North Carolina Office of Archives and History
4610 Mail Service Center
Raleigh, NC 27699-4610

May 12, 2004

Dear N.C. Archives and History:

     I am writing to you today to help end a heated debate currently underway between me and my Grandfather. His name is Pepper Longfellow, and he recently turned 73 years old. He was actually born with a different name, but due to the decade he spent living in the Haight Ashbury area of San Francisco (1960’s to 70’s), he adopted one more to his pleasing. It is during this decade of experimentation, and ritualistic drug use, that he began to envision moments from his past lives. One of these flashbacks directly involves the State of North Carolina, and brings me to why I write you: I wish you to reply to me debunking his take on the North Carolina’s battle for independence and stateship.

     He claims that he (whose name at the time was Leenis Whitman) lost the colony of North Carolina in 1862 to Andrew Johnson in a game that was the precursor to Parker Bros. Monopoly. According to him, this game board was made of dogwood, and you would charcoal in the properties that each participant presided over. In his case, he owned the territory of North Carolina as well as various other archaic territories. His recounting of the match is a detailed journey that has been known to take several days; so I will attempt to relay it as briefly as I can.

     After a few nips of brandy, they began the game promptly upon the arrival of Bill Sherman. They played feverishly into the night, with the odd accusation of cheating from the trio of participants. Eventually, the two with the strongest stronghold of properties was my grandfather (well, I guess technically he wasn’t my grandfather at the time, just a spiritual relation) and Andrew Johnson. He says Johnson is a fierce competitor, who would show now mercy when you landed on one of his properties and pout on odd occasions when he didn’t get his way. Eventually my grandfather landed on a property of Johnson’s. He was asked to pay what my grandfather calls ‘gravel road robbery’ (apparently the earlier version of the game allowed the proprietor of each property to set his own price); this only led to an argument and cries of “foulness” from both sides. In a bold move by my grandfather, he offered up the then colony of North Carolina with the agreement that he would be allowed to spend any night, anywhere he wished within the territory, free of charge. This, incidentally, parlays into another story my grandfather tells about the ten months he spent in 1974 sleeping in almost every house and barn in the state, with or without the owner’s consent. Anyhow;

     Apparently Johnson quit the game shortly after gaining the property, left town, and was scarcely heard from again until he became president of the United States. There is still bad blood between them since Pepper never was invited to Andrew’s inauguration.

     When I confront him about the Civil war that went on during that time and subsequently lead to North Carolina’s official independence from Britain; he brushes it off as politically fabricated poppycock!

     If you could please write back to me, letting me know your thoughts on this version of your State’s Independence, I would be most appreciative. My grandfather has promised me a great deal of his possessions if I prove him wrong, and your letter could be vital to my cause.

In wait of your response,
Name I Used