Treasure Chest Thursday: Another Letter Found in the Pape House

Abby, one of the current owners of the house my great-grandfather, John Pape (1851-1945), built and lived in from at least 1882 to at least 1925, at 1043 Sherman Avenue in Evanston, Illinois, contacted me a couple months ago, and she told me she'd found a few items related to our family in the house. 

This letter is missing the top part that might have provided a date and the name of the addressee.  Like the last letter, it's also missing a signature.  Based on the dates of three other items found in the attic, I'm guessing this was written sometime between 1904 and 1917.  Research on one of the names in the letter (more on that in a bit) makes me think it was written in 1906, probably by a woman and sent to a woman.

You can click on the images to enlarge them.  Abby was able to come up with a transcription, which I have edited a bit.  If you think you read something different or additional, PLEASE leave a comment!

{page 1, above:}
. . .little quick to answer so soon.  I thought perhaps you would answer in a week, but not in one day, oh! no!  But you can’t imagine my delight in hearing from you.
This week has been “spring vacation,” and such a vacation!  It has rained, hailed, snowed and done everything possible to keep one indoors.   I expect a flood from the amount of rain we are having and just tell you they are “jolly good
{page 2, below:}
…water…suppose you [have] floods ou[tside] Chicago.
I am getting skinnier every day I live and am ashamed to have my picture taken.  I simply must have it taken soon, though.  Last spring I had typhoid and a touch of diphtheria so I suppose that every spring about that time I’ll feel the effects of it.  Yesterday afternoon Rowena Drew gave a Kensington {a covered dish supper} for three of her college friends who came home with her for Spring vacation, and I went to that and am going to one Monday at Katherine Waite’s.
You asked me if I had a picture of M.Y.  I did have some small ones but they have “flew the coop.”  I’ll ask her if she has any more and if she has I’ll send one.  “Babes in. . .

{in left margin on page 2, above:} 
Didn’t get to go to Katherine Waite’s because I was…If you can rake up some sort of a picture of D. B. {probably Dick Blake} send it, I’d like to. . .
{page 3, below:}
. . .  would certainly like to see and meet Dick Blake for I certainly like handsome fellows.  I suppose if I saw his picture I’d say “He certainly looks good to mother.”
Anson Jones is nearly twenty although short.  He doesn’t go with our crowd, but is a very good friend of mine.  Nearly all the girls [love] him.  I am sure you will look stunning. . .

There are a number of names mentioned in this letter:  Dick Blake (aka "D. B."), Rowena Drew, Katherine Waite, Anson Jones, and "M. Y." (probably a girl, based on the context).  Dick Blake seems to be a friend of the letter's recipient and thus living in the Chicago area.  Unfortunately, that name is a little too common for such a large city for me to be able to pinpoint him.

However...I found a Rowena Drew, a Katherine Waite, AND a William Anson Jones, all born in 1887, living near each other in Portsmouth, Ohio, on the 1900 Census.  This was particularly interesting to me because when my great-grandmother Gertrude Kramer Pape (John's second wife) died in August 1919, her newspaper obituary had a note at the end for the "Sioux City, Ia. [Iowa] and Portsmouth, Oh. [Ohio] papers please copy."  Oldest daughter Clara was living in Sioux City at the time - but who was in Portsmouth?

Rowena Nye Drew's family lived at 191 Gallia Street in 1900.  Katherine Dillian Waite's family lived at 161 E. 4th Street in 1900.  William Anson Jones' family lived at 202 E. 4th in 1900.  In the July 1897 Sanborn map of Portsmouth below, Rowena would have been in the upper quarter of the pink-shaded section 13 (right at the corner of Gallia and Waller, in fact), Katherine at the bottom of the green-shaded section 15, and Anson at the top of the blue-shaded section 11.

A 1908 Portsmouth city directory shows Rowena and Katherine at the same addresses as in 1900, but Anson (age 21 in 1908) is at 146 E. 3rd.  That's in the middle of the yellow-shaded section 10, still close to the girls' homes.

Unfortunately, none of this really gives me a clue about who wrote the letter, or to whom it was written, or how this connects to the mention of Portsmouth in my great-grandmother's 1919 death.  The mystery continues!


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