Letter: Josie Bumpus

My dear Friend,
First I must beg your pardon for not replying sooner to your good letters. I have thought of you so many times & have heard from you often through Maybelle.

These are such beautiful days. I am out a good deal looking over God's wonderful landscape. I do not like to stay indoors more than I can help. Our son has been down for a little visit. He left last night for Detroit. My heart ? home ? very very often. It is Natural of course. Mr. Bumpus is my comfort sake and I expect to make a trip to Ruttenville very soon. Have been here three months to day. You will not know the sanitarium when you come again. Dr. Strand and Maybelle have transformed it into a very different place with all new decorations & paint, varnish & c&c oil - looks fine and Maybelle graces the place as Matron beautifully. She lacks a good deal of being well but she is better. How thankful all her friends must be to have her in Dr. Strand's care as he possibly loved her as a daughter and she is a great help to him. She is real happy - she probably writes you of all her doings. Mr. Bumpus enjoys seeing the improvements going on - I think they expect some new patients soon - Mrs. Strand retired from Utica last January - been up ? you know. Faith cures I believe. Draw your own conclusions of the ? This is such a lovely morning wish you were here and we would walk the town over. I got a great deal of pleasure walking around this old town. Was down to Cooperstown a few days ago. I think it one of the most beautiful spots I have ever seen. The lakes. The hills & the old pine trees have a great charm for me. I suppose these are all busy days with you - teaching the young ? how to shoot. I went to teacher school once upon a time, years ago - I did not like it a little bit.

Maybelle's husband has been here quite a little of late, his work is somewhere in this locality. She hears good news from her kiddies. Do you I think Maybelle a fine character. She is always full of sunshine and never burdens anyone with all her suffering. I am so glad she has found such a friend in Dr. Strand and if anyone in all the world can cure her he certainly will.

Mr. Bumpus & ? Grille play dominoes as normal & must take a lot of comfort for they keep at the game at the old pace.

They will soon let up then laffe and walk out & sit in the shade of the old apple tree I suppose.

I hope your father & mother are all over neuritis. The name warm weather will do much for them I am sure.

When are you coming up again. I look forward to seeing you again &having a longer visit. "Daddy" often speaks of you - surely you have a warm place in all our hearts.

Do write me soon again and I won't wait so long again before replying. Shall report to Maybelle that I have written.

Hoping you are real well. ? these May days.

With love, I am sincerely yours,
Josie P Bumpus

Richfield Springs N.J.
May 17th, 1918

Notes: Sorry I am not able to completely transcribe this one. This woman had some... interesting... handwriting. If anyone can make out something I missed please let me know. (Or if you disagree with any of my transcriptions.)

Letter: Charlotte King

Dear Calla
How glad our letters have finished crossing, perhaps we can start on an equal footing again.

Well, I suppose you are wondering what excuse I have for not paying that promised visit, here it is—Natalie has the measles and another cough, so that,I will be obliged to postpone my trip.

If you knew how homesick for the country your last letter made me feel! I can shut my eyes and almost see the valley from your front porch. Never mind, when I do come I can assure you my visit will be well earned.

To be honest, I hate to lay off now when the fight is fiercer than ever and the little I do seems so small & insignificant & I only feel comforted when I am so tired that I am ready to drop.

Every day I wish I were a man, there is so much great work to be done which only men can do.

We have had the Blue Devils” of France visiting New York. They are fine specimens of manhood and have a look in their eyes which speaks of glimpses into another world. Some of them have been wounded 6 times & most of them twice.

Wasn’t it very sad about Horace Beale. I am so sorry for his father. His life has never been strewn with roses and this last blow seems rather too much.

Natalie was so excited over the Nanny goat. I hope Grandpa has not traded it.

Maybe this hot spell will wend the neuritis into Kingdom Come. Let’s hope so.

I have rheumatism so badly but have tried not to think about it only when it wouldn’t let me sleep, as one’s physical comfort is a matter of little importance & should not be given much thought.

Dear Calla, I hope I can come soon but will not make any promises.

Give my love to grandma & grandpa & I would hope they will soon feel well again.

Lovingly,
Lottie

Notes: Charlotte King is Calla's sister in law.

