DENVER -- It took three weeks for a 10-inch square box from England to arrive at William Suitts' office.
But this was not an ordinary package.Inside were pieces of Glenn Miller history, including a logbook kept by Royal Air Force navigator Fred Shaw that outlines the circumstances surrounding the band leader's death during World War II, and a letter from the British Air Ministry.
"I was very excited about it," said Suitts, who had paid $32,864.78 for the items in April.
On Sunday Suitts plans to talk about his treasures at the Glenn Miller Festival in Fort Morgan, Colo. He will be part of a presentation given by Alan Cass, the curator of the Glenn Miller exhibit at University of Colorado at Boulder.
The logbook, a copy of the letter and several other pieces of memorabilia will be on display at the festival, which started Thursday and runs through Sunday.
Suitts also will have about 100 copies of the logbook to distribute to fans if they want it.
"That's the greatest thing about the whole thing -- the sharing of it," said Suitts.
On April 13, Suitts, a diehard Glenn Miller fan, made the top bid for the items to Sothesby's auction house in Birmingham, England.
The items are significant to Glenn Miller lore because the logbook holds a crucial clue to the band leader's mysterious disappearance over the English Channel during World War II. In the logbook, he suggested that Miller's plane might have been blown out of the sky by bombs a Royal Air Force squadron jettisoned over the Channel while returning from an aborted raid on Germany.
In 1985, the Ministry of Defense wrote a letter to Shaw, saying "in retrospect we now lean towards this being the most likely solution to the mystery."
Since the news that Suitts had the logbook and the letter, he said he's received calls and letters from Glenn Miller fans around the world.
"It's been a real great ride," Suitts said. "The fans are so sincere and so appreciative of this. So many people were so happy that it (the logbook) was in America and felt that's where it belonged that it was part of history."