How long had the letter been on the desk at UEA’s U.N. office at 777 UN Plaza in New York City? Who was it from? Why send something to an office that is infrequently visited? I suspect these were some of the questions running through Humphrey Tonkin’s mind when he discovered a letter with an Alabama return address when he visited the office in late 2023.

The handwritten letter was from Shannon Barlow who, with two others, had started studying Esperanto. Somehow, they found the 777 address and sent the letter. So why write instead of using the Internet to find out about Esperanto? Well, Shannon, Ryan and Michael don’t have access to the Internet. They are prisoners at the Bibb County Correctional Facility in Brent, Alabama. Humphrey sent the letter to me, and I responded; anyone resourceful enough to write to the 777 address deserved an answer!

Here are their Esperanto stories.

Shannon, Ryan and Michael would like to correspond with the readers of Usona Esperantisto. You can do so by snail mail (address is found after each of their messages). You can also write to them electronically online (it costs $0.15 to send a message)!

—Chuck Mays