File:35. Col. John Virden to Superintendent George Emery. June 24. 1966 Page 1 (293bb71b-0e5b-4dc1-b76f-6e1f7f808d09).jpg

White paper with typed black text

Dear Mr. Emery: Thank you so very much for sending me the Gettysburg TIMES of 18 and 20 June carrying pictures and stories of the dedication of the Gettysburg Monument to the Third Arkansas Infantry Regiment. And I read you loud and clear re the letter to the Director of the National Park Service. And I’ll take care of that no later than this weekend. Frankly, right now I wish the national headquarters of the National Park Service in Washington was half as efficient as are the men assigned to the Gettysburg National Military Park. Though you probably won’t even believe this, I called National Park Headquarters three times trying to get your first name and middle initial. The “Information Service” first insisted that Mr. Wing was still there. I told them that he couldn’t be since I’d only talked to Superintendent Emery two days earlier and that Mr. Wing was out in the Petrified Forest, and that since this was the most important and biggest battlefield park in America they surely must know the full name of the Superintendent. Finally some fussy gal called me back and said “Fred W. Emery is the Superintendent at Gettysburg.” Bureaucracy is the same the world over, Mr. Emery. Remember that the next time you feel inclined to say “there are three ways to do everything: 1) the right way, 2) the wrong way, and the way the military does it. But please do accept my apology for addressing you by the wrong first name. I do not make those kind of mistakes if I can possibly help it. I talked with Judge Bohlinger in St. Vincent’s Hospital in Little Rock last night. They took a tumor out of him about the size of a Texas grapefruit. No cancer. He was very cheerful and very pleased with the way things went off last Saturday. I have, of course, sent him the clippings you sent, the ones from Carlisle and Chambersburg, and Lancaster which George Diffenderfer snipped and sent to me.

• Keywords: Gettysburg; Gettysburg National Military Park; Photography; monuments; memorials; virtual experience; battlefield