How to Adopt a Marine Penpal

Finding Marine pen pals is easier in the Internet age.

Adopting a service member as a pen pal used to involve letter writing and postage, but things have changed with technology. While it is still possible to write letters to deployed military personnel, there are more and more resources for email pen pals available. Whether you want to help boost morale, get in touch with old friends, or find military singles, there is a website for your interests.

Instructions

1. Ask friends and family if they know someone deployed in Iraq. Someone you know probably does. Ask if they would mind having a pen pal.

2. Contact local organizations involved in supporting troops with care packages and messages. Your local grocery store, VFW, American Legion or AmVets are good places to contact. They may have an address of a platoon or individual that you could connect with.

3. Ask on message boards whether someone knows a soldier who needs a pen pal. Similarly, you can seek out message boards and forums where service members seeking pen pals post, like Military Pen Pals.

4. Register at with interest-based group like ChristiaNet. They provide pen pal connections for Christian deployed military service members.

5. Try a website that matches individual civilians with individual service members, like Email Our Military (eMOM). Groups like these are the way around the ban on writing to "Any Service Member." They require a registration where you provide information about yourself, for safety reasons.

Tips & Warnings

• There are many websites where you can send your message to troops without a certain email address. They will be included in care packages or printed and mailed or emailed to soldiers. [e-mail] is one way to send a general email to any service member.

Resources

• Read this Article in Spanish
• Military Pen Pals: Home Page
• Email Our Military
• ChristiaNet: Christian Military Pen Pals