eri een aC les boa tel aa Ly rel N 3 
An Interesting Letter 
Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 
Dear Betty Ann: November 7th, 1940 
They have told me about your being in the hospital, which I hope 
will not be for long, and I send you my very best wishes. 
Mary Anne tells me you are collecting all sorts of horses, and am 
wondering if you collect pictures of them. If so, enclosed are a few that 
I printed up myself, just this week. These are pictures that I snapped 
last Saturday afternoon, out 
near Alburnett. 
And shall I tell you 
about the big owl that I saw 
back in September. Sept. 
13th, to be exact, 1940. 
Well, this big owl was 
out in the woods back of the 
Cedar Rapids Air Port. A 
huge Barred Owl, maybe 
close to two feet tall. Shall 
we name it old ‘Sleepy Eyes,’ 
or just say ‘Sleepy’ for short? 
Now maybe it was on ac- 
count of the weather and the 
wind that day, but the num- 
erous airplanes roared so low 
and so close to those trees that old Sleepy could not sleep. So what’s to 
do but go down and hide in the woods by the creek. And first, a little 
rest down on the bank of the creek. But NO! for hello! here comes a 
man—just a little man. What does he want? And what’s that he holds in 
his hand. Oh! a camera. Well, that’s all right. Just so it isn’t a gun. 
And Betty Ann, that 
little man was just me. For 
as I was driving along that: 
nice afternoon, I noticed a 
big bird flying up the creek 
a ways. I was curious, and 
stopped and parked the car 
near the bridge, and hiked 
up the creek, and just around 
a bend, standing down on the 
bank of the creek by a big 
stump, I saw that big owl, 
right close to the water. And 
with my camera in hand, I 
excitedly stole up, slowly, and 
snapped this first picture. Old Sleepy on the post 
Sleepy near the big stump 
ee : 
Fe 
