Letter from Alma to Eva: 12/3/1958
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Thanksgiving with Roger's family, and revised plans for the trip to Hawaii
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1958-12-03: tour stops---images---audio---~TRANSCRIPT~---notes---links---site navigation
Dec. 3rd
Dear Eva:
This is the day we were to sail - and have not done it. The date is set for Jan. 15th. Geoffroy is feeling all right - takes a 10 minute walk every day - and thinks there will be no hitch this time. Our sailing address:
S.S.Leilani, sailing Jan. 15th
Hawaiian Textron Line
Los Angeles, California.
I gather that we are not to have as good accomodations as on the Matson Line, but it is only 5 days and we shall survive it - probably fair to good, not like the Merco.
This noon Helen Fuller took me over to the Atkinsons, and then I stayed until 4 and Lenette brought me back and picked up several reprints which she wanted. I had to be back at Clapp by 4 for a Dept. Journal Club at which our newest assistant was to report - Dorothy Osgood - and she did very well.
I hope there is nothing the matter with you - I have expected to hear about the Kneewarmer, if it is right, so that I can finish the other. I was disappointed not to hear from you Saturday when Edie and Elizabeth brought me back. We stopped at the Spot for lunch and then came here, left my things and went to Fredda's to show her the candle chandelier which Edie had had made for the diningroom. Fredda is considering having one made for her diningtable - to hang above it.
When I did not get a letter Saturday I thought I would wait until Monday before writing, and then I put it off another day, and then another. Yesterday noon I left for Holyoke and spent most of the afternoon - going down just after lunch. I had to go to have my ear treated - and that consumes much time as I always have to wait. Then I had my eyes tested; I wanted to be sure they are all right before settling down to work hard - I hope I'll work hard. Dr. McCullough says my eyes are all right and my glasses do not need to be changed. Dr. Halton thinks my ear will be all right - I am not as hopeful as he is; I am to go to him again in two weeks. Then today I left just after lunch - I came home to get my mail and there was nothing. I hope there is tomorrow or I'll not get it until Monday night, as I have decided to go to New York to visit AG and Clara - Friday until Monday. I hope that I'll do some Christmas cards during the trip. I hoped that I would in Wayland, but I didn't.
It seems so long since I came back that it is hardly worth writing about. Except that I had a very good time. Edie and Elizabeth came Tuesday afternoon, we picked up my things, went to Fredda's for Tea and then started off - a lovely drive facing the new moon, part of the time through trails of wet planehaze. Edie makes it in 1 1/2 hrs. from house to house - if we do not stop. Wednesday evening Roger and Edie went to the Republican Dance, while Helen and I were the baby-sitters. Helen had come up on Saturday so that Roger and Edie could go to the Harvard-Yale football game. She also got the two turkeys ready and made the pudding. She brought up my ivory beads but did not find my ivory earrings or your opera glasses; she thinks she is not a good burglar. Everett came Thursday morning - nearer noon.
The brothers Li and Lee, with wives and children were there for dinner, and we ate in the diningroom!!! It is not really finished but quite finished enough to be used pleasantly and conveniently. They have had the grandfather's table finished off and it was large enough for 9 grown-ups. The 9 children sat in the end of the diningroom nearest the kitchen on an improvised table - a plywood top on a coffee table; the infant children were not at table - yes. little Wendy, aged 1 yr. sat mostly on her mother's lap; the 3 months old baby of the other family was upstairs in its bassinet, and appeared only at time of entrance and exit. Edie had 2 turkeys - she said she would last year when it took so long to carve for the children that we had a long wait. One turkey was roasted early and enough carved - and cut into bite-sized pieces for the smaller children - and dishes of vegetable, etcs, left on the kitchen table so that they could go replenish their plates as needed. Roger went out to get us something and found them skinning the turkey to get the nice brown outside part. So he cut what he thought ought to be enough for them. The children behaved very well - not always quietly, but orderly and happily. After dinner while we were having coffee in the living-room and playroom, after having circled up and down stairs, Betsy had them playing school - and naturally she was the teacher. There are two girls, a Li and a Lee near her age, also a boy a little younger (?), and a boy about Lucy's age. I am not good at guessing ages of Chinese children. We had dinner shortly after 5 and the guests stayed until about 8:30. Then Helen, Everett, Roger, Edie, Betsy and I played Fantan. Betsy likes to divide her hand and keep her hold-up cards separately - that is inclined to slow up her playing.
