ELIZABETH HENCH Correspondence 1921

Pine Mountain Settlement School
Series 02: GOVERNANCE – Board of Trustees
Elizabeth Hench, Trustee, 1914-1931(?)
Elizabeth C. Hench (1869–1939)
Correspondence 1921

The Cow’s Stomachs. Elizabeth Hench Scrapbook. [hench_scrapbook_00001-2-107.jpg]

TAGS: Elizabeth Hench 1921 correspondence, Pine Mountain Settlement School Board of Trustees, fund-raising letters, cows, donors, promotional mailings

ELIZABETH HENCH Correspondence 1921

TRANSCRIPTIONS & SUMMARIES

[Note: Letters from PMSS staff in the PMSS Collections are carbon copies, typewritten, unsigned, and meant for the Office files. The original signed documents were sent to the correspondents. The initials at the bottom left of most PMSS letters indicate the writer (along with initials of the secretary). For example, “EZ” are the initials for Ethel de Long Zande and “EKW” or “W” is for Evelyn K. Wells. Letters from Elizabeth C. Hench are handwritten. The following transcriptions and summaries are in chronological order and not necessarily in the order of the image numbers.]

001 March 18, 1921. “EZ” [Ethel de Long Zande] to Elizabeth C. Hench.

Dear E.C. Hench: I am sorry for you, getting back to work in the spring, after your wonderful time in the Adirondacks! Indianapolis always seems to me at its worst in the spring, when the wind blows dust through the streets, and the weather is a little enervating. I hope you have gotten over your first feelings of lassitude.

I will certainly see that your address on the mailing list is Manual Training High School, even though I may write to you at … North Meridian St.

The tam-o’-shanter is a perfect winner! If I got it on just right, it is stunning, though Luigi [Zande] says it’s too young for me! I suppose people will soon be saying that I’m a foolish old woman, who dresses too young, but next winter, I am certainly going to wear the tam-o’-shanter with my red coat, no matter what Luigi says!

Do you know that we have electric lights, and a new infirmary which is almost finished? And that we are carrying insurance on $62,000 worth of property here, and want as soon as possible to increase it to $72,000? All this is to impress you with the solid respectability of the school with which you are connected.

Don’t you think we ought to have a board meeting at Pine Mountain next fall?

Evelyn Wells is back for a month, and starts out in April for a trip through Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York. Celia [Cathcart] Holton will speak at Chautauquas this summer for us. You may already know that Angela Melville is selling bonds in New York, and that Mary Rockwell is going to be married on April 9th

It is perfectly beautiful here now; I just wish you could see it. The Maples are red on the mountain, there are new blossoms every day, and the fruit trees are glorious. We have ten children down with mumps, and all of us understand why each other’s house is dirty!

I will append to this letter some answers to your questions about the Cow Joy; it is wonderful that you have $181.00 for her [Signed] Att. yours EZ-

002 March 24, 1921. To Hench in Laurel, Mississippi, from [unsigned: EZ (Zande)].

Dear Miss Hench: I am so sorry to hear from Mrs. Smead that you as well as Elizabeth have had to take this winter to go searching for better health.

Mrs. Smead is arranging for Miss Wells to go to Carlisle, and I think she will be there either on the 27th or 28th of May. I hope you will be home by that time, because I should like you to hear first hand about us. Cordially yours, [Unsigned: Zande]

Miss Mary Hench, Laurel, Mississippi. EZ:W

003 March 24, 1921. To Hench from [unsigned: EZ]

Dear Elizabeth: It seems to me that we must get out an appeal for funds before the end of April, and then another copy of the Notes in June. My idea is to stress the way our children have been givers themselves this last year. Do you know we have sent to the following causes during this last twelve months:

July, 1920 – Central Europe $40, Armenia 83.23 December, 1920 – Literary Digest, Child Feeding 55.00, Near East 10.00 March, 1921 – China Famine 101.38

We are living on famine rations one day a week, by the children’s own vote, during lurch, so we shall have something for this terrible appeal for the Near East this Easter.

I want the letter short, – one page if possible, with one cut at the top. Possibly a second cut.

Could you get the material to the printer in a hurry, and away from him in the same way to us, if I send it to you by the end of next week? I am starting on envelopes today. Yours always, [Unsigned, Zande]

Miss E.C. Hench, … North Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. EZ: W

004 March 30, 1921. To Hench from [unsigned: EZ] [Handwritten in top margin: “March 30-1921”]

Dear E.C.H.: Here’s the letter, and I am delighted that you will hurry it through. Evelyn [Wells] and I want to leave out paragraph three, for the letter was conceived as a unity and has it if the third paragraph is omitted. However, I feel that you will want it in, and want your judgment on the matter. It would be great to get the letter on two pages, wouldn’t it? And I think it is a good appeal. I have been struck myself by the value of brief appeals in the many I have had this year.

