Letters and author's papers documenting the writing, editing, publication, and marketing of the "Mandie" juvenile fiction mystery series. These books feature stories about Amanda "Mandie" Elizabeth Shaw, a girl living in western North Carolina, ca. 1900, although several titles are set in Charleston, S.C., and elsewhere. Leppard cited the childhood experiences of her mother, Bessie A. Wilson Leppard who was an orphan, as the inspiration for many of the stories in this series. Drafts, galleys, correspondence, historical research notes, and other materials. Includes letters and email exchanged with editors, fan clubs, materials relating to operation of the Mandie web site, calendars, audio cassette tapes, writers conference materials, professional affiliations (National Leauge of American Pen Women, Author's Guild, Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, North Carolina Writers' Network, etc.), ephemera and promotional materials. Carton 25 includes complete set of her books in the original Mandie series (40 titles); three Mandie Christmas-themed books; the final title in the series, Mandie: Her College Days (1 title); the Young Mandie series (7 titles); the Lily Adventures (2 titles) about a sixteen year old character who lives in Fountain Inn, S.C., the birthplace of Leppard's father, James William Leppard (1886-1960), and where her grandfather worked as a blacksmith; and a blank diary and datebook, "Mandie 1901," both illustrated. Majority of collection documents Leppard's career as a writer; however Box 1 includes resumes, birth certificate, and other biographical information, including obituraries of the Leppard and related families. In 1995, Leppard began a spin-off series featuring sixteen-year-old Lily Masterson, whose advetures take place at the turn of the century in Fountain Inn, South Carolina, where Lois Gladys Lepprd's father was born, and where her grandfather was a landowner and blacksmith. Box 1 includes five booklets, 1959-1966 about Libya reflecting Leppard's work as a civilian employee of Wheelus Air Base located five miles east of Tripoli, at the time the largest American air base outside the U.S.; titles include, A Reader's Guide to Libya and the Arab World (bibliography, 1959, 19 sheets) re Libya, North Africa, the Middle East, and Islam; the "Special Independence Issue" of the Libyan Review (No. 12 : Dec. 1966); and a orientation booklet re Libya, published 1961 by U.S. Air Forces in Europe (USAFE Pamphlet 40-1-1), includes many annotations updating or contradicting the information as printed, "Base Exchange has a large variety of items for sale," annotated with comment, "No!"; and printed description of the service-operated schools on base as equivalent to an education received in the U.S., includes annotation that this might be true "when the teachers are sober."
