KATHERINE PETTIT Correspondence 1913

Pine Mountain Settlement School
Series 07: DIRECTORS
KATHERINE PETTIT
CORRESPONDENCE
1913

362 Katherine Pettit at Big Log house, Pine Mountain Settlement School.

TAGS: Katherine Pettit, correspondence 1913, Ethel de Long, Pine Mountain Settlement School, Pine Mountain., KY, Jennie Helm, Miss Wilson, mountain schools, land donations, farming, buildings, board members, curriculum, model cottages, Mrs. Morton, Nurse Davis, Elizabeth Moore, Mary Rockwell, State Library Commission, Merritt Wilson, Kentweva Coal & Lumber Co.. Wildell, WV. William Creech, Sr., Judge A.B. Cornett, deeds , tram roads, rights-of-way, surveys, Mr. Chaffey, Charles S. Robb, Elkins, WV,

KATHERINE PETTIT Correspondence 1913

CONTENTS

001 Handwritten list of 1913 correspondence to and from Miss Pettit. [001]

JANUARY

FEBRUARY

002 February 4, 1913. Charles S. Robb to Katherine Pettit. Robb discusses arrangements of details of transfer of Creech property to PMSS. [002]

003 Typewritten TRANSCRIPT of February 4, 1913 letter. [003]

004 February 6, 1913. Katherine Pettit, Lexington, KY, to Charles Robb, Elkins, W. Va. Details of surveying and transferring Creech land to PMSS; leaving Hindman for P.M. [004]
Handwritten note on reverse side of Feb. 6, 1913, letter: “Copy of letter sent Mr. Robb March 1913”. [004a]

005 Typewritten TRANSCRIPT of February 6, 1913, letter. [05]

MARCH

006 – 011 March 20, 1913. [unsigned] Katherine Pettit[?] to Miss Wilson. Describes plans for a mountain school: name of school, location, land donations, farming, buildings, board members, curriculum, mountain character; invites Miss Wilson to raise money for a model cottage for girls and join the staff. [006-011]

APRIL

MAY

012 – 013 May 30, 1913. May 30, 1913 Katherine Pettit to Mrs. J.R. Morton, 231 E. Short Street, Lexington, Ky. Miss Pettit on PMSS stationary to Mrs. Morton, Lexington, KY. Nurse Davis to attend Middlesboro meeting; Pettit invites Morton to P.M.; gives directions; reading material; Victrola records; Elizabeth Moore, board member, and Miss Rockwell visited; State Library Commission offered books. [012-013] SEE FULL TEXT BELOW

My Dear Mrs. Morton:

Thank you for your letter asking me to meet you in Middlesbrough. I certainly should like to do it, but it won’t be possible for me to be away at this time Ethel de Long will not come back from Cleveland before the 14th and I must be here while the building is going on. I was away a long time in Atlanta and you know when one has a job like mine they must stick to it. However, I am going to try hard to get things arranged so that I can get out often to such things. For I certainly have lost out in all these years along that line. And if you will remind me next year, I will make every effort to go there.

Miss Davis, our trained nurse, is going to be there. And I shall tell her to meet you. She is going especially to meet and talk over rural mountain problems of nursing with Miss Butler, [Harriet Butler] who is on the program. Miss Davis is a wonder, and you would have to know her up here to really appreciate her. But I do want you to know and like her. She has the most wonderful spirit in the world. She and Miss Stoughton, our secretary, and Bertha Lewis, our pretty Harlan County girl leave tomorrow for Berea for commencement and Miss Davis is going to stay over for the Middlesbrough meeting.

How I wish you could come here from there. I have a very comfortable room which I could give to you, for we have a large tent that I can go into at anytime. Still, if you want to wait in the Fall for the auto party, We can make you very much more comfortable then. You can be finding out while you’re in Middlesbrough something. about the roads They say anything can get to Pineville. All right, from Pineville, you come up Straight Creek 35 miles to where we live. Much. of the way you may be able to come in the machine. It seems to me that we might plan to have a wagon and good strong mules to meet you. So that if the machine gives out you could get in the wagon and come on the rest of the way. A Bluegrass man is giving the Pine Mountain School and the Hindman School a pair each of good mules. Isn’t that great? And, he is also sending the harness, I think the Kentucky Wagon Works in Louisville will give us a road wagon. And, if I knew some way to get a good, strong spring wagon, I could have that wagon at Pineville to meet you. However, by October, there surely will be some way to get you here and whatever you do, don’t give up the trip. This is such beautiful country. I have enjoyed the Laurel so much and it will be wonderful when the rhododendron comes. We have some of the purple rhododendron around here, which you know is very rare– ” red laurel” they call it.

Isn’t it fine that we have two-hundred and thirty [230] acres instead of one hundred and eight [108] that the people thought they were giving us? They are so delighted also. And isn’t it fine that. the same mule-blue-grass-man is ready to give us more land whenever we can get our neighbors to sell it to us?

Won’t you do what you can to help Miss Davis to meet people and clubs who might be willing to help her in her department. If she just knew some society to turn to when she had any special need it would be a tremendous help. You see, it has been the great advantage of having the local unions. All over the state there are certain organizations that we would write to from Hindman for any special need, and they would move heaven and earth to bring it to pass. And if you could help her to ….

p.2

….. get a club or two or so, interested, just in her department, you can see what it would mean. She has already chosen the location for the hospital and when she gets a chance, she is going to try to raise some money for it.

