13th January, 1880

Both Cora Sue and I decided that the first thing we needed to do regarding our projects was to write letters. Hers was very easy, as Mr. P. Barnum lives locally, and we could hand deliver his letter. She showed me it to see if I agreed with what she had written.

Dear Mr. Barnum,

Our Bridgeport High School English class has been given a topic to write an essay on, “Which Famous Person Would You Most Like to Meet and Why”, and I have chosen you.
 
I am so very interested in how you have created and developed the circus, and would like to know how you managed to do it and what sorts of problems you encountered along the way.

Would it be possible for me and my sister to meet up with you in the near future to ask you some questions about your life? It would have to be on the weekends, so might I suggest next weekend, if you are available.

Yours sincerely,

Cora Sue Kellogg

I told her that I thought she sounded a bit soppy in the part where she is saying why she chose him, but she felt that she had to make him feel flattered so that he would agree, as he must be a very busy man.

Dear Mr. Bennett,

Thank you again very much for the money that you sent my sister and me this last Christmas. We give most of it to our aunt who takes care of us, but we would like, this year, to spend some of it on a trip to New York. We would very much like to meet you  and be able to thank you in person for all that you have done for us since our Pa died.

I have another reason for wanting to visit you, and that is to find out from you whatever I can for a school project that I am doing. In our senior English class we have been given the assignment to write about someone famous who we would like to meet.

I wanted to write about my Pa, but the teacher said that it wouldn’t be fair, as that wouldn’t involve much research on my part. So she said I should do it on General Custer. However, what I really want to find out is about what the whole Battle of the Little Big Horn was about.

I know that the army was sent to put down an Indian uprising, but I want to know why the Indians were so upset. I want to know why after General Custer and the others in his squad, including my father, were massacred, that the other army groups were not treated in the same way. I want to find out what happened to the Indians involved afterwards, and where they are now.

I think that you, as a good newspaper man, will know much of what I am asking. I suspect that you will have had someone interviewing the Indians involved and will have found out their side of the story. So that is my second reason for wanting to visit you.

We can only go on a weekend, as we cannot take much time off school. I think our teacher would allow us to leave somewhat early on Friday afternoon, so as to catch a train that will get us to Grand Central Station before too late at night. We would hope to impose on your hospitality, if we might, as we would have nowhere else to stay in New York.

Cora Sue is doing her project on Mr. P. Barnum, the circus man, so she won’t need to find out anything from you about him, as he lives in our city. But some of our other friends are doing projects on Sacagawea, and Harriet Beecher Stowe. The boys are doing their projects on Charles Dickens, Abraham Lincoln and Mark Twain, so if you had anything newsworthy available on any of those, I am sure that they would be much obliged.

But if you are very busy and cannot help us at all on our projects, we shall understand. We can’t come next weekend, as we plan to go to see Mr. Barnum then, but would appreciate it if we could come the weekend after, so that we have more time, once we have the information, to get on with our project.

We have to write 10,000 words which seems a very great many.

I hope you don’t think I am too forward in contacting you in this way, and inviting Cora Sue and myself to your house, but I couldn’t see any other way of getting the information that I need about the Indians. Our teacher is very anti-Indians anyway, and I have a feeling that Pa was too, but I think for all our sakes that it is necessary to know the full picture of why he died as he did.

Yours sincerely,

Mattie Kellogg

I showed Cora Sue my letter and she suggested that I leave out the bit about what our friends are researching, but I don’t want the job of writing it out all again, so I decided to leave it in. If he says no to that, it won’t really matter, and I can tell our friends that at least I asked.

I can leave my Introductory Chapter for another day, but since I am in the mood, I will write my outline now. But I have to remember to keep my real motive in writing as I intend to a secret, lest Miss Marble tells me that I must not continue in that vein.

GENERAL GEORGE ARMSTRONG CUSTER

I. Introduction

II. Basic details about General Custer

      A. Where he was born
      B. His education
      C. His marriage and family

III. General Custer’s Military Career

IV. The Battle of the Little Bighorn

     A. Preliminaries while living in Bismarck, North Dakota
     B. The involvement of Mark Kellogg
     C. The reason for the Battle
     D. The Battle itself
     E. The Aftermath for Mrs. Custer, the army and the      Indians

V. Summary and Conclusions

Cora Sue and I plan on going to the Library after school tomorrow to begin our basic research into the lives of our subjects, so that we can get the Introductions written in time for Monday’s deadline.

I just love going to our library. Not only are there many reference books like the Encyclopedia Americana, but also many reference books on all sorts of topics. And I check out at least a book each week just to read for my own pleasure.