From Marsha Roberts, "Letters TO the Front" Letter Writing Campaign Coordinator

To all of you  who have participated in the "Letters TO the Front Letter Writing Contest" in the past,
please note the changes for 2005.  This year IT'S ALL ABOUT THE TROOPS!!

Since 1999, with the assistance of the Defense Commissary Agency, our sponsors, schools and some wonderful veteran groups, we have coordinated a letter writing campaign to generate letters of support for our troops stationed overseas.  This campaign began as a contest in hopes of motivating Americans of all ages to write Letters TO the Front.  And, thanks to groups like yours, we have been extraordinarily successful!  Over the years we have sent hundreds of thousands of letters to American troops overseas and we appreciate all of your efforts in helping us to make this happen.   And I know that countless American troops have been touched by your efforts - we've heard from a lot of them!

It is now 2005 and we have had American troops in harm's way in Iraq, Afghanistan and other difficult locations for several years now.  We feel it is time to aim the focus of our letter writing campaign directly on the troops we all want to support.  It IS all about the troops this year!

How the 2005 "Letters TO the Front" Letter Writing Campaign works:

• Letters should be 100 - 200 words in length and begin something like
  "Dear Service Member, I just want to say  thanks for . . ."

• Letters should be postmarked by Veterans' Day, November 11th in hopes of getting the letters processed before the holidays.  Groups and schools can choose to send their letters individually or to mail them as a groups in a large envelope or box to:

LETTERS TO THE FRONT
P. O. BOX 25348
ALEXANDRIA, VA  22313

• Groups that collect 100 or more letters and choose to run their letter writing campaign as a local contest, judge the letters themselves and award their own local prizes are encouraged to do so. Any letters that are flagged by these organizations as first prize winners will be posted on our web site for a 30 day period (plus: see below for how the troops win!)
  (Please note: Rector Roberts Productions, Inc. will not be awarding local or Grand Prizes during the 2005 "Letters TO the Front" Letter Writing Campaign.) 

• As always, we'll make sure that all appropriate letters are sent to our troops stationed in remote areas overseas, particularly Iraq and Afghanistan.   (see "Campaign 2005 Guidelines" for definition of appropriate letters)
  
  
  HOW THE TROOPS WIN!

• Any letters that have been chosen as local winners by groups who run the own contest will have a special "Winning Ticket" attached from "Letters TO the Front" Headquarters.

• One out of every 500 letters that are sent directly to the "Letters TO the Front" address will be randomly chosen to also have a special "Winning Ticket" attached from LTTF HQ.

• When one of our troops received a letter with a "Winning Ticket" attached and either sends it back to us or e-mails us with the ticket number, we'll send him or her a terrific "WE CARE" package full of items that can be shared with their entire unit!

You write Letters TO the Front and OUR TROOPS WIN!

Thanks once again for helping us generate letters of support for our troops who are stationed overseas.  Let's make this the biggest year yet!