I am so sorry to hear [of] the destruction at Canewood. When I read the account of the storm in the paper, I wondered if it could have touched Canewood.

We have been so glad to have the papers. Thank you for offering to send any other magazines. You see, people haven’t learned about us yet, and so we’re having practically none except what you sent in one package that Jennie Helm sent. Perhaps, if you have a chance to speak to her, you can tell her how much I appreciated those and suggest that she keep on sending them, and we shall indeed be glad to have anything that you send. Miss Stoughton has the literary digest and Atlantic Monthly sent to her regularly. So those two things we can count on and I tell you after a busy day from early morning to sit down in the evening. With the Atlantic Monthly and hear Fitzhugh play the Victor, is just about the greatest happiness that can come to anybody. The superintendent at Camden sent us some lovely records., and we still have some of Mr. Gratz money left to buy an occasional good one. Surely no school ever started off with such a beautiful gift as this is.

We have just written a new leaflet. When you get it, please tell me what you think of it. You just must be critical, really severe, For how are we going to know if some friend isn’t good enough to tell us about such things? So anything that we write, you must tell us If it is worthwhile or what we must leave that and what we must put in.

Miss Elizabeth Moore of St Louis, Mr Philip Moore’s daughter. In a member of our board, came with Miss Rockwell, the architect. For a few days, we liked her tremendously.

Please tell me about the Middlesbrough meeting.

as Ethel Delong will be returning from Cleveland, she may get into Middlesbrough for the last day of the meeting, So if you have a chance to introduce her to people, and even let her say a few words at the convention, I think they would enjoy it.

The state Library Commission people wrote me that they could send a library, but we would have to pay $2. And as I don’t dare take any $2 from our building fund and haven’t any of my own and won’t have for a long time. We just will have to do without the library. Don’t they ever send it to places that are just as poor as we are?

Very affectionately yours.
Katherine Pettit

Mrs. J.R. Morton
231 E Short St.
Lexington, Kentucky.

Love all of you

JUNE

JULY

AUGUST

SEPTEMBER

015 September 1, 1913. Katherine Pettit to Merritt Wilson, Kentweva Coal & Lumber Co., Wildell, W. Va. Pettit and Mr. Creech object to right-of-way clause in Kentweva’s deed. [014]
Typewritten TRANSCRIPT of September 1, 1913, letter. [015]

016 – 017 September 10, 1913. [unsigned] KP to Judge Cornett. Sends him deed between Kentweva and Wm. Creech, Sr. with objectionable clause (about temporary tram road across the land) crossed out; provides re-worded clause. [016-017]

018 Handwritten note on reverse side of September 10, 1913, letter: “Letter to Judge Cornett about Uncle Wm. and the deed. Sept 18, 1913.” [018]

019 Typewritten TRANSCRIPT of September 10, 1913, to Judge Cornett. [019]

020 September 10, 1913. Merritt Wilson, Pres., Kentweva Coal & Lumber Co., on letterhead for Wildell (W. Va.) Lumber Company, to Miss Pettit. His stockholders and directors wish to keep original clause; offers survey to indicate location of right-of-way. [020]

021 Typewritten TRANSCRIPT of September 10, 1913, letter from Merritt Wilson. [021]

022 September 12, 1913. Handwritten on half-page by A.B. Cornett, Dealer in Real Estate, Harlan, KY, to Ethel de Long, Pine Mt. Cornett is not authorized to change deed; Mr. Wilson is the only one who can do so; his opinion of the clause in question. [022]

023 Typewritten TRANSCRIPT of September 12, 1913, letter. [023]

024 September 17, 1913. [unsigned]. E. de Long to A.B. Cornett. We “understand the matter of the change in the clause” & sent the deed first to Cornett, hoping his opinion would help P.M., before his forwarding it to Wilson. [024]

Handwritten note on reverse side of September 17, 1913, letter; “To Judy[?] & Cornett about deed Sept 17.” [025]

026 Typewritten TRANSCRIPT of September 17, 1913, letter. [026]

027-029 September 18, 1913. [unsigned] KP to Merritt Wilson, President, Kentweva, Wildell, W. Va. Stressed importance of a visit to P.M. by Wilson re right-of-way question; quotes explanations of right-of-way from Mr. Chaffey and Mr. Wilson; describes Wm. Creech’s fears that railroad will be permanent. [027-029]

030 Handwritten note on reverse side of September 18, 1913, letter: “Copy of letter to Mr. Wilson Sept. 18.” [030]

031-032 Typewritten TRANSCRIPT of September 18, 1913, letter. [031-032]

033 September 26, 1913. Merritt Wilson to Katherine Pettit [letterhead: Charles S. Robb, Elkins, W. Va.]. Sends revised right-of-way clause stating railroad will be temporary; cannot include Mr. Creech’s request not to damage school property. [033]
Typewritten TRANSCRIPT of September 26, 1913, letter. [034]

OCTOBER

NOVEMBER

DECEMBER

GALLERY: KATHERINE PETTIT CORRESPONDENCE 1913