Letter: Kate Voeglin

Dear Sister & all at home,

I have been thinking of you all today and do hope that you all are feeling good if Father & Mother are not on the pick up. The nurse here tells me that Dr. Greys glycerin compound is a very good tonic & body builder. I am staying here until the woman gets well, to take her place. The work is very easy & the hours are dandy. Half past nine until five and half the day Saturday. I am getting a rest & quite a bit of sewing & mending done.

Clayton has not been feeling very good. Raymond & Grace were up Sunday it was his birthday. I wish you was here this afternoon for this is baby clinic afternoon & I do enjoy it all.

I guess Mrs. Cunningham is going to look on, she is a nurse now and interested in babies. Does father have strength to plant much. The garden was so hard for Will & it would kill me I rather work for the vegetables I eat, how does the pain in Father & Mother’s shoulder get along I do hope it is all gone. Let me hear from you if can find time for it is willing but hustle all the time.

Well I must stop and write to Joe. It will be three o’clock and the clinic is from three to five o’clock.

Love to for all.

Your off sister
Kate V.

Notes: Kate Voeglin is Calla's sister.

Letter: Fayette King

Dear Baby,

Your Pa rec'd your letter and postcard and was tickled 2 death. I asked the Dr. what I should tell you for him and he said to tell you he sent his sweetest smiles boxed up. Daddy says you can head the procession when you come again. Stuart Holdredge wrote like this to the Dr. It beats all how you get all the nice girls up with you. Let me know when she comes again and I will come up. This may not be the exact wording but it has the meaning. Ha Ha. Say what a good time you had with your Pa. Try it again soon. My what a lot of germs is marching around here. I have to let my feet hang out the window to make room. Our new paper is nearly all on. Your Pa has been sick in bed since you left. Had awful pains in my head but are better now.

Now Baby be good and write Pa soon.

Lovingly,
Your Dear Pa

900000000 kisses with love

Letter: Louisa

51 Broad St.
Endicott N.Y.
Apr 18 1918

Dear Calla,

Fully expected to write you before our vacation telling you how pleased I am that you are to be in Endicott next year. I am sure you will like it after becoming acclimated.

I am wondering where you will be located. I hope where I may see you real often.

Several of mine have left so I have only 32 on my register, at present. Several are absent these days and I am wondering when they will ever make up lost work.

This evening Helen and I have been to Prayer Meeting which we do not attend every Wed. Eve, our pastor is attending Conference but expect that he will be returned for another year.

Spent pleasant ten days vacation at home. Olive and Laverne were with us part of the time.

At present, Miss Sprague and I are getting our own breakfasts and taking our other meals at the restaurant. It seems about the only way.

Are you going to visit the schools here this spring? Think it would be a pleasant experience.

Kind Regards to your people,

Sincerely,
Louisa

Notes: I am still not sure of Louisa's last name, but you may remember that Calla remarked on her leaving Sidney to go teach in Endicott in the April 13, 1917 entry of the diary. She also mentions a Miss Sprague in that entry, possibly the same lady mentioned here.

Letter: Mae Sackett

Dear Calla,

Your breezy before breakfast letter was very much enjoyed. I would never be up in time to do anything of that sort. Am quite thankful if I don't over sleep since the clock's now set ahead.

This is a lazy household today. Not one of us has been outside thus far. Seems the April showers continued all day & a substitute preacher in our church gave me the desired excuse to at house & be as lazy as I felt inclined.

We live in a great bustle these days because of so many "Drives" beside our own regular affairs to look after. Just now it's Liberty Loan & immediately following comes the big Red Cross Drive.

Last week our oldest sister was here to say goodbye to Clair that we suppose sailed for France April 13th but of course nothing has been heard from him yet.

We haven't taken our little "Ford" out of winter quarters yet largely because of so many different kinds of "busy ness" but plan that we will the last of this week. Haven't made any plans yet for our Summer vacation but suppose it will be spent somewhere in the Ford with Sidney certain to be included in the trip.

Sidney papers don't afford us the kind of news we like best to read of late. So many sudden deaths of people we knew so well makes us sober & wonder who of our friends will be left there in a few more years.

Seems to bad for all the teachers to be compelled to leave but I don't blame them when they can get better pay elsewhere. I am wondering what the new "prof" will be like. I read that he would become a resident of riverside. That surely shows good taste on his part.

Tell your good mother that I say its a shame for her to be troubled with neuritis & I sincerely hope she is feeling much better by this time.

