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Page 23
Last Tuesday the lightning hit. The Thetas called the house . . .
and they asked her to come to the Theta House for supper. And
after supper, they asked her to join. And she did. And that night
came home with the colors on. She is a happy, happy girl. Things
have changed overnight. The leading college man, or at least one
of them, called the Thetas and openly congratulated them on
getting her. Hundreds have congratulated her, and all this makes
her very happy.
I have told you all this to sort of try to explain what she had
undergone. It makes me hot under the collar to write it, and to
even think about it. To think that a thing of that character
could so get hold of a college and of college students to make
them or break them at the whim of this or that fraternity or
sorority is an outrage. But it is a fact nevertheless. And so I
am glad for her eventual triumph. But at the same time, I am
humiliated to think that such things exist in a free country. And
the more so because membership in any organization of that
character is not based on ability or scholarship but is based, on
a large measure, on the whim of the individuals who happen to
belong in the organization at the time the individual is
proposed.
I must stop, or you will not get this all read.
PLEASE DESTROY IT AT ONCE. . .
As Ever,
Andrew
DAUGHTERS ADORNED LIKE UNTO CLEOPATRA
Greencastle, Indiana
Nov. 17, 1930
Dear Sister Margaret:
Joan and Sarah Jane went to the Theta big party last Saturday
night, and I'll tell you they both looked mighty pretty, at least
they did to me. "Not because they are my daughters," as Charlie
McWethy says, and all that sort of thing. But I'll say this, they
looked mighty pretty to me. Sarah Jane had her hair waived and
screwed on some ear rings that hung on small chains about six
inches long, and I'll be dad burned if she didn't look like the
advertisements you see for perfumes and things of that sort in
the Ladies Home Journal. She was so highly colored by reason of
the excitement she didn't need any artificial color. Her necklace
I think was Joan's, maybe one that Grandma Sawyer gave Joan--
looks something like an old fashioned hammock in shape, made of
brilliants or imitation diamonds set in black, and she walked out
looking like Mrs. Stuyvesant Fish's favorite daughter. And Joan
looked just as well, all trigged up for the occasion. Her
greeting to the boys when they came was that of a young woman
perfectly confident in herself. No stammering or anything of that
sort. Sarah Jane was not so free in her conversation, but she'll
get over that. She is a great deal like Ma, only she has more
nerve in speaking out. . . Both of them had their hands and nails
smoothed up and shined up and tapered down like unto Cleopatra
herself.
That night they got home shortly after midnight. The boys just
brought them to the front door and about a minute after the door
closed I heard the shoes flying here and there. I heard both of
them say their feet and legs ached so bad they were numb. They
talked it all over and I went to sleep.
Andrew
CHRISTMAS CHAOS AND AMAZING FREIGHT
Greencastle, Indiana
Dec. 26, 1930
Dear Sister Margaret:
Yesterday was Christmas Day. Of course we had far too much of
everything: two big crocks of oysters, about 150 biscuits, a 24-
pound turkey, and so on--you know how Aura does thing--so we will
have a hard time getting things eaten before they get too old and
dry.
We spent the day mostly at home. The children all got a good many
presents. Grandma Sawyer has been sending things for the past
month or two. She has the world beat. She actually sent about a
peck of apples all rolled up in a mattress, or feather tick.
First we get a head and foot board of a bed; then she finds out
she forgot the rails, and they come separately; then in a few
days the slats come on independent; then we find they are the
wrong slats, and also that one of the rails sent belongs to
another bed back there. . . She sent a sort of tea wagon--that is
she first sent the frame part with the glass imbedded in it--it
was one she had in one of the houses and one fine morning decided
that Aura should have a tea wagon. That came through in enough
crating to make kindling for two or three months. In about two
weeks, here came another crate with the greater part of the
balance of said tea wagon. But on careful investigation and
splicing, we found one wheel gone and also one handle. She had
retained the one wheel to get it fixed, so in due time, it came.
Later the missing handle was located and sent. And all the time,
these various parts and pieces come by parcel post, freight and
express, as the spirit moves her. By some strange coincidence the
freight invariably comes over different railroads. We will get
the main parts, say via Big 4, the slats via Monon and the rails
by way of the Pennsylvania; then a "cunning" little dinky that
Grandma saw in a shop in Middletown and figured would match the
wheels of the tea wagon so nicely, will come by parcel post, and
so it goes. The freight men at the various depots have come to
look on me and my consignments of freight in amazement. . .
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