The envelopes are being printed and we want to get this out hot from the press. We are going to put in annual subscription cards for all who aren’t A.S.’s. What would you think of having a little leaflet printed of this story I wrote last year? I have put in parentheses a section which I thought could be omitted. Let me have your frank opinion, and if you think this enclosure would be of value in this letter, I guess you’d better go ahead and get this done.

There’s something quite inspiring about getting a letter off in a hurry, and it’s corking to know there is someone at the other end who is speeding up the process. I’ll let you know tomorrow how many more subscription cards I ought to have, in the same letter which talks about “Joy.” Yours ever.

Miss Elizabeth C. Hench, … North Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. EZ:W

005-005b N.D. [Easter] Three-page letter to “Dear Friend” from “Ethel de Long Zande.”

005

… This Easter Monday Pine Mountain has been proudly giving, for the children of the Near East and the Far. One hears of the magnificence of kings’ gifts; you would like better the simplicity and the fine, careless rapture of our children’s gifts. After everybody had emptied his pockets, the sum total was so small that our children could not stop thinking of the needs of the pitiful countries, so they asked for famine rations one day a week in March, that they might send the difference. We could not resist their appeal for just a little chance to help, even though it meant giving up necessities. Rice and water cocoa it was, then, for four Fridays dinners, and never was giving more graciously done. Early in the morning, it would be “Gee-oh, I’m glad this is China day!” At noon, everybody talked about how good the bowls of rice were, though some were almost choked by our plenty as they thought that the seventeen cents they were saving would provide nearly six meals for a Chinese child. Ar-dent little boys said, “I weren’t nary grain hungry at supper time”, and even those who confessed to very empty feelings about four o’clock scorned to eat more supper than usual. So, at the rate of seventeen cents each meal, we have sent away $82.00 today.

And now we wonder if anyone will eat famine rations for our children, that bodies, hearts, and minds may be nourished and cherished. Never were needier givers than these! There are still in school three little Callahans of the seven their…

005a

-2- …father brought us four years ago to “raise towards humanity”. They are fatherless as well as motherless now, since John was shot in revenge when he had testified to a man’s lawbreaking. More than a score of other little orphan boys and girls look to the school as their “certain stayin’ place”, a true alma mater, to say nothing of the fortunate ones who have parents and homes, even though they have to leave them for the sake of an education. Ninety-four children altogether!

Though coal has brought the railroads and big interests into the mountains, the mountain people themselves reap no wealth. The rich possibilities of childhood come to no fruition, although mining camps are built on many creeks and hundreds of coal cars go out every day. Rather, even that which they had is taken away; freedom, independence, dignified living and inherited culture. The mountains are in a desperate plight, and it is entirely for the outside world to decide how much of their human wealth shall be saved. You can trust men if you will train them, says Democracy. Young souls can be fortified for life, whether the conditions be new or old.

Pine Mountain wants for its boys and girls frugal living, but a most glorious chance, to learn well and lustily, to play blithely and to feel rightly, – to partake of the splendors of living as well as of its toil. We cannot give them the chance they ought to have without more help, -$1,000 more a month in annual subscriptions. We still have two wards and a nurse’s room in our new infirmary to pay for, each one costing $500.00. One ward has already been given as a memorial to a mother; it would be fitting if the other three could also be memorials.

005b

-3- Think what $1.00, $5.00, $10.00, given annually, means in the education of a child. $150.00 pays for a year’s scholarship: $3,000 endows one. Won’t you let us transmute your dollars into something shining for a stout little heart, that another child may follow a gleam? Very sincerely yours. Ethel delong (sic) Zande

Picture of little boys.

006 April 20, 1921. To Hench from [unsigned: EZ (Zande)]

Dear E.C.H.: The letters have come and I think the picture turned out very well and the thing looks readable, but of course, my first impression was how very unfortunate the spacing of the first page is. It seems to me the Campbell people always manage to do something to spoil one of our letters. This looks like the spacing of the last letter from Hindman which I criticized very severely. I hope you will blow him up. I also hope the letter will bring in money for of course I know the public wont criticize that gap as you and I and Mabel Ely do.

The weather is glorious down here and we haven’t had a new measles case in three days. Also Evelyn is sending in a little money from her trip nearly every day and that encourages us.