Friday night we played Michigan. Everett and Helen went home Friday, so there were only four of us to play.
Ming seems to be definitely better - not really easy to manage but not so difficult. Edie said they were feeling encouraged about her. They say that things are working out as the doctor said they would and he is hopeful that is some years she will be almost normal, and will be able to learn as the other children do. They have cut down on her medicine, and next spring hope to cut out the tranquilizers completely. She needs them more during the winter as she can't get as much exercise, and that makes her more difficult.
Lucy is a dear, as usual, but she was having her difficulties with her small doll, Henry Jones, not a boy but a girl, named for a baby in the neighborhood. Between feeding Henry and getting her clothes washed life is difficult, and she will wake up in the night and cry because Henry Jones did not have her supper. She means to bring her highchair to the table (Henry is 5-6 inches tall) but sometimes gets so much interested in her own food that she forgets it, and when she remembers that Henry did not have her supper there is weeping and wailing. Then her pyjamas need constant washing, and she wants them dry faster than they can be dried. Edie is finding grandmotherhood difficult - she said that Lucy had never been any trouble until the last few weeks when Henry came into her life.
Roger 2 is also a dear, and easier to manage now that he has reached the age of more reason. He gets along with Ming better than he did and is less likely to make trouble.
The diningroom is very nice; partly plastered - all but the far end finished. The cupboards are done and the gold-band china is in them. The room is larger than I had thought and very pleasant. Roger 2's room is almost finished, ready for papering and they have the paper.
Love,
Dear Eva:
This is the day we were to sail - and have not done it. The date is set for Jan. 15th. Geoffroy is feeling all right - takes a 10 minute walk every day - and thinks there will be no hitch this time. Our sailing address:
S.S.Leilani, sailing Jan. 15th
Hawaiian Textron Line
Los Angeles, California.
I gather that we are not to have as good accomodations as on the Matson Line, but it is only 5 days and we shall survive it - probably fair to good, not like the Merco.
This noon Helen Fuller took me over to the Atkinsons, and then I stayed until 4 and Lenette brought me back and picked up several reprints which she wanted. I had to be back at Clapp by 4 for a Dept. Journal Club at which our newest assistant was to report - Dorothy Osgood - and she did very well.
I hope there is nothing the matter with you - I have expected to hear about the Kneewarmer, if it is right, so that I can finish the other. I was disappointed not to hear from you Saturday when Edie and Elizabeth brought me back. We stopped at the Spot for lunch and then came here, left my things and went to Fredda's to show her the candle chandelier which Edie had had made for the diningroom. Fredda is considering having one made for her diningtable - to hang above it.
When I did not get a letter Saturday I thought I would wait until Monday before writing, and then I put it off another day, and then another. Yesterday noon I left for Holyoke and spent most of the afternoon - going down just after lunch. I had to go to have my ear treated - and that consumes much time as I always have to wait. Then I had my eyes tested; I wanted to be sure they are all right before settling down to work hard - I hope I'll work hard. Dr. McCullough says my eyes are all right and my glasses do not need to be changed. Dr. Halton thinks my ear will be all right - I am not as hopeful as he is; I am to go to him again in two weeks. Then today I left just after lunch - I came home to get my mail and there was nothing. I hope there is tomorrow or I'll not get it until Monday night, as I have decided to go to New York to visit AG and Clara - Friday until Monday. I hope that I'll do some Christmas cards during the trip. I hoped that I would in Wayland, but I didn't.
It seems so long since I came back that it is hardly worth writing about. Except that I had a very good time. Edie and Elizabeth came Tuesday afternoon, we picked up my things, went to Fredda's for Tea and then started off - a lovely drive facing the new moon, part of the time through trails of wet planehaze. Edie makes it in 1 1/2 hrs. from house to house - if we do not stop. Wednesday evening Roger and Edie went to the Republican Dance, while Helen and I were the baby-sitters. Helen had come up on Saturday so that Roger and Edie could go to the Harvard-Yale football game. She also got the two turkeys ready and made the pudding. She brought up my ivory beads but did not find my ivory earrings or your opera glasses; she thinks she is not a good burglar. Everett came Thursday morning - nearer noon.
