‘The Making of a Flyover American’

Travel Blog  •  Michael Yessis  •  10.15.09 | 4:09 PM ET

Feel a traveler’s love for the United States bloom through the excerpts of a 32-year-old letter World Hum contributor Sophia Dembling shares at Flyover America. She wrote it during her first cross-country drive when she was a teenager.

Partway through the drive, I started writing a letter to my brother documenting the trip. I wrote 14 pages, all the way through the final leg of the drive, San Francisco to L.A. Nick saved the letter and returned it to me a few years ago. As literature, it’s unimpressive. But as a record of the awakening of a provincial city girl, it’s kinda special.

Indeed.