You have no doubt read in the papers that the Winnes case is dismissed. Certainly it is a travesty on justice, but since Harlan County took the position that Winnes was innocent and would have used every means to get an acquittal, we may be thankful that there was no second trial, for now in case new evidence develops he could be re-indicted. I imagine he is thankful he is in his skin, but I hope he is not too sure of himself.

Aren’t you glad we have our letters ready for the right season this year? I am just hugging myself to think we didn’t get things pushed off too late to be effective. Don’t mind my eruption at the first part of this letter. It expresses my first disappointment, two minutes after seeing the letter. It doesn’t look so awful to me now as it did when I first beheld it, and you know I think you are an old brick and wouldn’t hurt your feelings for anything. Affectionately yours, [Unsigned: EZ]

Miss Elizabeth C. Hench, … No. Meridian Street, Indianapolis, Indiana EZ:M

007 March 29, 1921. To Hench from Evelyn K. Wells, Secretary, informing Hench that her packages have arrived and will be kept in the vault.

008 April 4, 1921. To Hench from Wells requesting “1500 subscription cards to send out with the letter.” Wells encloses a copy of the letter that Zande wrote to the Printer’s Ink.

009 April 6, 1921. To Hench at Manual Training High School, Indianapolis, Ind., from EZ (Zande) , who is glad that Hench approves of the leaflet and letter. “Our mailing list is six thousand” and she asks for 1000 extra of each.

010 April 18, 1921. To Hench on North Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind., from EZ (Zande) , requesting Hench to order 2500 additional subscription cards from Campbell because Wells took most of them by mistake.

011 April 25, 1921. To Hench from EZ (Zande), asking her to call Campbell and report that none of the printed items have arrived yet.

012 May 16, 1921. To Hench from EZ (Zande), sending her letters Zande received in response to the mailing.

Some of them have been really beautiful and have brought great inspirations to me. We have received over $3500 so far, and I think our total returns will be larger on this letter than we have ever had on any except the Callahan. Of course, I do not expect they will come nearly up to that total.

Zande asks Hench to explain to Mrs. Ruth Allerdice the reasons for her plans to dismiss, after the measles epidemic, Miss Roderick, a nurse who came in about the first of February. Allerdice was one of her references. “P.S. Your Margaret sent fifty dollars as a result of the Easter letter.”

013 May 25, 1921. To Hench from EZ (Zande), agreeing with Hench’s suggestion for a new Uncle William [Creech] leaflet. Zande explains why she is pleased with her leaflet; she is ready to send out the remaining 4,000 letters; she will send addresses envelopes to Hench to be filled. Zande is cheered by the news from the Indleys that “the lady who has left some money to our endowment fund must be Mrs. Esther Davis Smith, who has been an annual subscriber for one dollar every since 1917, and who last year was inspired to double her subscription!”

014 June 3, 1921. To Hench from EZ (Zande), asking for more copies of the Easter letter. “…[S]everal hundred new people who heard Miss Wells speak ought to have letters sent to them. Also, I think we should have a hundred or so in reserve.”

015 [Truncated date], 1921. To Hench from EZ (Zande), asking for 2,000 subscription cards to be printed at once and to send 200 to Miss Wells in Nantucket, Mass. In July, Wells will be at Pigeon Cove, Mass., and later at Summit, New Jersey.

016 June 16, 1921. To Hench from Zande, who is enjoying a visit from Antoinette Bigelow. Zande reports on the problem of “finding a good cow that would be fresh in October.” Zande describes, “Joy,” a cow owned by a trusted farmer, with all PMSS’s requirements and recommended by Luigi [Zande]. She wishes Hench “a beautiful vacation” and writes that Luigi and she are going to Colorado, near Estes Park. “Mary Rockwell wants Luigi to finish a little stone house she started there, and she will be with us.”

017 June 21, 1921. To Hench at Pinewood Camp, Brutus, Mich., from EZ (Zande), who is sending her six letters and enclosures. She asks Hench to consult Gertrude Tuttle concerning “the salaries that can be commanded by teachers of domestic science….? I would like to have a basis of comparison.”

018 June 28, 1921. To Hench from EZ (Zande), who is disappointed that the cow “had a mortgage on her…and was not a good milker…” so she is searching for another Joy. Zande and staff are preparing for “Mother and Helen” and Antoinette Bigalow. Luigi’s trip to Colorado has been cancelled. The Easter letter has brought in $5,960 so far, and an increase of annual subscribers.

019 July 22, 1921. To Hench at Buckeye House, Burt Lake, Mich., from EZ (Zande), Mrs. [Celia Cathcart] Holton spoke and Linda Lewis sang the Detroit D.A.R. Chapter.