We both keep very well but do not get fat, if you discover how we could, let us know.

Shall love to hear from you anytime & certainly hope that you will be home this summer while we are in Sidney.

Much love to your father & mother & yourself.

Sincerely yours,
Mae Sackett

Sunday P.M.

UPDATE: The Historian for the Sackett Family Association confirms that this is Mae Sackett, twin sister of Adda Pearl Sackett. Both girls lived in Sidney in the 1900's with their widowed mother Mary J Sackett. Just after this letter Pearl's address is known to be Brooklyn, but he did not relay where Mae would have been living at the tiem of this letter.

Letter: Charlotte King

4/21/18

Dear Calla,
I was very glad to hear about your contract for next year. Perhaps, if you are so near Binghamton you can get a chance to take a business course.

We have moved into beautiful new quarters and I have a private office handsomely furnished in comparison to my previous offices.

I hope to get a few days off in a few weeks and will make a flying trip to Sidney. However will let you know positively when I am coming. I am so anxious to get a glimpse of the country and most of all a look at you up there.

Natalie is growing so big - she will be a surprise.

Dear Calla, I thank you very much for getting the wreath for Ivan's grave. It must have been beautiful from the description.

The city wears a very festive look these days. Heaps of men in uniforms, Liberty Crow posters everywhere & parades daily. Our Headquarters is at 16 East 39th Street right in the heart of things, so that we keep in touch with all the doings.

Altman's have decorated their building with that wonderful flag, I pass it every day & always stop to look at it.

Hoping to find you all well when I came with lots of love,

Lottie

XXXXXXXXX
Natalie


Notes: Charlotte L. King (Lottie) was Calla's sister in law, married to her brother Ivan. She lived in Weehawken, NJ and worked in New York City at the American Committee for devastated France. According to her passport application she was a stenographer, but a letter from the Committee attached to her application mentions that she is being sent to France for "overseas service." This photo was taken from that application, (found online).

I find several examples in folk art sites of "Liberty Crows" but I am not sure exactly what they are or why there would be posters of them all over midtown Manhattan.

About Altman's: "Altman & Co. opened their new store in 1906. It was the first large-scale department store on Fifth Avenue and occupied a whole city block. The building was designed to blend into the grand residential structures that dominated the area at that time.

The building went without outside signs for 25 years, perhaps out of deference to high-class residential neighbors. It was built catty-corner to the original Waldorf-Astoria Hotel.

It now stands catty-corner to the Empire State Building. During World War I the company began displaying what may have been the largest American flag ever hung. It measured 100 by 65 feet and covered much of the building's Fifth Avenue front."

Letter: Gladys

Middleville, NY
March 21, 1918

My dear Calla,
I have been going to write you all winter but here it is the first day of spring and no letter written yet. It is not because I have not thought of you, tho, that I have done, as I have, because I do often wonder how things are going with you.

In the Record we read of your brother-in-laws death. How sad it was and to leave such a nice family too. It seems that you people do have your share of grief. Please accept our sincerest sympathy.

I have thought all winter that I would write you and Adelia to spend your Easter vacation in M'ville, but as conditions are now I believe I could give you a more enjoyable time during the summer vacation.

Five weeks ago our Grammar Dep't teacher resigned for a better position in Cape May, so of course they came for me to teach for I have been substitute ever since I gave up my school. They asked me to take the work for the remainder of the year but I refused to do that tho promising to teach until they found a regular teacher. Tomorrow night I shall have completed my fifth week and no teacher is in sight yet. I didn't expect to teach more than a week or two. Teachers are very scarce they say, tho I don't believe they are looking "very hard." But I wouldn't mind teaching until the warm weather commences and that is when they are to have spring vacation. You probably will have yours about Easter time. So you see how it is about my entertaining you then, but I do want you to be sure to come this summer.



We are all quite well, tho we have all had attacks of an epidemic that has been going the rounds this Spring. They call it intestinal grippe. Through out the winter though we were all real well, not even having severe colds.

This has been a very hard winter for many people though we have not suffered at all, having had plenty of fuel, food and good health.

Did you know that Elizabeth has a daughter, born two weeks ago today? I have not seen her yet or know what name they have given the babe.

I have not seen Nell since before Christmas though I have been in the store and talked with Alf occasionally. We take a bundle of Sidney Records down to him when we go.

