when i was a schoolteacher one of the great things i love to get involved with was local history history or etc because you could teach anything any world event this collection of letters that talks about or is written about his great great beats me i'll explain in a different way it's going to take me a long time to set up actually there are eighty eight letters in these two notebooks and that form the basis of what i'll try to talk to you about tonight and i'm going to set this thing here is a mystery which we'll get to at the end and so that you know who we're talking about i'll circulate this picture and i wish i had more information on the picture itself i suspect that it's alluded to in one of the letters but i didn't really try to puzzle it out but i put a little iran and up above and a part is head so you can take a look at what she looked like and i want to apologize to you because in a formal life i really hated to talk from a script and i will tell you why because once upon a time i had to follow the agency policy that i worked for and it absolutely blew my mind it was in front of a crowd in detroit michigan and i can remember the sports editor of the detroit free press looking at me after i stuck to the script completely and said you're a liar and that that that maybe maybe never want to talk that way again so since then that's like thirty forty years ago always spoken from an outline but tonight i'm going to revert to following the script because my cousin jim is the one that actually  actually second cousin actually provided these letters and said that you should bring him to the historical society and turn them over and when i tried to do that in november the membership said no you have to go home with those letters and come back and give us a talk  think it might be a little bit helpful for those of you who are familiar with new gloucester and maybe those who aren't where some of the physical places might be and how i'm related to the  and his wife was katherine and they lived in what we probably all know always eastgate school now that was my great grandfather's house so eas and they had four sons andrew junior married cora and then my grandfather child pilate in fact married anna who was the subject of the top tonight giles peele a big had four children one of them was warner and i'm steve so second cousin that just to give you a little bit of the relationship so now i'll stick to the script and i don't read very well  story in my opinion is kind of kind of demonstrates the human condition her father was killed on the railroad and i'm not going to say anything that i don't know but i don't know how he was killed or exactly where he was killed  wife was sick at home in bed his body was carried by her and whether it was the illness or the shock she died that left anna to herself i guess  more as we go through but she wrote these letters to my grandfather when she was a teenager and peele which was my grandfather's nickname was running has been this in minneapolis minnesota thread was peals younger brother their older their fortune out west wherever that was in whatever they did i really don't know but i do know that they both went to school in boston and at one point in time fred took a trip to los angeles now that would have been charlie after the transcontinental railroad was the stablished and i really don't know what he was doing there besides having a good time and i know that from some old letters that they had some kinds of adventures in th dakotas before was not in south dakota and in oklahoma i think it had to do with cattle but i don't know for sure that just lost the time and interestingly enough peel told an destroy all his letters to her which she mentions in the lead is that she is done with a couple of exceptions it appears that some of the letters made the rounds in the family and keep in mind it and i was a teenager and i feel much more like the ones of today than we might think due to this half hour conversation here it's a little difficult to know exactly everything that was taking place because you know you know exactly what she was answering are what she was saying because you don't have the full context of the compensation and then sometimes i don't know who they were really talking about their gloucester that i recognized but i really they knew who they were talking about they used initials of a they just referred to so and so so i'm going to start with the letters in one thousand nine hundred this is when i was fifteen there are a few go back to when she was thirteen but they are thought of before and as personality it kind of developed a little bit and she was pretty much like all young people her handwriting changed from letter to later as hundred eighty ninety four it's pretty clear that the letters up between what we might consider a younger sister and older brother among family members today jim and i've talked about this quite a bit we really don't know if there was any romance involved in art but there was a big age difference but it doesn't seem so to me they're pretty much like i said a brother sister type exchange and while  minneapolis he seems to have had a steady girl named bell what you will hear about again to try to read any of these letters in their entirety or even fortunes of them it answers keep us here until dawn because the they're pretty amusing so i'm going to read excerpts from the letters themselves and i'll try to remember to let you know when i'm quoting and that we leave her grandma pretty much as i could interpret sometimes i missed words and added to touch here and there it was my grandfather's by which is now channel bed and breakfast that was the baptist church and throughout this whole period this four year period the stevens school which was