George J. Myers, Jr.
1918 Holland Ave.
Bronx, NY 10462

National Archives and Records Administration
Washington, DC

Dear NARA:

What a happy day in New York City this was to be with the Yankees winning the
World Series. However, having read over the material contained in the
"Prologue: Quarterly of the National Archives and Records Administration,
Summer 1999, vol. 31, no. 2," and the article "Standing in for the
President," by W. Dale Nelson, that I just recently read on the World Wide
Web, I must pause today and raise objections.

First let me state that George Bruce Cortelyou was related to me and my
family through the marriage of a "great aunt" Rosalie Myers. The Cortelyou
family has been important to the history of this country since Jacque
Cortelyou surveyed Brooklyn for the Dutch Indies Company. A street near the
courthouse is named for them, and George B. Cortelyou, from what I have
hesitantly gathered was once a very powerful man, Chairman of the Republican
Party, CEO of Con Edison and as you may know in Washington, held four Cabinet
posts under Presidents William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt during those
troubled times. I might relate a silly story that claims he was responsible
for making a nickel loaf a bread a dime, thereby staving off an economic
depression, that unfortunately came later.

That said, my family formerly, staunch supporters of Alfred E. Smith, the
first Catholic Governor of New York and therefore Democrats really have never
any connection with the Cortelyou's. Why have you left out Ms. Dee Dee Myers
in your review of White House Press Secretaries? Doesn't it matter that she
was the first woman in that role and handled it remarkably well for three
years before Mr. Mike McCurry? "The evolution of what became the White House
press office, from George Cortelyou to Mike McCurry, was gradual, but the
change was profound." To leave her out is to deny her rightful place in this
so-called "evolution."

I will personally as a citizen never forgive the current President for firing
Ms. Dee Dee Myers for such a small egregious error in judgment, which I still
suspect is the result of politics not law enforcement. The President wants to
be considered a fallible human yet will not extend the same compassion to one
I considered one of his "thousand points of light," to borrow a metaphor.

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