William Horberg

Cousin Marion, 1878

Today's letter from a Cousin Marion writing from Washington, D.C. in 1878 almost reads like an American version of a Jane Austen novel, or perhaps something from Booth Tarkington, as Marion relates her concerns about a budding romance between a "Burt" and her house guest "Mary".

Washington, D.C.

August 5^th, 1878

My Dear Cousin:

                        I will begin a letter to you, writing between remarks for I am in midst of a social group and can not resist an occasional word. Papa is perched on piano stool, “glancing over” one of Chas. Reids novels ^ (Love me little, etc) Burt brought this evening to a young lady who has been with me since Saturday and with whom he is in “converse sweet” over the card table. Lil is bent double girl-like over her book and your humble servant is ditto over this sheet of paper which is held in the lap, laziness of same precluding use of desk which is upstairs.

                        Thanks, many and more for that vivid description & that charming pen portrait of that most charming individual – the grass widow! Her heroism (manifested in that stern resolve to resist the multifold attractions of “cow men”- of which I may believe you are not least? -) wins my admiration. Further description - though he left us and went outside, we quickly joined him and sisterly lecture has been delivered to deaf ears. Ears, I should say, for one on Mary’s side, was open to every sound – proceeding from her lips.

                         I can gratefully say that mosquitos are few and far between down here. You poor boy! Why don’t you leave that wretched camp for at least the warm season. Don’t examine your food then. “Where ignorance is bliss”, etc. I like very well to read letters from you so write often even if pencil must be used. I like pen writing best, however, because it keeps longer.

                         We have had two grand storms recently, the last was today. The water fell in torrents – in sheets, so thick we could not clearly distinguish objects across our narrow street – and then hail came – seems as if every window pane must be shattered, meanwhile peal after peal of thunder, and lightening flashes. I enjoyed it! We were just about baked, and the earth needed water. Don’t you admire this penmanship? What is that pretty little rhyme? “My pen is poor my ink’s not pale – this string of words will never fail”? if I don not break it soon. I will only mention in brief a delightful trip to Great Falls by canal.  Climbed highest peaks, tumbled around involuntarily, wrote on sand at water’s edge and had gay times generally. Have been to two picnics and on one other excursion since writing. Expect to go to Arsenal Friday. Will notice things and tell you about every thing I see, in next. This is more a talk than a letter.

                        Burt and Mary on front porch. I must join them. I read your letter to papa. He was pleased to hear from you. Hopes, as we all do, that you will succeed in life. Burt and all send love. My love to all your home folks.

                        Good night. God guard and bless you. Be a good boy.

                                                                         Cousin Marion

I could not find any information on a 19th century novelist named Chas. or Charles Reid. But I did locate a Charles Reade, who seems to be the author that Marion is referring to:

This Reade is the English author of Love Me Little, Love Me Long (1859) and is described as - "a man of what one might call penny-encyclopaedic learning. He possessed vast stocks of disconnected information which a lively narrative gift allowed him to cram into books which would at any rate pass as novels. If you have the sort of mind that takes a pleasure in dates, lists, catalogues, concrete details, descriptions of processes, junk-shop windows and back numbers of the Exchange and Mart, the sort of mind that likes knowing exactly how a medieval catapult worked or just what objects a prison cell of the eighteen-forties contained, then you can hardly help enjoying Reade."

I just love Marion saying: "this is more a talk than a letter".

What a way with words this writer had, you can feel her personality in every cursive stroke of her sweeping pen!

Enjoy!

william

Henry and Millie

Back to The Box.

Two new documents today yielded two more additions to the growing family tree.

HENRY as lovingly and humorously described in a poem by Aunt JULIA.

Stock in his pastures and money and mules galore! Wish I could say the same! :)

And this almost perfect learning-to-write-block-letters note from young MILLIE to her grandmother, on letterhead from the 1890's but with the exact year left blank.

 

I hope I find some other correspondence from "Millie" all grown up, and we can see the path that this sweet young girl took in her 20th century life! 

Enjoy!

william

 

The Parisian Nephew

The Box revealed a new set of letters and a new branch of this far flung family today with the unearthing of this correspondence from Herman, an artist and illustrator who seems to have come to Europe to fight (for the French army?) in World War I and to have stayed behind and made a life for himself in Paris.

Out of touch with at least this Uncle for some twenty years, he has managed to track him down and writes to him in hopes of rekindling a connection. It was a bit of a challenge to decipher his cursive handwriting so apologies for any inaccuracies. Perhaps future letters will yield the correct name of his Uncle and friends.