right here in the lower village paid a big role in the activities of young women in town in those that voted at the school the church is also a center of much activity and it appears that kind of hope that linda would be here tonight but missed the mark was the minister during the whole four on september twenty first date hundred ninety he notes that stephen schools that's within roldan of thirty girls i had no idea how many attended that's quite a group miss sophia is a constant well that teaches kind of com this letter the fifteen year old girl comes through and i quote mr mark is on vacation i wish you would take a vacation all the time it makes me think of an old worn out hand og and when i hear him talk maggie said i could not go to prison meeting any more if i made fun of mr mark in quote maggie who i believe was margaret maggie mcglinchey she worked so long from our great great grandparents she was actually almost a part of the family but she really became a part of the family which down what is eastgate school now and she's buried in the lower village cemetery and i suspect she probably had quite a bit to do with anna living in the family but again i don't know all that was certain october twelfth eighty ninety in part again i quote the minister today gave us a few hints on reading trash and dime novels and i've changed my sunday occupation to writing letters and quote and on being catty i called again told you who is two girls were that he had at the circle so i shall say the room for something else i think golden hair is very pretty but i should think it would spoil here to bleach it on february third eight their illnesses that concerned folks then that we take for granted today measles being one and i pick some of these because i thought tom would be here tonight and even not he's going to be has just got over the measles and now is younger brother cecil has and quote throughout the winter in the spring it was i was just amazed at the amount of activity these young people did but there were sleigh ride skating pocket parties the circle and attainment and dances skipping a little bit into the summer in july of eighty ninety one humans into drowning in royal river and i think very likely he was one of the young men hating at that time of the year he also talks in july of a ride to poland springs but doesn't mention much more than that in that era poland springs was probably at its peak pretty interesting place a lot going on up there but from what i read the ricketts did as much as possible to keep locals away from their guests so the letter doesn't tell us but i wonder what the hayride where they write went and what they did i don't know if they were getting into mischief and and it's also worth mentioning that anna has a brother frank who is a rarity engineer living in bay city michigan i gather she has a system any who lives in the area but i don't know with who where she live again these half have conversations and of course we kind of missed that generation by a few decades on august tenth of a ninety eight hundred ninety one she mentions they go blu ray picking and gather thirty five squats i wish she'd said how many of them went and how they picked them that's a lot of blueberries if you're not using a rake and she also casually mentions a trip to peaks island the movie the ferry running in eighty nine she also mentions her love of the hammock that they have hanging in the house so if you can picture the front of the eastgate school of the home there i think that's were on in fact i think i've seen a picture of her danica in it and she uses it a lot for such things as letter writing sitting up late which she does often in of course at attaining boys was a magnet just like things that a day on october thirtieth eighteen ninety one she takes a trip to  on for a new one a cult but the real fun the letter is lots of girls talk and i quote we had a harvest festival at the vestry the other night i had a good time i counted fifteen boys that went to supper alone and fifteen girls i never such saw such boys in all my life is that our at the corner at the present day the girls didn't care we lots more than we would if somebody had taken us to sup three pieces pa and about tens of beans and four pieces of cake well my mistake was in telling the boys i hadn't been to supper i suppose they got somewhat frightened for they all know what a ferocious appetite after supper i wouldn't have anything to do with the boys in the winter of february twenty first eighteen ninety two and is in her seventeenth year in describes the clothes pin game and i quote we had a close kin pin game tuesday night tuesday night not a weekend they were out all the dime there were only two more boys and there was girls and those two are all right for they would have had a girl if they could they were just nineteen couples charlie and susie were there we had a very nice time at least i did an all or rest after i passed the clothes pins around to the girls i took what was left in the office where w was whose w w was selling clothes pins to the boys tally t followed me in and took a close been to met susie's put down the money and walked off that is one way lucy down to the hall and when they got there lucy went off and left and was with him for about five minutes all evening that is another way in  there was also a new game they play called under the juniper tree i think it kind of probably sounds like it was some sort of musical chairs but my time is limited this evening so i'm not going to get into that may twenty ninth eight hundred ninety two and it describes how she would be sure a lock in the merchant of venice which will be part of the graduation ceremonies although she doesn't specify whether that's at the stephen school  it is but