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Food is in short supply in most countries, too, and Buekner dispatches 200 food packages to the overseas bureaus each month. The one worry he does not have is fretting his purchases through customs at the other end. Russian customs officials, for instance, once levied 3,600 roubles ($300) on some stationery that TLI's Moscow bureau chief had ordered. It took endless dickering to get the stationery released at a sensible fee.
Of all the requests he has satisfied, one stands out vividly in Buckner's memory. It was a London bureau man's Christmas present to an English family. They dearly wanted eight pounds of knitting wool (two pounds each of three-ply Navy, grey, dark green and red) with two sets of knitting needles for a young Dutch girl who tends the grave of their son, an R.A.F. pilot shot down by the Luftwaffe over Holland. They had asked her what she wanted most, and she had answered: yarn.
Cordially,
James A. Linen