Paris  3q Rue d’Artois

18 Nov. 1937

 Dear Uncle (Dong?)

             From time to time during the last eight or ten years I have wanted to write to you and each time have hesitated – just too long – over an old address somewhere in Sioux City, for in the back of my mind there was a vague recollection that you had left there and gone to Minneapolis. Recently on the chance I wrote May (Staridge?) asking if she knew where you really were and I have just received this morning the address in Fremont Avenue.

             So after all these years I’ve got you back again and want to know all about you and what you are doing & how you are – and news of your daughters, Marjorie and Mrs. Brace whose welcome visit I have never forgotten eight or ten years ago when they came to Paris.

            Much water has run under the bridge since then & I have been very busy and done a lot of work and travelled in short jumps pretty much all over Europe, but I haven’t been in America – which even in these modern times is very far away – since 1917.  I went over then for a flying trip to Washington to change from the French into the American Army and came back to France after a short three weeks in a Khaki uniform instead of Blue. Since then fortune has varied, sometimes good, sometimes bad for an artists’ job is a thankless and unproductive one in these modern times of political and financial trouble.

            For many years I have been much interested in the beautiful old windmills which for centuries past have ground the wheat of France and Europe, (before the day of the modern roller mills) – and just recently published an article on them illustrated with drawings of my own – a sort of an appeal for the mills and the millers – both disappearing very rapidly now. I am sending you a copy of the magazine – you will probably have to brush up your school French to read it – or perhaps Marjorie can read it for you. At any rate the drawings will give you some idea of what I have been doing lately. 

            Do you hear from George? He has been living near Colorado Springs – (Motor Route No. 3 – Colo. Spgs is his address) since he sold his ranch in New Mexico. He was not well last year, but I believe is very much better now. 

            I shall look forward to haering from you! My love in the meantime to all the family.

                                                                        Affectionately,

                                                                        Herman

I wish I could track down that French magazine, or find any examples of his drawings of the old Windmills and millers of Europe. How cool would that be? Who knows, maybe one will spill out from the seemingly endless nooks and crannies of The Box!

It might even look like this:

From Minneapolis to Houston to Colorado Springs to Sioux City to Kansas and now Paris, what a wide web of places and people one family weaves as they shuffle through this mortal coil!

Enjoy!

william

The Happening

Today's letter is from Houston-based Rosena or "Ro" to Margie and Carl up in Minneapolis, from March of 1968.

Perhaps American Vendors is the successor name to the U-Select-It confectionary company which was also Houston-based and from the earlier letterhead apparently had a connection to this family?

"The Happening" here is not the kind of hippie happening that was breaking out around the country in that summer of '68, but a frightening incident when visiting Chloe's new house that "shattered" the "white glove" gentility of the family's social scene that Spring.

As this is typewritten I did not transcribe it for you, but please let me know if you have any trouble reading it and I will do so.

I love the image of Rosena casually killing the snake she found under "Baby's" water dish. I assume Baby was their dog, but it sounds soooo Texas!

Enjoy!

william

I'm Headed For The Last Roundup

Here's another poem from our 1930's rhyming civilian. Seems like a rough draft as he loses the plot a bit with the stanza about the little girl clutching her loaf of bread.

But I like his musical playlist!

I’m headed for the last roundup

Is a melody old but dear

And whose afraid of the Big Bad Wolf

Is another I love to hear

But best of all where ere I be

Give me Lazy Bones and Don’t Blame Me

 

I have a friend & love him well

And many a tale to me he’ll tell

And if you treat him fair (kind) & true

I’m sure he’ll tell his tale to you

 

The snow was flying thru the air

The wind blew loud and shrill

When a little girl was wandering

Upon a lonely hill

The tears were in her little eyes

& her little nose was red

& tight beneath her ragged shawl

She clutched a loaf of bread

 

Some like liver

Some like fish

Some like pork in a big white dish

But for me be the weather fair or murky

I’ll take a slice of a big fat turkey

 

Believe me of all those endearing young charms

Is a melody old but dear

& Silver threads among the gold

Is another I love to hear

But best of all where ere I roam

Give me Swaney River and Home Sweet Home

 

Enjoy!

william 

No Such Happiness

This yellowed paper from The Box contained a poem by an unknown member of the family. From the Greta Garbo and Joe E. Brown references it seems safe to guess it is from the 1930's. It has a wonderful bittersweet tone, a paean to lost youth.

