visit the official website: https://www.theallgoodslove.com

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In this May 30, 1971 letter from Bien Hoa Air Base, Captain Dick Allgood writes to his pregnant wife Sarah, who’s serving as an Air Force nurse at Wilford Hall in San Antonio.

He opens with flirtation, calling her “the best I ever had,” and confesses to reading a “sort of a sex book,” followed by a quarter to their private pot. But the real heart of the letter is his growing awe at the love expanding inside him—“I have another ‘being’ to be able to love along with you.”

He’s been trying to call her all day. He’s craving her touch. But in the absence of physical connection, his words become a lifeline—proof of a man completely present in love, even in war.

As their daughter reading this now, I hear more than just a voice from the past. I hear the beginning of mine.

Support the show

The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love is a personal podcast project based on real letters exchanged between Capt. Richard Allgood and Capt. Sarah Allgood during the Vietnam War. Photos of the original letters, family snapshots, and behind-the-scenes commentary are available for supporters.

Support the show:

https://buymeacoffee.com/theallgoodslove

Visit the official website: https://www.theallgoodslove.com

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This isn’t your typical Vietnam War letter.

On May 29, 1971, my father—Captain Dick Allgood—wrote to my mother from Bien Hoa Air Base. She was thousands of miles away, working long hours as a military nurse at Wilford Hall in San Antonio and newly pregnant with me. And he was scared. Scared for her health, for the baby, for the pace she was keeping while he could do nothing but write from across the world.

In this letter, his love takes the shape of fierce protectiveness: “You and our Baby are the Number One most precious things in this world. Fuck the Air Force & Wilford Hall.” He didn’t care about protocol. He cared about us. He was asking her to stop pushing so hard, to stay safe, and to believe that his daily letters would never stop coming.

Even in a war zone, he still jokes about skin flicks, mushy posters, and how much he adores his “whittle chick-a-dee.” But underneath it all is a man who had no control over the world except the pages he sent home.

Fifty years later, as their daughter reading these words, I’m stunned by how raw and honest this letter is. And how loved I already was, even before I was born.

Support the show

The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love is a personal podcast project based on real letters exchanged between Capt. Richard Allgood and Capt. Sarah Allgood during the Vietnam War. Photos of the original letters, family snapshots, and behind-the-scenes commentary are available for supporters.

Support the show:

https://buymeacoffee.com/theallgoodslove

Visit the official website: https://www.theallgoodslove.com

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It’s Friday, May 28, 1971, and Captain Dick Allgood, a U.S. Air Force rescue pilot on alert in Vietnam, writes to his wife Sarah with aching tenderness. He’s been reading The Seven Minutes—a racy novel that stirs memories of their intimacy—and he can’t help but tie its themes to the passion they share. With each passing day, he saves himself for her and dreams of fatherhood, asking how their “little baby” is coming along. Even as mail disruptions frustrate their connection, Dick’s devotion never falters. He closes with a line that captures the heart of this war-born romance: “For once in my life I have someone who needs me and someone who I need.”

Support the show

The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love is a personal podcast project based on real letters exchanged between Capt. Richard Allgood and Capt. Sarah Allgood during the Vietnam War. Photos of the original letters, family snapshots, and behind-the-scenes commentary are available for supporters.

Support the show:

https://buymeacoffee.com/theallgoodslove

Visit the official website: https://www.theallgoodslove.com

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On May 27, 1971, Sarah Allgood writes to her husband from San Antonio after a day that pushed her to the edge—physically and emotionally. Just a few months pregnant, she faints twice while scrubbing in for surgery, narrowly avoiding the floor thanks to a nearby sergeant. She’s frustrated, foggy, and overwhelmed—but still determined to reassure Dick that everything will be okay.

A visit to her doctor confirms what her body’s been trying to tell her: her blood pressure is low, her iron is depleted, and her baby is taking everything she’s got to grow strong. She’s advised to eat more protein, start vitamins early, and monitor how she feels. And through it all, she writes—honestly, lovingly, and with humor only Sarah could deliver.

She talks about quarters in the “sex bank,” getting “seepy,” and how everyone says pregnancy agrees with her. But more than anything, this letter is a promise: she’ll take care of herself and their child. All he has to do is keep loving her.

If you’re listening to The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love, this episode captures the intimate reality of what it meant to be a pregnant military nurse in 1971—writing through fatigue, fear, and unshakable devotion.

Support the show

The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love is a personal podcast project based on real letters exchanged between Capt. Richard Allgood and Capt. Sarah Allgood during the Vietnam War. Photos of the original letters, family snapshots, and behind-the-scenes commentary are available for supporters.

Support the show:

https://buymeacoffee.com/theallgoodslove

Visit the official website: https://www.theallgoodslove.com

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On May 27, 1971, my dad, Capt. Richard Allgood, wrote two letters to my mom in one day—one in the afternoon, and one just before bed. Together, they offer a glimpse into the rhythm of his life in Vietnam: picking up mail at the post office, flying training hours over the base, eating meatloaf at the detachment, watching Flip Wilson and Ironside on TV, and thinking constantly of the woman he loved.

He doesn’t talk about rescue missions or danger in these letters. What he shares instead is intimacy, routine, humor, and a deep devotion to my mom and their unborn baby—me.

By this point in the war, my father had transitioned from flying massive C-141 Starlifters to training on HH-43 helicopters, part of the Air Force’s Pedro rescue team. But in his letters, you hear a different kind of bravery: the quiet kind. The kind that shows up day after day, stays emotionally present, and never lets love slip out of focus.

If you’re listening to The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love, this episode is a reminder that even during war, tenderness had a place—and that love was never mailed in.

Support the show

The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love is a personal podcast project based on real letters exchanged between Capt. Richard Allgood and Capt. Sarah Allgood during the Vietnam War. Photos of the original letters, family snapshots, and behind-the-scenes commentary are available for supporters.

Support the show:

https://buymeacoffee.com/theallgoodslove

Visit the official website: https://www.theallgoodslove.com

Send us Fan Mail

It’s the last week of May 1971, and Memorial Day is approaching. Sarah is writing from their apartment near Lackland Air Force Base — the one she and Dick once shared before he left for Vietnam.

She writes with her usual mix of tenderness, humor, and deep emotional clarity. There’s longing in this letter — but also intention. Sarah had an intuitive spirit. She often sensed things before they happened.

And even when she had a hunch that a call might not come, she kept hoping. Because she believed in the power of positive thought. She believed joy was something you could choose, even when the world was uncertain, even when war hung in the background of every day.

She stayed home, afraid to miss him — because in 1971, there were no cell phones, no email, no backup plan. If he called and she wasn’t there, that moment was gone.

So she waited. She reread his letters. She dreamed of him. And through it all, she chose love over fear. Joy over dread.

“Even near Memorial Day, I choose joy,” she writes — and asks him, gently and powerfully, to do the same.

Support the show

The Allgoods: Vietnam Through the Eyes of Love is a personal podcast project based on real letters exchanged between Capt. Richard Allgood and Capt. Sarah Allgood during the Vietnam War. Photos of the original letters, family snapshots, and behind-the-scenes commentary are available for supporters.

Support the show:

https://buymeacoffee.com/theallgoodslove

Visit the official website: https://www.theallgoodslove.com