Mr. Imes,
I just read your article from April 24 about Charles Lindbergh”s landing in Maben in 1923. It brought a smile to my face.
My grandmother, Edna Clayton Simoneaux, told me that story over and over again when I was a child. She was just a child herself when her father brought her and her brothers by horse-drawn wagon to see the airplane and meet the aviator. They packed a picnic basket for the day. Her two brothers each took a ride in the plane.
She often wondered out loud how her father had found the $10 for the boys–not a small sum in those days. My grandmother described it, as you do, as a time of innocence and simplicity in Mississippi. She said that seeing the airplane and Mr. Lindbergh gave her a glimpse into the greater world outside their simple farm life. She said that for a long time after that, she and her brothers would extend their arms and pretend to fly while jumping off the porch of their house.
I recently found a children”s book about the Maben landing titled Good-bye Charles Lindbergh by Louise Borden. I read it often to my two children since my grandmother is no longer with us to tell the story. Thank you for telling the story in your April article. It transported me to another place and time.
Denise Simoneaux Molina
New Orleans
The Dispatch Editorial Board is made up of publisher Peter Imes, columnist Slim Smith, managing editor Zack Plair and senior newsroom staff.
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