I run all day

 & sleep all night

Upon my new soft bed

& believe it or not its very true

My mouth is larger than my head

 

In the Spring a young man’s fancy

Rightly turns to love and beer

& he takes his girl to the picture house

To see the show that’s here

They weep with G Garbo

& laugh at old Joe Brown

& then go home and save their dimes

Until another comes to town

 

I often long for those happy days

When I was a simple child

& all the men seemed brave and good

& the women fair and mild

But now with all the faults I see

There no such happiness for me

 

Was this the classroom assignment of a student or the earnest effort of a young man scribbling verses at his old oak desk by candlelight?

Either way, it delights, and reveals more of the qualities that make these vernacular letters so special.

Enjoy!

william

Learning To Drive

James Dean famously crashed his Porsche Spyder on 9.30.55 but this letter from The Box from 10.23.55 makes no mention of Dean or his tragic death, which had teenagers across America mourning the loss of their rebellious hero. Instead we find the teenage letter writer Susie getting her own driving permit and dreaming about taking a road trip up north some day to visit her relatives.

Sunday, October 23, 1955

Dear Nani and Dantie:

I know I haven't written in weeks and am really ashamed for it. I hope you all are having a grand time way up north but I think about you so often and I wished you lived a little closer to us.

Please excuse the notebook paper but I am over at Sandy's house, you know the girl that wrote to me this summer. I don't usually spend the night out on Sunday but we were together all day Saturday and she spent the night with me last night and all afternoon today so I got over here about 8 p.m., it's now about 9:30 and I have just finished my homework. We got our reportcards Thursday and I got the best grades I ever have, all "a''s except for a "d" in typing which I don't get along with very well. And another wonderful think that happened this week you know that I have been taking Driver's Ed. don't you, well anyway Wednesday I passed my test for my restricted license, which means I can drive as long as there is a licensed person sitting in the front seat. I've been driving around the house in the Oldsmobile and it works just beautifully and as soon as I learn to drive well enough I can have the restrictions removed so I may drive up to see you some day.

Last night mother, daddy, the Bar------'s, the Cowans, and the Boudrett's all went to a masquerade together. You should have seen them, it was just a scream, they all wore long night shirts, the men in matching caps and the women with bows in their hair. The men had long sideburns and black mustaches, daddy even had black hair painted on his forehead which looked hilarious.

Mother may have already told you this, but she got the most beautiful present in the whole wide world for her 20th anniversary, her engagement ring was reset and it looks just beautiful, daddy got a pair of diamond cufflinks that are just gorgeous. It was a very happy occasion and daddy took mother out to dinner that night.

The whole family is well and happy and everything is going along just fine. I hope you all are getting along fine, too and I hope to hear from you soon.

                                                                Love,

                                                                Susie

Once again I'm struck by a family whose letter-writing was so frequent and heartfelt that a break of just a few weeks in correspondence would be a source of shame and necessitate a sincere apology. 

I remember my own mother drove a great big Oldsmobile back in the mid-'60's; a gleaming blue boat that seemed to glide along on summer days as we cruised over to the Waveland tennis courts. If I remember, seat belts were still optional back then, but we felt safe inside that car which seemed as big as a house on wheels.

What do you remember of your own family history on those days, however rare they might have been, when everyone was "well and happy and everything is going along just fine"?

william

 

Groundhog's Day

Today's vernacular letter from The Box takes us back to Chloe, the author of the first letter I posted and collector of horse statues as a young girl. 

I was oddly touched to find her all grown up here and married to "Jim" and buying her first house in this letter from Groundhog's Day in 1968.

Dearest Dantie and Uncle Carl:

I decided to start February off right by writing you a letter. I have written a million letters in my mind to you, but never seem to have a minute to put it all on paper.

Jim and I have bought a house, the most beautiful house in the world. It is out in Memorial Bend, further out Memorial than Mommy and Daddy. After looking for two whole years, we finally found just the right house. It has 3 bedrooms, 2 full baths, a den, a newly carpeted living room and dining room and a beautiful fireplace. The ceilings are beamed, it has a great big kitchen, lots of tall trees, fenced in back yard, a very pretty wood fence and a 2 car detached garage. We are so excited about it. The children are just going to love every minute of it. We have the closing on Monday and move in the end of February. It is centrally air conditioned and heated and just has everything we've been looking for. I am going to have such fun decorating the children's rooms and doing things like that. The addition has a community swimming pool and club we can join this summer, and both Kent and Tammy love the water.

I think of you both every day. Sure hope Uncle Carl is doing better. I just love to get your letters Dantie, and want you to write whenever you can. All our love to you both and give Uncle Carl a kiss for me.

Our new address as of Feb. 29 will be                                    , Houston, Texas 77024.

