- July ??? – 1933???? – JSA to Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt (White House)
My dear Mrs. Roosevelt:
I hope you recall enjoying our community on Lake George when your brother owned a camp in our neighborhood. If so, you may not think I am intruding too much in writing to you about our welfare.
Old residents and some others last week were surprised and somewhat distressed by receiving a notice from the 1st Assistant Postmaster General that the name of our Post Office was to be changed from the old name of Bolton to Beckersville.
Shortly before the World War, William G. Beckers came to our village with the reputation of having been educated at Heidelberg and having obtained his fortune from the Allied Chemicals. He caught up several tracts of land in our village moving old residences and dominating the community to an extent not consistent with our ideas of representative government, insists on doing away with our much needed highway lighting to reduce his personal taxes. In fairness I must say that he has given some employment to our neighbors who are still poor and inclined to be subservient for that reason. It is, of course, easy for such a man to obtain names on a petition for such a change, although at this writing I have not been able to determine just what percentage of the people actually signed, bit I know of several who though poor, are not in sympathy with the ambitious plan of our neighbor to substitute his name for the name of our village.
The settlement of the town of Bolton was commenced in 1792 and while many changes have taken place since that time the name is cherished and carries with it certain historical interest that some of us feel should be kept associated with the name. It would seem more reasonable to do away with the Post Office entirely if economic conditions warrant, rather than substitute a new name, and I write to you in this frank manner to give you knowledge of our predicament and with the hope that you might be sufficiently interested to ask the Postmaster General to give us back our old name of Bolton I am enclosing a copy of a map to assist you in visualizing the geographic location of our village.
Sincerely yours,
JSApperson