ALMA AND MAMA MARGARET GO TO CALIFORNIA IN 1915: THE TOUR: ~LUCY'S LECTURE~---the list of tour stops---other links---site navigation
I imagine Alma spending the cold dark winter nights in South Hadley looking at journals for botany and other sciences, and scoping out which scientific conference next summer would be in the perfect place for her to use it as an excuse to take a trip.  I don't think it's a true picture, but I like it anyway.

The 1910 trip to Europe left Alma wanting more, but in 1915, Europe was not a good tourist destination.  World War I was raging.  The United States was not involved (not yet, anyway), but that didn't make Europe any more attractive.

So Alma looked around North America, and found a meeting of The American Association For the Advancement of Science in California.  Perfect!

I wonder if the reason that the AAAS (I'm not typing out that whole name again) held their meeting in California in 1915 was because the Panama Pacific International Exposition was being held there.  The Exposition was a very big deal, celebrating the completion of the Panama Canal the previous year, although it was planned long before the Canal was completed.  The postmarks on letters that Will and Margaret sent east from California in 1911 and 1912 advertised the Exposition.  Of course, the other reason for the Exposition was so that California could say to the world, "That earthquake in 1906?  We're SO over it!"

The family back east would have known about the Exposition, and Mama Margaret wanted to go.  I do not know when the whole idea blossomed, but in April 1915 Mama Margaret was hoping that she would be able go with Alma to California that summer.  Besides wanting to see the Exposition, Mama Margaret wanted to revisit the state where she had taken care of Will's daughter Maggie two years before.  (Disclaimer: Will's daughter wasn't called Maggie at that point.  She was still called Margaret.  But I find it less confusing to call her Maggie.)  Also there were lots of relatives for her to visit.

One problem was that Mama Margaret was housekeeping for Will in Savannah, and taking care of his daughter, Maggie, now age two and a half.  It was decided that Eva would come take Mama Margaret's place for the summer.  This is an interesting plan, because Eva was not a lover of children, and she was not a lover of housekeeping.  But, for Will, Eva would apparently do anything.

Alma came down to Savannah in June to link up with Mama Margaret.  I don't know if Eva came at the same time, but something in a letter of Alma's suggests that she came later.

At the moment I don't have any letters for June or July; the first letter we have from the trip is from Alma in August.

From that point I think I'll allow Alma to tell the story.  The letters that we have from Alma were written to Eva, and they are very entertaining.  Eva, I think, was a better audience for the sort of things I want to read about than Mama Margaret was.

I've included Mama Margaret's letter to Alma from after they got to their respective homes.  Mama Margaret tells of a visit on the way home to another relative  - her sister Sallie.  And there was a surprise awaiting her in Savannah:  Will had bought his first car!

The last stop in the Tour is an item Alma's local paper in Massachusetts, mentioning what how she had spent her summer - more or less.
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