Our train service has been extremely poor this winter the evening train up being very late almost every night. So when we have had errands in Herkimer we have usually gone down in the morning and back at noon. Consequently have not had time to make calls while down there. Fred and I have been to Utica twice so this has been the extent of our travels this winter.

We may go to Utica Saturday if the weather is still pleasant. Our neighbor next door, a widow, has a new Studebacher which none of the family can drive yet. She wants Fred to drive it to the city for her, so of course I am invited to go as a passenger. She has a son sixteen years old who will soon drive for her and she expects to learn to manage it herself. Last year they had a Ford. She has five children the oldest seventeen years old, but she has plenty of money, so they have everything going. The widow is only about thirty six or seven herself.

Have you been doing Red Cross work? Probably not much, for now that I am back in the school room I see how little time teachers have for anything else. Of course of have quite a bit of house work to do for mamma is not strong enough to do much more than get dinner and wash the dishes. We wash with the motor Monday evenings which is very easy, Fred doing the main part, then we hire the ironing done so we get along very nicely with the rest. But it is too hard on me when the weather becomes warm to try to do both, so that is one reason why I don't care to stay in school then.

Do you remember my cousin Sara Davis, who used to visit us in Sidney? She teaches in Pennsylvania in a small village and her school is out in April. I have written asking her to finish for me in case they do not have someone by that time.

We expect her to visit us any way so thought it would be a good chance for her to visit and earn a little besides for girls never have enough money. They are paying $60 now but I'm afraid they will have to pay more another year. I only have twenty in my room so the work is very easy.

Ethel Whiting has a splendid position in Mt. Vernon. This is her second year there. Her brother Wilbur is at Camp Devens and is already a commissioned officer.

How is crocheting coming these days? I learned to knit in the Fall and have not crocheted since. I knitted seven sweaters and two helmets and am making myself a sleeveless sweater now.

Fred attended the auto show in Utica when we were over two weeks ago.

He had quite a talk with Mr. Griffin who represented the Hatfield Car and they are trying to get him to take the agency for the car in this territory. He had a letter from Mr. Hatfield last week requesting me to come to Sidney to go thru the factory. So you may see us down there before summer tho I hardly believe he will take the agency. He doesn't have time to devote to much extra work but he thinks he would like one of the cars himself.

It is now time I get ready for school so will have to close hoping to hear from you soon. Remember us all to your father and mother.

With love,
Gladys

P.S. Tell us all the Sidney "gossip" when you write. Ha! Ha!

Notes: I am not sure if Gladys is a friend or relative, there is no last name on the letter and the envelope was not inside the diary. She sounds like a former Sidney teacher. I do not see a Gladys with a brother or husband named Fred in Middleville in the census. If she was teaching however she was most likely still single, as I've been told that married women were not allowed to reach in this era. So Fred is most likely her brother.

Intestinal grippe: A possibly viral epidemic disease which is occurs during winter and involves a range of gastrointestinal symptoms

Letters: American Funds for French Wounded

Note: I am not going to transcribe these as they don't contain any personal information, but they may still be of interest to historians from the area.

About The American Fund for French Wounded: One of the most important of the organizations in America which is devoted to French relief is the American Fund for French Wounded, which was established in November, 1914, in London, under the name of the French Wounded Emergency Fund. The present organization was formed in December, 1915, and the first work of relief was in Normandy and Brittany. There are more than 500 branch committees, and up to the fall of 1917 more than 15,000,000 separate articles had been shipped abroad, and a sum approximating $1,000,000 had been expended. The organization exists in practically every state in the Union, the principal branches being the New England branch in Boston, and those in New York, Chicago, San Francisco and Baltimore.

Letter: Fayette King

July 18, 1917

Dear Calla Baby,
Your pa now takes his pen in his hand to inform you that he loves you still? and that Stuart Holdridge was here the other day and said that when you come to visit me this summer he would come down to your pa's house two see yew. Now baby you owe your poor old dad a letter so answer me soon. This letter is crazy, so is your Pa. I am in such a hurry 900000000000000 of love,
kisses
Ditto
Pa

Written on stationary from Shaul's Skin and Cancer Hospital, Richfield Spring, NY

Notes: In 1920 there was a Stuart Holdridge living in New Lisbon, Otsego, New York.