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1915-04-05: ​tour stops---images---audio---~TRANSCRIPT~---notes---links---site navigation
303 Hall st East
Savannah Ga
April 5

Dear Alma,

I gave the postman a letter to mail to you this morning and received yours and one from Mabel at the same time so I am writing tonight to send hers and all that I have received since I was there including Fred’s that she sent.  Also to ask you to send the check for 60 and if you can duplicate it he could use it.  I think he wants to pay for the uniforms +c at the co-operative store.  I don’t think there is any particular hurry about the bills here for furniture +c.  (+c means shades and refrigerator.)  I think they give two or three months on that.  I hope we can take the trip to California.  This is the year for you to go when you can’t go to Europe.  I am afraid you wouldn’t want to go if you could go there again.  But perhaps it will not be so interesting there if they keep fighting much longer.  There has been some company drilling out in front of our house.  I have heard them several times but never went out to see what it was until a few minutes ago I thought I would investigate.  There are about a dozen but they look quite natural in their olive drab.  The orders or command sounds rather queer, rather amateurish after hearing them on the Post.

I received a nice Easter card from Anne also from Miss Rhodehouse and Mrs. Jackson.  They all came today.  Mrs. Jackson sent one to Margaret.

I hope you can find out something about the expense of the trip.  If we go tourist it would cut down the expense.  If I were going alone again I would prefer to go that way for I met such nice people and all so friendly that the trip did not seem long.  It is likely there will be a good many go that way to the exposition.

Margaret wants me to read to her now.  We have worn out the cat book that Grace Clarke gave her and are reading the Bunny book you gave her.  I have to hide it occasionally in self defence.  When I stop reading she will say “read honey,”  There was an advertisement for a refrigerator that she brought to me to read and I asked her to name the letters they were “Good Food-keeping”.  She has never learned the small letters.  She named G then two o’s and she came to d and she asked “What is that sitting down” then she noticed the other d in food and said “two sitting down.”  I will enclose it so you can see “sitting down.”

She took nuts to the park today and fed the squirrels.  She has taken some before but they never came near as they did today.  We are just two blocks from the park and they are short.  The street cars are a square away, both east and west.

Will has gone to call on his old landlady tonight.  Her mother is visiting her, and she asked him to call.  He said he would probably make another.

Col. and Mrs. Langfitt called on us a week ago Sunday but we had gone to Thunderbolt.  A nice car ride and a nice place to go.  It is a kind of summer resort on a small scale.  Will took Margaret on the Merry go round, she enjoyed it.

The bugle has called the soldiers in (ten o clock) so I had better get ready to retire too.

Yesterday was the day the men commenced to wear straw hats.  There were some very odd ones to be seen in the parade.  It looked too cool for them.  Good night.

With lots of love

Mother
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1915-04-05: ​​​tour stops---images---audio---transcript---~NOTES~---links---site navigation
1.
I gave the postman a letter to mail to you this morning and received yours and one from Mabel at the same time so I am writing tonight to send hers and all that I have received since I was there including Fred’s that she sent.
At this time, Fred's wife, Mabel, and her mother were in the US, having come home in 1914 from their missionary work in Africa because Mabel had tuberculosis.  Fred didn't come back from Africa until 1916.  The "since I was there" suggests that Mama Margaret had gone to visit Mabel, but I don't know anything about that.

2.
Also to ask you to send the check for 60 and if you can duplicate it he could use it.  I think he wants to pay for the uniforms +c at the co-operative store.
The "he" must be Will, since Mama Margaret mentioned uniforms.  It surprises me to see Will in need of cash, but he had just moved down from Washington in March, and perhaps the Army wasn't particularly forthcoming with moving expense reimbursements for Will, his mother, and his little daughter.  Or maybe there was a loan of sort from Will to Alma, though that seems unlikely.

3.
I hope we can take the trip to California.
This bit, and an additional mention further down of the possible trip, is why this letter this letter is included in:
4.
This is the year for you to go when you can’t go to Europe.  I am afraid you wouldn’t want to go if you could go there again.  But perhaps it will not be so interesting there if they keep fighting much longer. 
It's 1915.  I daresay they're once again hoping that the war will over by Christmas.
​
5.
​I received a nice Easter card from Anne also from Miss Rhodehouse and Mrs. Jackson.
In 1915, Easter was on April 4, i.e. the day before this letter was written.
Anne was surely Anne Starr, who has a Non-Family page on this website.
I think Miss Rhodehouse must be Mary Elizabeth Rodhouse Creglow, who is on the Non-Family page for Ohio folks.  I'm never sure if it's Rhodehouse or Rodehouse or Rodhouse or what.
I don't know who Mrs. Jackson is.  Maybe Ethel's mother, but I've no particular reason to believe that.

6.
I hope you can find out something about the expense of the trip.  If we go tourist it would cut down the expense.  If I were going alone again I would prefer to go that way for I met such nice people and all so friendly that the trip did not seem long.  It is likely there will be a good many go that way to the exposition.
More about the California trip.  No surprise that Mama wanted have a grand time meeting people on the train.

7.
Margaret wants me to read to her now.  We have worn out the cat book that Grace Clarke gave her and are reading the Bunny book you gave her.
The name Grace Clarke sounds familiar, but I can't remember anything about her, except that she was no relation to Maggie, even though Maggie's mother's maiden name was Sarah Margaret Clarke.

8.
Col. and Mrs. Langfitt called on us a week ago Sunday but we had gone to Thunderbolt.  A nice car ride and a nice place to go.  It is a kind of summer resort on a small scale.  Will took Margaret on the Merry go round, she enjoyed it.
I couldn't find a satisfactory description of the Thunderbolt resort to copy and paste here.  It existed, with rides including the merry-go-round.  The town of Thunderbolt is about five miles from Savannah.

About Col. Langfitt, Wikipedia says:
William Campbell Langfitt (10 August 1860 – 20 April 1934) was a major general in the United States Army. He was prominent as the chief of staff and chief engineer for the American Expeditionary Forces in World War I.
[and]
From 1910 to 1914, Langfitt was responsible for river and harbor improvements in the Washington, D.C., area, as well as improvements to municipal water supply. From 1914 to 1916, he was chief engineer of the Southern Department, responsible for improving rivers and harbors in and around Savannah, Georgia.[and]
The USS General W. C. Langfitt (AP-151), a United States Navy transport ship, was commissioned on September 30, 1944. It continued to be used as a transport ship until 1969, when it was sold to a private company and overhauled for civilian service. The Langfitt transported containerized cargo as the SS Transindiana until being scrapped in 1983.

Sic transit gloria mundi.

​9.
Yesterday was the day the men commenced to wear straw hats.
The "Yesterday" in question was Easter, of course.
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