Anchorage Daily News

CALDWELL, Idaho -- The father of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin says his daughter has been steering clear of the media spotlight in recent weeks to focus on writing her memoirs.

Chuck Heath, in Idaho campaigning for a Republican congressional candidate last week, said Palin has been away from her Alaska home for more than a month but is in touch.

Heath said he gets e-mails from his daughter when she's looking for trivial details of her past, things like how many points she scored in a high school basketball game or the year the family attended the Boston Marathon.

"Sarah's been out of town for almost a month now," Heath told the Spokane Spokesman-Review. "I don't know exactly where she is, but she's writing her book. She e-mails me quite frequently. She asks, 'Oh, what happened on June 13, 1978?' This is material for her book."

Palin, 45, who stepped down as governor on July 26 with more than a year left in her first term, has made no public appearances since she resigned as governor but has voiced opinions on health care and other issues via social networking Web sites like Facebook.

Heath and Jim Palin, Sarah Palin's father-in-law, visited Idaho to stump for Republican congressional hopeful Vaughn Ward, an Iraq veteran they met when Ward served as Nevada director last year for the McCain-Palin campaign. Ward is seeking the GOP nomination and the chance to take on Democratic incumbent Walt Minnick in Idaho's 1st Congressional District.

Heath and Palin campaigned for Ward during seven stops in three days. Heath grew up in Hope, Idaho, and taught at Sandpoint Junior High School before moving his family to Alaska when Sarah was an infant.

As for his daughter's political plans, Heath says: "We absolutely, positively do not know. We haven't seen the last of her."

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