The brothers Li and Lee, with wives and children were there for dinner, and we ate in the diningroom!!! It is not really finished but quite finished enough to be used pleasantly and conveniently. They have had the grandfather's table finished off and it was large enough for 9 grown-ups. The 9 children sat in the end of the diningroom nearest the kitchen on an improvised table - a plywood top on a coffee table; the infant children were not at table - yes. little Wendy, aged 1 yr. sat mostly on her mother's lap; the 3 months old baby of the other family was upstairs in its bassinet, and appeared only at time of entrance and exit. Edie had 2 turkeys - she said she would last year when it took so long to carve for the children that we had a long wait. One turkey was roasted early and enough carved - and cut into bite-sized pieces for the smaller children - and dishes of vegetable, etcs, left on the kitchen table so that they could go replenish their plates as needed. Roger went out to get us something and found them skinning the turkey to get the nice brown outside part. So he cut what he thought ought to be enough for them. The children behaved very well - not always quietly, but orderly and happily. After dinner while we were having coffee in the living-room and playroom, after having circled up and down stairs, Betsy had them playing school - and naturally she was the teacher. There are two girls, a Li and a Lee near her age, also a boy a little younger (?), and a boy about Lucy's age. I am not good at guessing ages of Chinese children. We had dinner shortly after 5 and the guests stayed until about 8:30. Then Helen, Everett, Roger, Edie, Betsy and I played Fantan. Betsy likes to divide her hand and keep her hold-up cards separately - that is inclined to slow up her playing.
Friday night we played Michigan. Everett and Helen went home Friday, so there were only four of us to play.
Ming seems to be definitely better - not really easy to manage but not so difficult. Edie said they were feeling encouraged about her. They say that things are working out as the doctor said they would and he is hopeful that is some years she will be almost normal, and will be able to learn as the other children do. They have cut down on her medicine, and next spring hope to cut out the tranquilizers completely. She needs them more during the winter as she can't get as much exercise, and that makes her more difficult.
Lucy is a dear, as usual, but she was having her difficulties with her small doll, Henry Jones, not a boy but a girl, named for a baby in the neighborhood. Between feeding Henry and getting her clothes washed life is difficult, and she will wake up in the night and cry because Henry Jones did not have her supper. She means to bring her highchair to the table (Henry is 5-6 inches tall) but sometimes gets so much interested in her own food that she forgets it, and when she remembers that Henry did not have her supper there is weeping and wailing. Then her pyjamas need constant washing, and she wants them dry faster than they can be dried. Edie is finding grandmotherhood difficult - she said that Lucy had never been any trouble until the last few weeks when Henry came into her life.
Roger 2 is also a dear, and easier to manage now that he has reached the age of more reason. He gets along with Ming better than he did and is less likely to make trouble.
The diningroom is very nice; partly plastered - all but the far end finished. The cupboards are done and the gold-band china is in them. The room is larger than I had thought and very pleasant. Roger 2's room is almost finished, ready for papering and they have the paper.
Love,
1958-12-03: tour stops---images---audio---transcript---~NOTES~---links---site navigation
1.
The writing on the back of the envelope looks like Eva's handwriting to me.
2.
Dec. 3rd
No year is given, but this must be 1958, because of the plans for the Hawaii trip.
3.
I was disappointed not to hear from you Saturday when Edie and Elizabeth brought me back.
Alma spent Thanksgiving with Will's younger son Roger, and Roger's wife Edie and their four children Elizabeth/Betsy, Ming, Roger2, and Lucy.
4.
We stopped at the Spot for lunch and then came here, left my things and went to Fredda's to show her the candle chandelier which Edie had had made for the diningroom. Fredda is considering having one made for her diningtable - to hang above it.
Fredda has a Non-family page on this website. She did have a chandelier made like ours - wrought iron - but with a stem that was six inches longer because her ceiling was higher than our dining room ceiling.
When my parents built a summer house on the Cape in 1970, my mother had a hook in that dining room ceiling for our chandelier, and we would cart it back and forth. Then Fredda gave my mother her chandelier, because she couldn't use it because she was going blind. Later she had a cataract operation, but she didn't take her chandelier back.
One of the happy memories in my childhood - repeated many times but always magical to me - was when we ate in the dining room (usually we ate in the kitchen) and I was the one who got to extinguish the candles in the chandelier with a candle extinguisher.
5.
I have decided to go to New York to visit AG and Clara
Clara is, of course, Clara Jones, who has a Non-family page on this website.
AG was attending secretarial school in New York, and this visit of Alma's caused confusion (unresolved, so far) for me as to the correct date of a letter from AG:
6.
Helen had come up on Saturday so that Roger and Edie could go to the Harvard-Yale football game. She also got the two turkeys ready and made the pudding. She brought up my ivory beads but did not find my ivory earrings or your opera glasses; she thinks she is not a good burglar. Everett came Thursday morning - nearer noon.
