Opening Hours
Daily: 10 A.M.–5 P.M.
Closed on Tuesdays
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108
Rare Books
Ella's Life & Poems
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Daily: 10 A.M.–5 P.M.
Closed on Tuesdays
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108
Image not available
Rare Books
303892
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Manuscripts
Series of letters from Ella Shute to her friend Louie Earle Williams, written when Ella was living in Wheatfields, Arizona, "12 miles from the mines" (she asks Louie to direct her letters to Globe City). Ella writes of her family life, their many illnesses ("every one here seems like dead people," she wrote in 1876) since moving "to the mines," and the cost of goods. She also writes of her son Walter (whom she refers to as Charles Clifton until 1878), including an incident where he was run over by a wagon wheel in 1879, and the birth of her son Eugene in 1878. She notes that her father, brothers Frank and Henry, and husband George are "at work in the mines," but that "we are not making any thing only a living." Frank also briefly worked at the Miami Mill Company until it burned down in May 1879. Ella speculated that it might have been arson, and lamented that the incident had caused many families to move away and had detrimentally affected the Middletons' and Shutes' mining interests. She also writes of dry conditions in August 1879, and that "the Indians ha[ve] burned every thing out and it will take a great deal of rains to bring every thing out again." Ella writes that she is unsure of the population of Wheatfields but that there are "so many young men down here that wants to get married but there is...few girls and they won't get married unless they get a rich man." She also mentions that her brother Henry and sister Hattie have gone away to school at the Picket Poste, and urges Louie to have her father move their family to Arizona. Also included is a letter to Louie from her friend Jennie A. Huckaby in Alexander, Illinois. Jennie writes that she envies Louie's work in a milliner's shop ("let's both learn [the trade] then we can set up a shop together"),that she hopes to be well enough to return home to Iowa soon, and of her "cherished wish" to go to California. She concludes that there "is nothing going on here except a negro excursion to Chicago."
mssHM 76737-76747
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Manuscripts
This letter was written by Ella P. Starkweather, a school teacher, living in the town of Bridgewater, now part of South Dakota. Starkweather describes her experiences in Dakota Territory to her friends back home. To her surprise, she likes the school where she is teaching. There are new series of books, a school room that is large and pleasantly furnished. She writes that some of her students could benefit from a lesson on cleanliness: "...a few would be rendered much more attractive by a vigorous application of soap suds..." Regarding life on the frontier, she writes: "You may imagine the people here are sick of the country, and I can hardly give you an idea how happy and contented they all seem to be. They say the most scant time for provisions they have known is since I came and I know of no one suffering." She also touches upon the weather and the farmers. "The country looks lovely, farmers who had seed here and sown find everything encouraging." Near the end of the letter, she describes her layover in Sheldon, Iowa for five days and her amusement regarding a car half-filled with Bohemian immigrants.
mssHM 80839