March 15, 2013
Dear Betty,
I am only a guy who grew up in the ‘40s and ‘50s but I think I can relate to your situation in the late ‘30s regarding Amelia Earhart.
Like they said in my time you were too old to be Brownie and too young to be a Bunny (Playboy type).
You sat at home listening to the radio for your favorite music only to dream of the day your first date would ask you out for a dance. However, it didn’t happen in that period of July 1937. Instead you listened and recorded in your notebook a dialog with a truly heroic woman Amelia Earhart.
Her words-according to your transcript- were very much the same as a very lonely and frustrated human being knowing that if help didn’t come soon things would come to an end in a very unpleasant matter. Detailed descriptions of circumstances lead into pleas of understanding and remorsefulness.
Betty, your recording of the last words that Amelia uttered is laced with compassion, understanding, curiosity and lastly a sense of hopefulness that can not be disputed if one was not there with you on that day in July, 1937.
The fact that you held onto your note book (far into your later years) tells us all that you believed and treasured your time as a young teen. There was no apprehension in what you recorded or what future generations may value your work.
Betty, I personally believe that when TIGHAR finally gets all the puzzle pieces together your recorded Amelia narrative will fill in the many, many gaps of what happened on that faithful day in July 1937.
Thank You Honey,
Ted Campbell