Happy Memorial Day

Hi Kids, I hope you all had a wonderful Memorial Day weekend. I have been a very busy monkey. I have been driving through lots of states. Cmor drove me through Ohio and West Virginia and into Pennsylvania. We went to see  Locks. Not the kind that you use keys for. These locks are for boats. They are elevators in the water . They can make boats go up and down by putting a fence in front and in back of boats and then either raising or lowering the water inside where the boat  is. The boats in the old days were filled with coal that people used to build fires in their homes and businesses. I got to see what the boats were like inside and I met a sock puppy and a sock rabbit. Thursday and Friday we spent in our countries Capitol, Washington D.C. I went to see lots of monuments and museums. I learned that chocolate beans are a fruit and grow on the outside of a tree. I saw bananas growing but they were not ripe yet. I saw lots of airplanes and tried on an astronaut suit. I even saw a copy of the giant balloon that was the first thing that ever took a person up into the sky. I climbed all the stairs up to the Lincoln Monument and saw the statue of President Lincoln. I saw the very very tall Washington Monument . I even saw an astronaut inside the space station eating his food from a tray full of little compartments so his food would not float away. One of my favorite things to see was the flag that Francis Scott Key saw that made him write The Star Spangled banner. Now that song is our National Anthem. The flag was so big it would not even fit in your classroom. I went to see the White House and I met a secret service man. He is one of the brave men that help to guard our President.

I went and saw a giant elephant and stood next to an elephant leg bone and toe bones and saw how big elephant teeth are. They spend 18 hours a day chewing so they need big teeth. I even saw the ruby slippers Dorothy wore in the Wizard of Oz movie.

I went into Baltimore and toured a baseball field. The Orioles are the State bird in Maryland and that is what their baseball team is called. I saw a picture of an Oriole that looks like Angry Birds grandpa.Then I went to a Grist Mill. Remember all the things I told you people had to do themselves. They grew corn and wheat and after they dried it so it was hard, they took it to a mill to be made into flour or cornmeal. When the Indians used to grind their corn they used two rocks. There are no rocks in Maryland so they had to trade for them with other Indians and they carried them everywhere with them.  The settlers put the corn in the top of the big grinding wheels and a waterwheel outside the building turned the wheels around and ground up the corn until the flour came out the bottom. I was very sad to learn that children were sent to learn how to work when they were 10 years old. They stayed with the people in the mills until thay were 18 years old. When they were done they knew how to be a miller. Children had to work very hard in those days. Sometimes they had to stay home from school and help with all the farm chores. I am glad I did not have to work that hard. The next state I went to visit was Deleware. It was our countries first State. All of you are very close to The Pacific Ocean. I was at the Atlantic Ocean all the way on the other side of our country. I was as far from you as I could be and still be in America. When I walked onto the beach, I thought I saw lots of turtles in the water but when I got close I saw they were Horseshoe crabs. They are very strange looking. They look like they have a long pointed stinger but it is to help them if they get turned over. I have one more thing for you to think about. The houses along the Atlantic ocean are built high on stilts. Why do you think they are built that way? Think about that and I will tell you tomorrow. Hugs from Junior.