The Mail Will Get Through!
You've seen Casey's regular mentions of the mail being safe and sound. I'm going to give Casey a break (or have Charles do more work, not sure which) and give some background.
When planning began for this adventure Casey wanted to include an educational component. He devised a lesson plan for school kids that would emphasize the mail delivery aspect of the Butterfield Overland Mail Company. Kids from a school at his starting point of St. Louis would be matched with a correspondent school near his final destination of San Francisco. The St. Louis students would write letters and Casey would deliver them in "stagecoach" time — the San Francisco area kids would reply and send the letters by United States Postal Service 
.
What really makes this fun is that all the kids can follow along via the Guided By History blog, track what Casey is up to, and imagine how difficult it was 150 years ago for a letter (and any news at all) to make its way across the country.
As Casey was researching for the trip, he also connected with the amazing Ms. Hansen of Lowell Elementary in Arkansas. Adding letters from her students worked especially well since Arkansas was historically a major mail connection point.
So now Casey has two bags in the RV full of inquiring letters that he is carefully transporting. (I wonder how the mail bags compare in size to the dogs?)
And now for a preview: on the morning of Friday, October 10, Casey will be presenting to the 4th graders of Mary E. Silveira School . Class representatives briefed the whole school at an assembly a few weeks ago about Casey's upcoming visit. So we will have lots of pictures and video to share from the Mary E. Silveira school visit, and of the letters finally being delivered to their intended recipients.
We'll also keep tabs on our three-way school connection after October 10 to hear how the USPS compares with delivery in "stagecoach" time.
(Click here to read what our wonderful teachers, Ms. Decker and Ms. Searway, and media specialists, Ms. Hansen, have said so far.)
Finding a Bay Area school for the end point was easy. The San Francisco History Museum team provides school tours and has relationships with an array of fantastic teachers. I just called one over the summer, Carlene Searway of Mary E. Silveira School, and she was on board with the project from the beginning.
Now then, what about a St. Louis school? We have no Wells Fargo History Museum in St. Louis and no banking stores. It was more complicated and really exemplifies a few degrees of separation .
There was a special Society of American Archivists event in the San Francisco Wells Fargo History Museum at the end of August. I was talking with Barbara Dean, Archivist at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . I mentioned our upcoming project and need for a corresponding St. Louis school. She traveled back to the office and enthusiastically put me in touch with her education-focused colleague, Mary Suiter. When I followed up with Mary and told her about our crazy RV idea, she went right to work using her network to try and locate a teacher that would help us. I think that says a lot about Mary's "make-it-happen" spirit.
While Casey was en route to St. Louis to begin the trip, I was fielding questions and trying to make sure there was a class ready and waiting for a match. Mary came through and connected us with the wonderful Ms. Decker of Kennard Academy , with 5 days to spare before Casey took off to head west! I give a gold star to Ms. Decker for talking to me on her cell phone on a Friday night outside a pizza parlor, delaying the gratification of a well-deserved Friday night pizza in order to help plan Casey's Monday school visit.
My amazement and gratitude to all the degrees that helped us make this work!
Comments
It is great to see kids from across the country connected this way. It's also great to know that sometimes simply talking to people and real person-to-person interactions get us the best results. Great teachers are out there and we all need to support them for working so well with kids.
Posted by: carlos999 | October 8, 2008 08:22 AM
It all went very well. We managed to get to the computer lab this morning and looked up the websites. He had coins for the kids. Sometimes the last minute is a good thing! We will check in day to day.
Thank you so much.
Posted by: Ms. Decker | October 8, 2008 08:54 AM
Ms. Hansen comment:
The experience of working with Casey and Anne so far on this project has been absolutely the best! What superlatives do you want me to use? Kind, expert, prompt, well done, professional, warm, outgoing........ (And Juan quietly working behind the scenes - so supportive.) The program Casey presented to the Lowell Elementary Students is absolutely fantastic. Thank you for sharing them through this project. They are phenomenal ambassadors for your museum and for Wells Fargo.
I also hope that the connection Casey is making today with Heritage Trail Partners will become a long lasting, oncoming and mutually beneficial relationship for both our group and for Wells Fargo Museum. Heritage Trail Partners is a group of educators, business people and government officials here in Northwest Arkansas that promotes the research, education and preservation of the history of the Cherokee Trail of Tears, The Butterfield Stage, the Old Telegraph Road and the Civil War sites in our area. We are blessed to be located in such an historically rich area and to have a group like Heritage Trail Partners who aggressively work at a wide range of projects from re-enacting the Butterfield run to getting legislation passed…The link to the Heritage Trail Partners website is www.heritagetrailpartners.com
Please convey my thanks to Casey, Anne and Juan…Again thank you for sponsoring such a wonderful project.
Posted by: Ms. Hansen | October 8, 2008 08:55 AM
(representing students from Ms. Sakellar's and Mrs. Beck's classes):
At our Assembly this morning, Grace, Kai, and Jason told everyone about our following the 150th reenactment of the Butterfield Stage Mail Delivery from St. Louis to SF.
Ms. Casella, our Principal, seemed pleased that the Wells Fargo RV will actually be delivering the Pen Pal letters to us on Oct. 10th. We plan on checking in on Casey, Juan, and the dogs about three times a week or so…Thank you for letting us participate in this experience.
Posted by: Ms. Searway | October 8, 2008 08:56 AM