020 August 17, 1921. To Hench from Wells at PMSS, where she is working on the mailing list. She asks about discrepancies in two addresses she is trying to correct.

021 September 1, 1921. To Hench in Indianapolis, Ind., from Zande, exclaiming that “Joy has come to Pine Mountain!” James Madison and Francis [Day] brought two cows, bought with money from the Joy Stock Company. Mr. [William] Browning wasn’t impressed with the cows, but Mrs. Burns, who is in charge of the milking, is approving of them.

022-022a September 11, [no year]. Two-page handwritten letter to “Ethel” [Zande] from Hench at Manual Training Jr. High School. “We have now 43 stockholders and $235.61 in the Savings Bank.” David will replace Mr. Kendall who died. Hench suggests that Zande and her husband, Luigi, find a “good blooded cow…fresh in Sept. or October” and “not a mountain cow” for the School, which would be a help in getting support.

023 September 14, 1921. To Hench from Wells, who wondered if Hench had not received Zande’s letter of September 11. “The cows are both mountain cows, bought about eighteen miles from here, and a good mountain cow seems to thrive better than the botched-on variety.” The Zandes are still on vacation but are eager to return to Berto and Grandma. 024-024a September 22, [no year]. Handwritten two-page letter to Wells from Hench. [Notation in upper right margin: “ck. 110.00 for Joy, a cow”]

024 Hench encloses the envelope of a letter announcing Joy’s arrival at PMSS and a check for Joy. She asks for information from the Zandes and Mrs. [Martha] Burns about “the cost of the upkeep of one cow for one year…,” and for undeveloped films of James Madison, Frances Day, Mrs. Burns, and various cow activities. Hench asks, ‘Who is Mr. Browning?”

025 September 23, 1921. To Hench from Wells, acknowledging her check. She will respond to Wells’ requests.

Mr. Browning is “Bill Browning” one of the first boys who ever came here to school, one of seventeen children from the Head of Little Laurel, who has been away in the navy for several years and took a course at the State University when he came back, and is now on our faculty as Mr. Zande’s assistant on the farm.

026 September 29, 1921. To Hench from Wells, sending two rolls of photographs and asking again about the discrepancies in two mailing addresses.

027 NO IMAGE

028 October 13, 1921. To Hench from EZ (Zande), asking whether Zande can write Mabel Ely about Hench’s plans to visit Cleveland. She also asks for the money Hench has in the Joy Stock Co. “to help us feed the cows.” She wonders what to call the other cow? She mentions “two little new heifers in the barn,” who will produce milk in the future.

030-030a October 19, 1921. Two-page letter to Hench from EZ (Zande). In answer to Hench’s question, Zande writes, “it costs us $275…a year, or did last year, to keep a cow at Pine Mountain.” She explains a problem with lighting for the photographs she sent. “I am happy that my letter on extreme poverty gave you inspiration to send another letter to the stock-holders.” Zande provides Mabel Ely’s address in Cleveland, suggesting that Hench visit her when Hench is there for an “operation.” She tells about the board meeting and sends Hench the minutes. The board was informed that the present valuation of the school is $140,701, The school’s budget for the coming year is the same as last year’s: $50,000. Zande describes the new board member:

Mr. Presley Atkins, is a young man in the early thirties, the owner of the Pineville Sun and the kind of newspaper man…

Zande mentions that Pinewood Camp donated $200 this year.

029-029c October 21, [no year]. A four-page handwritten letter to Zande from Hench, 029 describing her organization of the Joy Stock Co. Ltd. papers. 029a She will keep “reserve capital” in case they have to buy a replacement cow and another fund for the upkeep of the two new cows. Hench continues to request “an estimate of the yearly cost of a cow.” 029b The second cow’s name is “Sorrow.” “…[W]e would promise support only for Joy.” 029c Eleanor Gardner will send Zande a monthly check for support of Joy.

031 October 25, 1921. To Hench from EZ (Zande), who explains the cost of a keeping a cow:

… The $275.00 for the cost of a cow covers all costs. Would you rather I should send you simply the cost of feed? I shall see that Delight is made a permanent name of Sorrow. which may sound humorous to you, but might be a name of evil omen in this country, where a cow can be snake-bitten and die therefrom.

Now may I tell you before you create that reserve capital fund, what the plan is for cows at Pine Mountain? It is, not that we shall bring in more from the outside, but that we shall raise up on own stock. The heifers that we have raised here are very satisfactory, do not have to get used to our hillside environment, and of course are of good blood because their parents are. We have put in all the money we need to, into good breeding stock. It is rather expensive raising stock; for instance, the three little he fer calves born this fall have to be maintained two years before they are milk-producers, but in the end we get a better cow for our environment.

