1981-JG

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Dear Laura,

 This year has been a very interesting one here in America. We’ve had a lot of big things happen for us, some good and some that weren’t so good. At the beginning of the year, our new president, Ronald Reagan was sworn into office. He is a Republican president who has a lot of good plans for our country. On the same day that the president was sworn in, there was an agreement to free some American hostages who were trapped in Tehran for 444 days. A group of Islamist students and militants took over the American Embassy in Tehran to support the Iranian Revolution. Our military tried to rescue the hostages with an airplane but they failed. Eight of our American servicemen were killed, one Iranian civilian and our plane was destroyed. We had to sign some sort of agreement to have the hostages released and returned home. It was pretty scary here for a while, wondering if they were actually going to release all of the Americans and return them safely.  Something else pretty tragic happened in March, the president was shot in the chest. He lived, but it was close. Reagan had to have emergency two hour surgery to save his life. Two other people were shot too. Reagan’s press secretary was shot in the head and a police officer was shot in the neck. Luckily everybody recovered. Police caught the man who attempted the assassination and put him in jail. His name is John Hinckley.  We had a very happy time here in America for women. President Reagan nominated Sandra Day O’Connor to the Supreme Court. She became the first woman to serve on the Supreme Court. I think this is really a breakthrough for women here in the United States.  Finally, we had the first discovery of this terrible disease they call HIV/AIDS. It stands for Human Immunodeficiency virus infection/ acquired immunodeficiency syndrome. It’s a disease that affects the immune system and makes it hard for the immune system to fight off other diseases. They say that his disease started in Africa. I’m not sure how they’re cure it but I hope it’s soon.  That’s all for now. Please write back and tell me how the year has been over there in France. I look forward to hearing from you. Your American friend, Jade