November 24, 1933 - Friday

George Darling,

Those letters that I had to write last night still haven’t been written. But you should see what I have done today. This morning except for going to town I didn’t have time to do anything except mend a few stockings but this afternoon and evening I made over the coat of my black suit and it certainly looks better and more stylish. Just wait until I strut for you up in the great city of Portland. Along with my other accomplishments I am becoming a great maker over!

Tomorrow, I have some more stockings to darn and maybe I will get started on my formal. I still have a little sewing to do on the blouse that goes with my black suit.

I certainly miss your letters. I like to answer your letters but it’s hard to do when I don’t have any to answer. I know, dear, how hard you are studying and I hope that you will just wiz thru those old exams. But I am worried about your health. Don’t wear yourself out.

While I was down in San Francisco I got my Christmas presents but when I got home I found that I had forgotten Grover and Sleepy so I will have to do some more up here.

Darling, I am only thinking about my trip north these days. I do hope the weather is nice while we are there because I want Pop to love it as I do.

I love you, and good night, lover.

Ann

To: GLH, Chi Psi Lodge, Eugene

Hello dear:

Just finished a letter to my other beau and now one to you. I rec’d one from La Grande and he said he received a letter from you which made him very happy.

I shall try and keep you filled up on egg nogs when you get home, but we can’t feed them to Annie because she will get too fat, what to do about it, la la. And if you leave the most on the drain board each time you make one I will bless Margaret for telling you how to make them.

We are having much fog up here, and yesterday it did not lift all day and about three in the afternoon it was so thick you could cut it with a knife.

Don’t worry about the ritual dear, it’s perhaps not the first one that has been bungled, we merit by experience and you will do better each time. Always remember one thing. When you see a man about twice your age doing a certain thing well, he has had much experience along that particular line and you are only just at the beginning, so don’t allow yourself to get down. I wish you could read the article about Lawrence Tibbet, our baritone opera singer, and the struggle he had to get where he is. It would perhaps give you a little more courage to go on. Everything that is worthwhile, is worth the struggle we have to get there. You may see someone who seemingly gets his lessons without much effort, but his struggles will be no less when he gets out among the world. Just as one would think, because Lawrence Tibbet had the voice. There would be nothing to it his success was assured, but he had personality and his own appearance against him and many other things.

Yes I know Anne is rather lax person in her corresponding, but as long as she write to you, that’s OK with me. I shall be very glad to see her though, no fooling.

Love and kisses, Mother

November 23, 1933 - Thursday

My Darling,

There are several people I should write to tonight but I am so tired that I am only going to write to you. I have really been quite busy today and besides that I have one of these nasty runny colds that just wear you out to have.

This morning, believe it or not I worked out in the garden.  I dug around in the dirt and had a swell time. We have had rain lately and it has been warmer so the ground was soft.

This afternoon I typed a letter for Pop and that took me about two hours. The rest of the afternoon I sewed on my black suit. I will finish it tomorrow. After supper I did some pressing and washed out a whole bunch of stockings so that means I have a lot of darning to do tomorrow, too. I am spending my time from now on mending my self up before I come up to see you. Some day soon I have to fix over my black satin formal so that I can be stylish at the Chi Psi Ball!

I just got a letter from one of my dearest friends who I haven’t seen since 1929 when we toured the states. She arrived in San Diego about a week after I left. Isn’t that exasperating? But she is going to live there permanently so maybe we will get together yet.

I just heard a song over the radio that was written about Sally Rand. It is called “The Lady with the Fan”. Have you heard it? O-----there goes my favorite someone is playing “The Day You Came Along” another one “I’ll be faithful, dear”

I love you, dear.

Ann

November 22, 1933 - Wednesday

My Darling,

Pictures can certainly bring up memories can’t they? I have just been looking at one of my many albums, looking at pictures of happy times we have had together. We didn’t know how lucky we were, did we, dear? I think that on a certain Thursday afternoon, the first day of June we knew tho! Sweet heart, I am never with out my badge. I cherish that more than any thing I own! Will Christmas never get here!

This morning I went to town. In the afternoon I washed my hair and made cookies. I plan to do so many more things than I can get around to. I wanted to sew this afternoon, too but didn’t get around to it. I am glad for several reasons that we won’t be going out much while I am in Portland.  In the first place I want to be alone with you as much of the time as possible. I don’t want to have to talk to a lot of other people. Also I haven’t got much in the way of a wardrobe and I am afraid I will be a little shabby.

When we take June back a week from Sunday, I think Mom and I will have to stay down a couple of days and do our Christmas shopping. Just think, next month!

Lover, I long for you more and more every day. When we are together again we will have so much to talk about.