We should not now add any more cows to the ones we have in the barn. Miss [Katherine] Pettit and Luigi and I had a meeting only a week ago to consider this question again, since we have been offered another cow. Don’t you rather think it would be better, then, to use your reserve capital for the expenses of raising a calf? Or for maintenance of a cow that is already yielding milk?

Now, I am not going to beg you for that $125.00, but only to ask you not to try to persuade us to buy any more cows, which is against our judgment.

So sorry that letter of mine followed you all about the country. We have Manual Training High School on the mailing list, and will use that hereafter. I know your letter about naming the second cow Sorrow couldn’t have been misdirected. It will probably turn up by-and-bye. I am delighted to know that Eleanor is going to send a monthly check for maintaining Joy.

Yours with much love and all sorts of good wishes, [truncated]

032-032a Saturday, [no date]. Two-page handwritten letter to Zande from Hench, sending a package of things, part of which are Green Room supplies. Hench comments on the $275 for Joy’s upkeep and the fundraising letter she plans to write. She will use the name “Delight.” changed from “Sorrow” in future letters.

033 NO IMAGE

034-034a [N.D.] Two-page handwritten list of names and addresses in Hench’s handwriting, 034 with the title, “For your mailing list. To be marked by “Joy Stock Co., Ltd.” Last names are Hitchcock, Hench, Moffat, Cavanaugh, Bozell, Norton, and Cole. 034a Continuation of the list: Evans, Field Hanson, Mathews, Lawson. A notation in red at the end: “The duplicates on your list and this one are entirely voluntary on the part of the givers.”

035 [N.D.] Mailing list of names and addresses, titled “Joy Stock Co. Ltd.” Handwritten notations, top margin: “It’s a great company, with fine possibilities,” “All on M.K.,” and “in our geog. Area, but not on M.K.” Last names on list: [Elizabeth] Hench, Gardiner, Lacy, Thorpe, Rothwell, Goodrich, [Mary] Hench, Kendall, Kelly, Hulst, Hendrickson, Tully, Kelly/Park, Landers, Insley, Boswell, Wade, Carter, Williams, Compton, Schaefer, Dillan, Perkins, Stone, Wisner, Simmons Jr., Simmons, Rogers. Handwritten notation in bottom margin: “Mark the address cards for the new ones of this list “Joy Stock Co, Ltd”.

036-036a November 10, 1921. Two-page letter to Hench from EZ (Zande), 036 who is pleased that Hench is feeling better and postponed the operation. Zande reports about the Board meeting: “We elected Mr. Atkins on the General Advisory Board because he resided near enough to come often.” She mentions trustee Mr. Bullock, who “gets great pleasure from this connection with the school, it seems.” Zande then provides information about the cows at PMSS:

It costs ninety cents a day to feed a cow in the winter time, when they cannot be on pasture. The total cost for the year is about $215.00, based on last year’s figures. Our calves that we want to raise are some of them pure Holstein and some of them Jersey and Holstein, and I think we have some of our good mountain cows that were bred by the Holstein bull. We have four heifers that will be cows next year, and two little ones just starting out. All we can afford to raise at one time, for a calf costs half as much as a cow to feed!

Zande is delighted with Mrs. Carter’s gift of one hundred dollars and asks if it goes toward cow feed or general school expenses. About the cow’s name, she writes, “I am sorry Mrs. Rogers’ suggestion about Overjoy came after Delight had been printed in on our records at the Barn and the family was used to calling her by that name.”

036a Zande asks about Mrs. Rogers’ family “tragedy.” Her letter continues:

I was delighted with those Rand McNally book posters that you sent, and have distributed them in houses that were [sparsely] furnished, and full of children who will enjoy them. and perhaps take more interest in reading because of them. Please send me the name of that English firm which gets out the pictures illustrative of English History. I believe I could get that series of pictures given to the School.

Mother goes tomorrow, It is going to mean a terrible hold for us, in the family and in the school as well, for she has had beautiful relations with the children in a Sunday School that she has conducted very much as if it were a church, and also a Round Table Class for the older ones which has met on Sunday evenings. I know Berto will miss her terribly, and she is racked by the thought of how she will miss him, and wishes she were gone already.

Give my love to Eleanor. You must bring her down to see us sometime. Yours always, [Unsigned, EZ]

037 November 17, 1921. To Hench from EZ (Zande), praising Hench for her “cow letter.” About the cost of cow upkeep, she explains:

The difference between $215 and $275 is in the cost of supervision, charges for student labor, and the general up-keep of the barn, which includes materials, etc. I don’t know whether the figures will be the same this year or not.