Launching on Valentine’s Day, the project will see the digital release of hundreds of thousands of personal letters, diaries and other handwritten documents.

That includes the beginning of Dorothy and Mac’s 70-year love story, which was penned in hundreds of love letters spanning five years.

Their romance began in 1937, when a 17-year-old Mac met a 14-year-old Dorothy, or – as he liked to call her – his darling Dot.

“He kept on asking me to go out but my father wouldn’t let me,” Dorothy laughed. 

In 1939, Mac was off to war, but the plan was always to come home to his Dot.

“He said to me, When I come back home…’ he said, ‘Will you come out with me then?'” Dorothy reminisced.

The couple met when Mac was 17 and Dot was 14, but her father would not let the pair date. 

“I said, ‘Of course I will, Mac!’ And then he gave me a kiss and went to war.”

They wrote letters to each other every week for five years.

Even when Mac was captured by the Germans and became a prisoner of war the letters continued.

“I hated him being away, and when the letters came back oh gee they were wonderful,” Dorothy said.

“A letter meant he was still alive, you see, so it was so exciting.”

But the best message of all came in April 1945.

Mac had escaped and he was coming home to his darling Dot.

“Hello my darling. What does one say in a moment such as this?” Dot wrote on April 30, 1945.

“I have butterflies in my stomach, love in my heart and few words that make sense in my mind. Well Mac, it’s really coming at last. You’re almost home”. 

You can read more in an article by Eleanor Wilson published in the nine.com.au web site at: http://tinyurl.com/5n8f7bva.