Recently, I was reorganizing some of the work that I have saved from my past students over the years and came across a crumpled envelope. Inside was a letter from Dad written to me on July 5, 1984. It was one of the moments when you discover something that you really never expected to see. This genealogy blog entry is going to be a sidebar away from a more linear look at the Northen family history to a look at what is occurring in my immediate family at one particular point in time. While it seems to be a relatively simple letter, it opens a window into a horizontal view of the family on one particular occasions.
Here is the letter. Other than transcribing it from a handwritten document to a keyed in computer file, I have not changed anything so any spelling, punctuation, etc. follows the original.
July 5, 1984
Dear Mike and Family
Received your letter on the 2nd. Guess your’s and Mom’s passed in the mail.
In regards the age of my parents when the photo was taken, it is only a guess. I think it was their wedding picture and they were about 19 and 20 years old. My Dad was 42 and my Mother was 41, when they died, they both died the same year. I was about 9 years old when they died. Sorry I can’t give you more information.
Glad to hear that all is going well with you. It is nice that you may be able to get your house in September. I know you will all be glad, especially the children.
Glad to hear that Lora is doing so well in her Profession. I am sure she is very intelligent. I would like very much to meet and I am sure that someday I shall.
I hope you will be able to make it to Buffalo. The vacation will be good for you all and I am sure the other children are looking forward to your visit.
We are all doing pretty good here. Mom has gotten over her boils but still has some with the leg it is getting better however. Grandma is doing great except this hot weather gets to her. She can’t stand the fan going, so we have a little controversy but we work it out.
I am feeling great. Getting stronger all the time since I have quit drinking. Mom is trying to get me to stop smoking but she is fighting a losing battle.
We had a nice get together on the 4th. Mary and Chauncey, Pat and Janine, Dave (Dorothy and the girls went back to South Dakota for 2 weeks) and Sister Karen. We roasted a turkey for dinner and shot off some fire works in the evening far with Chauncie. He had a fall.
Our garden is going real well. We have had a lot of nice fresh vegetables.
We are just ready to go to Long Beach for Aunt Odelia’s 89th birthday. She is Grandpa Wilkin’s sister.
Well take care and write when you can.
Love to all
Mom, Dad & Grandma
There are a number of things going on in this letter that illuminate what was going on in the life of the family on the particular day that her wrote this, but there is also an interesting situation in which the kind of first hand narrative that one receives and the objective recording of facts conflict. Dad mentions that his mother (Mattie Lewis) and father (Marcellus Crocker Northen) were 42 and 41 years old respectively when they died. According to newspaper reports and death certificates his father died in February of 1931 and his mother in September of the same year. Since all records indicate that his father was born in 1889 and his mother in 1885, his mother could not have been 42 when she died, nor could there only have been a difference of year in their ages when they were married. Moreover, Dad was born in March of 1920, so he would have been 10 when his father died and 11 when his mother died. For all other events, however, there is no reason to not take everything else that Dad had to say in the letter at face value.
One of the things that the letter sets up clearly for me is what was going on in my life at that point. He mentions that Lora and I were hoping to be into our house in September, so it is the time that was just ending our one year residence in Camden prior to moving into the house where we have lived for the past 37 years. At the same time, my grandmother had moved in with my parents. Mary, Pat and Dave were still coming over for holidays – in this case, the Fourth of July. I remember the times when I was younger and the Fourth of July was celebrated as a real holiday, capped off with setting off fireworks. Sr. Karen, the perennial guest was coming there then and, particularly with my grandmother there probably came often. One thing that I did not know for sure was that Lindsey and Sydney (Dave’s daughters) had ever actually been to South Dakota where their mother was born, but this letter confirms it. I was also not aware that my grandfather’s sister Odelia was still alive at that point and did not know she had lived in Long Beach. If this was her 89th birthday, then she would have been born in 1895.
In addition to these specific events, two ongoing themes are mentioned in the letter as well: Dad’s drinking and Mom’s health. Dad declares that he has stopped drinking and, from what I know, this time it was for good. (Though if others in the family know differently, I am open to the information.) The second is that Mom has had boils again – something that growing up we all experienced at different points in time – and that she is still having problems with her leg. Again, anyone who grew up in our family can picture the huge, pus-filled ulcer on her ankle that was continually weeping. In 1984, it was apparently still with her.
Because he is writing a letter, much of the writing is a generalized stylization of the kinds of things people say to each other when writing. For example. he opens with the words “Received your letter…” and at another point says, “Glad to hear that all is well with you.” These kinds of formalizations do not give a great deal of feeling for Dad as a person, but there are a couple of places in the letter that do. The first is when he was talking about Grandma’s being hot but not liking the fan on. Dad says, “We have a little controversy but we work it out.” This to me is the kind of classic understatement that was characteristic of Dad. He did not like to make a big deal out of anything and tried to minimize conflict. He hated gossip and talking negatively about people. The second instance was his statement, “Mom is trying to get me to stop smoking but she is fighting a losing battle.” To me, again, that is classic Dad. He did not take a strong stand on very many things, but this was one thing he was not going to give in on. I can almost hear Mom telling him over and over that he should give up smoking and Dad is basically not even going to get involved in that conversation.
I think what I’ve said gives a good idea of why I found this letter so valuable, in addition to the fact that I treasure it simply because it is something that Dad wrote to me with his own hands. No doubt, other family members, will have different insights into the things that he mentions and be able to add to the story in ways that I can’t. I hope you do.
Northen History 