A 1957 letter

A few days ago I visited my Aunt in Connecticut. She showed me a box of old letters to and from my mother (her sister). I pulled out one at random, and read with interest my mother's words, dated June 11, 1957:

"Our new house is progressing and this is the rapid stage when you get more for your money, so to speak. They are trying to get the roof on this week while the weather is good so that they can work during any rainy periods. Every evening we all go to inspect the progress. Last evening we saw a large raccoon coming down from a giant tulip tree. That tree will bear watching. I shouldn't be surprised if there were a coon family sheltered in its innards, somewhere. And last weekend, a baby owl fell out [of] a tree on to the road and there was much excitement trying to decide what to do with it. We ended up putting back where it fell in the hopes that the parent owls would look after it. You have to have a permit to keep a songbird or owl in Mass. But it was a sweet little bundle of feathers with tiny horns -- a baby screech owl, we think."

I don't recall seeing that baby owl. I do recall much about the raccoon raised that summer. And yes, we needed a permit to keep a raccoon. I've written more about this coon for my July column:
Adventures with Danny the Raccoon.