                                                                Love,

                                                                Chloe

If the Vietnam War or the draft were any part of "Jim's" concerns back there in 1968 they are certainly completely off-screen here in his wife's sunny letter. Only two months later Martin Luther King was assassinated and the cities were in flames.

There is something so optimistic and full of hope and promise about this middle class family buying a house and planning their version of the American Dream.

I wonder how they would fare setting out with the same aspirations today? As the movie "Groundhog's Day" so brilliantly and comically illustrated, those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it.

The Box is a kind of time capsule, and by looking back we can also reflect on where we are today, and how we got here. 

william

 

Death On The Rio Grande

Today's vernacular letter is from 6.6.48 and is on the letterhead of the sender's business, The U-Select-It Houston Co, Specialized Service of Nationally Advertised Confections.

It appears from the letters so far that a few generations after the patriarch left the employ of Carlos Cobb in New York and settled in Kansas, sometime after the depression, or perhaps after the War years, the family split in two and these folks moved down to Houston while Marjorie and other members of the clan stayed up in Minneapolis. Giving us a fascinating look at the frozen Midwest and the deep South through their correspondence.

Before Salk's famous vaccine, the outbreak of polio must have played like a terrifying science-fiction movie - a real life Andromeda Strain spreading through the Rio Grande Valley!

Dear Marjorie:

   When we talked with him briefly yesterday, our local sawbones, who is a queer duck and who does not inspire much confidence, had nothing much to offer regarding polio here. He did not think it was in epidemic stage, nor did he think it threatened to be so. . . The enclosed editorial appeared locally one week ago today. Since then there have been additional cases, some days six, etc. There are said to be today almost 100 cases here, almost half from Houston proper, the remainder from adjoining areas. It is reported that certain areas in the Rio Grande Valley are worse hit than this area.

   Unless the polio situation worsens here there would seem to be no urgency for Rosena to take the children away. However, we deeply appreciate your wanting them, and if it appeared desirable to do so, I would send them to Minneapolis promptly.

   We are now in the summer doledrums. For the next three months living is unpleasant and business terrible - the candy business that is.

   Your letters are eagerly looked for. We miss you-all, and Minneapolis, friends and familiar places, a great deal. Most of the time however we are taken up with work and detail, seven days a week, and this will have to continue the balance of this year, unless something intervenes to change our routine, such as spreading polio.

   We look forward to getting a shipment of Marjorie W----- products. When will you have the varieties in stock to make the shipment? I have to have strawberry, for instance, and we should have a sampling of most of the others, too.

                                                                    Best regards,

I really can't make out the signature on this one. Perhaps future letters will hold a clue to decipher it. Rosena must be "Ro" and this seems to have been written by her husband. Like a found novel in small chapters, the letters in the Box continue to gradually reveal their hidden narrative.

How many of us are "taken up by work and detail, seven days a week, unless something intervenes to change our routine"?

Enjoy!

william

Carlos Cobb & Co.

I don't know what might be the oldest item The Box contains, but I found this letter from August 19, 1876!

It is a letter of recommendation from one Carlos Cobb, "commission merchant" given presumably to the original patriarch of this clan as he made his way from New York City out west.

Go West, young man! A real piece of American history.

To Whom This May Concern:

The bearer, Mister Douglas ------ has been in our employ as clerk for two years past and now leaves at his own request to take a position out of New York City.

We have found him truthful, industrious, reliable under all circumstances, and of good ability.

We take great pleasure in giving this expression of the result of our intercourse with him.

                                                Very Respectful,

                                                Carlos Cobb

I found an obituary in the New York Times archives for "old Carlos Cobb" a prominent grain merchant on the board of the old Produce Exchange, who seemed to have passed away in 1877, only a year after our Daniel departed his employment there.

Cobb was known as a man of "commanding presence", with "flowing white beard and hair."

"His partner, Mr. Kneeland, says he was a man of great integrity and singular ability and courage to meet and dispose of exigencies. He was also a man of great simplicity. He was ill only six weeks. He first had an attack of pneumonia from which he seemed to be recovering when a malarial fever set in, followed by inflammation of the bowels and these carried him off."

I have found no such description yet of Douglas in the Box of letters, or news of the circumstances of his own demise, but it sounds like he had an apprenticeship with a major figure in New York City Commerce before he set off West to give birth to the progeny whose correspondence is being unearthed here on the blog.

I did however find this levy or tax bill from 1880 which indicates that Douglas made it out to Kansas, purchased 23,000 acres of land, and paid the princely sum of $9.49 in real estate taxes on his homestead!

Enjoy!

william