I.ake Cushman, Washington. 
,Jan. SI, 1917. 
My dear Mr. Deane 
It is a very long tine since we have hearl frem 
each other. I had yrur card at Christmas, and '"as greatly pleased 
to think you had not forgotten us. Here we are not so close to the 
source of supplies and cannot get crris at a moment's notice, and 
our friends do not always receive the expressions of' our good will 
iust on tine. 
^his is a very lonely winter, all the boys are away, and 
the Madame and I are keeping the cat's tail out of the fire and 
endeavoring to provide the means of subsistence. Tne hotel work^ 
owing to the automobile, is no longer what it was, and we shall 
probably not attempt to open thas summer, but our parcel post bus¬ 
iness is growing as fast as our ability to provide the needed stock. 
If we do not run the hotel there will be no difficulty in handling 
it this coming winter, whe growth of the work has been very encour- 
aging, and it took 9 big sacks to take out our Thanksgiving Day 
shipment, and nearly as many for Xmas. 
We nearly came a cropper this fall. Last winter during 
the big storm our carrier landed m Hrodsport one afternoon with 
some SO lbs. of mail which he had. had to carry.^out on his back. 
There he found a P. 0. inspector. Now Oscar's idea of carrying the 
mail consists largely in endorsing his paychecks, so long as he 
can sit in his car he dont mind it, but when conditions compel him 
to do otherwise he puts up a howl. And so he poured out his tale of 
woe to the inspector. During the summer this same inspector paid 
me a visit, and after he had gone over my records, began to make 
inquiry regarding the business. He got here on a day when the hotel 
was full and his questions brought out the facts that there were 
