On January 8, 2022, which would have been Bowie's 75th birthday, they republished what they had written at first. Based on what was on my site, they [too-quickly] wrote:
David Bowie was just 20 years of age and yet to make a dent in the music scene when, in September of 1967, he received his first piece of fan mail from America. The fan in question was 14-year-old Sandra Dodd, a New Mexico resident whose uncle, a manager of a local radio station, had recently given her a promotional copy of Bowie’s first album. Intrigued, she wrote him a letter, told him that his music was as good as that of The Beatles and offered to start a US fan club on his behalf. Her letter did reach Bowie. In fact, he was so excited to receive such praise from across the Atlantic that he immediately typed out this endearing reply from the office of his manager, Kenneth Pitt.I was Sandra Adams, when I was a kid, not Dodd, but they found the letter on SandraDodd.com.
Amarillo, Texas was 300 miles away, not local, and my uncle didn't give it to me; the real story's better.
My Uncle AJ (Johnny Hatchcock, to most people) always brought any of the freebie/demo records that seemed to be rock'n'roll to his younger daughter, my cousin Debbie. Debbie went through and saved what she wanted.
Th that summer, she came to Española for a long visit. She brought some albums to give to Nada, another cousin of ours, who lived with us, in New Mexico. We were all three within about nine months of age.
Nada went through and kept albums she wanted, and passed the rest to me. In there, rejected by both Nada and Debbie, was "David Bowie." One more interesting thing. "Her letter did reach Bowie." The first time, it didn't. I sent it to the only address I could find on the album cover, and it was the American distributor, in New York. WONDERFULLY, they returned the letter, and gave me the proper address.
So for the first time, I sent an international letter, from the Fairview post office, which was at the corner of The Taos Highway and Fairview Lane (now Riverside Drive and Fairview Lane, where there's a Walgreen's, but used to be a strip mall with the post office, a pharmacy, Piggly Wiggly, and another shop or two. THAT's the letter he received.
His return packet came to our mailbox, Rt. 1 Box 15, which is not an address there anymore. I don't know who lives in that house, but I have thought sometimes that I should tell them they live where that letter lived for a few years.
I wish "Letters of Note" had contacted me, or had at least read more carefully on my site, but I'm still happy that the letter became available to fans in the larger world. And I suppose the perspective of someone in England, New Mexico and Texas might seem to be local to each other. 😉