Helen and Everett were Edie's parents. They lived in Falmouth. It sounds as though Alma and Eva left some things behind when they closed up Fernbank for the winter, and Helen did her best to find them. Everett would have delayed coming for Thanksgiving because he would have been taking care of their cats.
7.
The brothers Li and Lee, with wives and children were there for dinner
These were Chinese friends, who came to the US in or around 1949. They came through different immigration entryways, which is why one was Li and the other was Lee. They had Thanksgiving with us all through my childhood.
8.
we ate in the diningroom!!! It is not really finished but quite finished enough to be used pleasantly and conveniently.
My parents bought an 18th century farmhouse in 1948 and spent the next ten years making it livable. The dining room was the last room to be done. I was born in 1955, and one of my first memories is of standing in the dining room looking at the construction. It's a very dim memory - just a faded snapshot in my mind.
The writing on the back of the envelope looks like Eva's handwriting to me.
2.
Dec. 3rd
No year is given, but this must be 1958, because of the plans for the Hawaii trip.
3.
I was disappointed not to hear from you Saturday when Edie and Elizabeth brought me back.
Alma spent Thanksgiving with Will's younger son Roger, and Roger's wife Edie and their four children Elizabeth/Betsy, Ming, Roger2, and Lucy.
4.
We stopped at the Spot for lunch and then came here, left my things and went to Fredda's to show her the candle chandelier which Edie had had made for the diningroom. Fredda is considering having one made for her diningtable - to hang above it.
Fredda has a Non-family page on this website. She did have a chandelier made like ours - wrought iron - but with a stem that was six inches longer because her ceiling was higher than our dining room ceiling.
When my parents built a summer house on the Cape in 1970, my mother had a hook in that dining room ceiling for our chandelier, and we would cart it back and forth. Then Fredda gave my mother her chandelier, because she couldn't use it because she was going blind. Later she had a cataract operation, but she didn't take her chandelier back.
One of the happy memories in my childhood - repeated many times but always magical to me - was when we ate in the dining room (usually we ate in the kitchen) and I was the one who got to extinguish the candles in the chandelier with a candle extinguisher.
5.
I have decided to go to New York to visit AG and Clara
Clara is, of course, Clara Jones, who has a Non-family page on this website.
AG was attending secretarial school in New York, and this visit of Alma's caused confusion (unresolved, so far) for me as to the correct date of a letter from AG:
6.
Helen had come up on Saturday so that Roger and Edie could go to the Harvard-Yale football game. She also got the two turkeys ready and made the pudding. She brought up my ivory beads but did not find my ivory earrings or your opera glasses; she thinks she is not a good burglar. Everett came Thursday morning - nearer noon.
Helen and Everett were Edie's parents. They lived in Falmouth. It sounds as though Alma and Eva left some things behind when they closed up Fernbank for the winter, and Helen did her best to find them. Everett would have delayed coming for Thanksgiving because he would have been taking care of their cats.
7.
The brothers Li and Lee, with wives and children were there for dinner
These were Chinese friends, who came to the US in or around 1949. They came through different immigration entryways, which is why one was Li and the other was Lee. They had Thanksgiving with us all through my childhood.
8.
we ate in the diningroom!!! It is not really finished but quite finished enough to be used pleasantly and conveniently.
My parents bought an 18th century farmhouse in 1948 and spent the next ten years making it livable. The dining room was the last room to be done. I was born in 1955, and one of my first memories is of standing in the dining room looking at the construction. It's a very dim memory - just a faded snapshot in my mind.
1958-12-03: tour stops---images---audio---transcript---notes---~LINKS~---site navigation
DOCUMENT LISTS FOR PEOPLE:
- ALMA: DOCUMENTS ----- Outgoing
- EVA: DOCUMENTS ----- Incoming
- THE NEXT GENERATION: DOCUMENTS ----- Roger, AG
- NON-FAMILY: CLARA JONES ----- Related
- NON-FAMILY: SOUTH HADLEY FOLKS ----- Geoffroy and Lenette Atkinson
- NON-FAMILY: FREDDA REED ----- Related
OTHER DOCUMENT LISTS:
- DOCUMENTS SORTED BY WHERE THEY WERE WRITTEN ----- Western Massachusetts
- DOCUMENTS SORTED BY SOURCE ----- Barbara
- AUDIO READINGS OF THE DOCUMENTS: 1950-1959
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