I love you, darling

Ann

November 21, 1933 - Tuesday

Dear Mother,

I received a letter from Dad, yesterday; and he is in the very scenic country surrounding Bend. He was going on to Baker from there, and I dropped him a line there. He is going to be gone some time, I guess. He asked me if I couldn’t get home to be with you for Thanksgiving, but I don’t know about that yet.

We had our regular Monday night meeting last night, and it was a formal one. As in all formal meetings of this nature, there is quite a bit of ritual connected with it, and it is my duty to carry on the heaviest part. WEll, I was so darn tired last evening, that I just bungled the whole works. I am going to bed at ten tonight in spite of all the work I have to do. I must get some sleep sometime, that is all there is to it.

Ann writes me that you sent her a nice invitation to come up for the Holidays. Thank you so much for doing that, Mother. She has promised to answer it soon, and I hope she does. She is a rather lax person in her corresponding habits.

Before long, now, the term will be over; and I will certainly be glad for it. There is much to think about and do, before that wonderful event rolls around, though. We had a Criminal Law exam the other morning, and I flunked it flat. Luckily it doesn’t count anything on our final grade but is merely an opportunity for us to learn how to write law examinations. It makes me feel pretty discouraged, though; I am spending so much time on the stuff and yet seem to comprehend so little. Well, I guess it will become easier as I get further into it.

Eddy Field went south with the team, and he had a wonderful time. He was with Bob Timm quite a bit, and he saw Case and Udall and the whole outfit that used to be here. This weekend we play St. Mary’s in San Francisco. I would give anything to be able to go down there and see it. I would wire Ann to meet me, and we would have a wonderful visit, even though a short one. How is that for a pipe dream? I have plenty of them even though I am twenty one.

I must go to bed, Mother; take good care of the old homestead and don’t get too lonesome.

Love, George

Penciled on the back handwriting of Anna Catherine Hibbard. “Miscellaneous writings pg. 190-23 Dumbness, an error of material sense.

You are a Spirited Idea and devil in Divine Mind, you can have no fear because you reflect all intelligent mind. No professor can test you. “We test our lives by thine.” Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of Thy laws.”

I assume the preceding is a passage from the scriptures as interpreted by Mary Baker Eddy.

November 20, 1933 - Monday

Dear Dad,

I received your very welcome letter this morning. You are apparently going to be on a long trip if you won’t even be home for Thanksgiving. I don’t possibly see how I can make it home for that event. I know that mother will be lonesome, but there is so much work that I must get done that it keeps me hopping every minute.

During your freshman year in the law school, they just seem out to get you. They pile the work on thick and heavy, until you wonder when you can get it all done. I haven’t had a good nights rest for so long that I don’t know what it feels like. I feel all worn out, and the worst part of it is yet to come. In the LIberal Arts school I used to cry about the two hour finals we had, but in this place they last four hours. I shall be most glad when this term ends.

Ann is back home, now; and I guess she is getting into her old stride of chief housewife. That must be the crux of joy for such a young person. If you have your own home to keep up, I can understand where there would be some joy connected with it; but to have to keep things going for a very incompetent family must be the “nuts”.

It is too much to expect of a team to go up against that power house, I guess. They have it all together with a veritable genius for a coach. There you have a combination that takes more than a half pint college to beat. They have done pretty well this year, though; and the whole school is right behind them. In fact the students are getting up at six tomorrow morning to go and meet the train that they are coming in on.

I hope you find that the Gill’s line is better than you thought it would be. When I was home, you were a little dubious about it. It will be harder in that you are in towns where you are not as well known, too. Well, there must be an end to all bad things, and the general morale of the country is certainly much brighter than it was a few months ago, so cheer up, Dad.

Love, George

Darling,

Tonight I feel better than I did this morning when I wrote to you. I still miss you almost more than I can stand, lover, but I don’t feel quite so blue and desperate. I am quite sure that I will come up before Christmas unless Mom breaks down and cries and makes me feel like a criminal. Do you know yet what day you will come home from school? Will it be in the afternoon or morning? Shall I come up the day before you get here or shall I get there the evening after you do? I would probably arrive in the evening about 8:30 as I was supposed to last New Years. O, sweet heart, the time will just drag until I can be with you again! I was just looking at the calendar and if I come up before Christmas I will probably leave exactly a month from today. It has been four months since we have seen each other dear. It seems four years to me!

Steve left this morning about nine. This morning was taken up with house work and cooking. This afternoon I went to town and read and sewed. No, darling I haven’t finished my afghan but I’m still working on it and expect to finish it before we have a chance to use it.

I love you darling

Annie

PS I’ll love you forever and ever