plays and musicals rip really commonly held i almost suspect this might have been what that picture was right there but i don't know to say an on july thirteenth eight hundred ninety two year that i read hang time was very busy a great fan grandfather boarded up the twenty four men every year to accomplish the task and make light of all the dishes to be done and  the town records but many of them with a surprisingly short courtship october second eight hundred ninety two and i write about a visit from her brother frank the one that's living in bay city michigan he notes the may be getting married soon and has purchased a small house at this time she talked of all her brothers but meaning but the meaning is not only does she have her brother frank but she considers peel and fred as ones too i find it kind of interesting that she did not say the same for andrew jr but he was married and living down the road and roland at the time was living at home but she spoke specifically his column fred and peels her her brother's oct ninth eight hundred ninety two i kind of made note of this one because i thought it was interesting she talks of getting when she gets married it will be to an older man kind of prescient as two years later she marries fred she's nineteen and he's thirty three january first eight hundred ninety three and is now in her eighteenth year and the news this day is a long involved story of burglars in the railroad stations  gloucester in gray however the authorities are waiting in gray and escapade in this pretty well being whether she talks of many sleigh rides in skating parties and it's pretty clear that boys and girls do what they do including the boys showing off and falling through the ice i guess nothing of the change in january fourteenth eight hundred ninety three a busy letter but here's an excerpt quote there was a lecture there was to be a lecture in the vestry tonight by a portland lady and women's rights nel says are you going to the lecture you are going to the lecture tonight i do i said no i do not care anything about the alias this why any i should think you would stand up here right i told it i had rights enough it makes me tired to hear people talk of women's rights january twenty second eighteen ninety three an issue is that she is one hundred five pounds kind of heaven exciting sleigh ride on icy roads and these are quite often at night i mean they're on a street like sort of lost and now i don't know what it was like in eighty ninety three and you wonder what they used for lighting or whether they waited for nights like tonight when the moon was for april second eight hundred ninety three i thought this one out with an out she describes spending a long day in the dentist years of fillings and to have a tooth pulled and this is has happened more than once she was told to do over two sittings but didn't want to waste her time have a friend who is an archeologist that's retired we worked together a number of years ago she says that in most photos of that era people are on smiling and the reason that they were is they had bad teeth but i kind of divert a little bit i have a picture of my grandmother grandmother when she was around twenty eight with a full smile so i guess the family took some pride in taking care that the april subsequent let it suggest as today things dragged on for some time during the debates peal and i don't know why being out in minneapolis offered to help pay for installing steam my guess is that m steam heat but the offer was declined i can't think of anything else that steam would be on may fourteenth eight hundred ninety three and it talks about mating this is may fourteenth and maine they got lots but lots of what is not clear so jim and i talked about it and he poked around and i don't think it was as we used to do is kids here in new gloucester on may first hang may baskets and get candy i think they were actually going out to collect flowers and that makes some sense because it was may first was may fourteenth maybe somebody no i don't july six eighteen ninety three she s peel this is go a couple of days after the fourth of july so she asked peel if he took a ride on his wheel and again to the context i think you referring to a single wheeled bike i'm not sure that was actually came a lot were involved it's the same time our sharply before the two wheel bicycle had to tell the way the sentence is a construct of that but he says the wheel and we do know that he'll head a bicycle as i see a picture of tom it's in the book that tom put together and she relates that to feel that she and fred went to portland for the fourth of july events and for some reason not clear threaded want to eat any of the restaurants in town so they took the boat piques island and had lunch there so it's in pencil july twelfth eight hundred ninety three paying is going on as every summer and while mccall switchable she says this yesterday afternoon they twenty five men having sent in for some sweetened water i guess they won't stand for anymore right away as the spoon got a little too full of ginger we then we then we took some vinegar with a little molasses and some ice and soda constructed that was cape cod in long island and it really does kind of amaze me that how many people travel i mean there's a lot of discussion of what people are doing but when you think about it  trains were in vogue and well situated people get around pretty easily and she's in a lot enjoying lots of hammock time again bicycles come up as a fellow stop to chat and she discovers he is on a forty mile ride to freeport imagine that on gravel road and one speed bikes i mean i ride a bike to four thousand miles every summer and i don't go to freeport that o and obviously the hammock was visible from the road like i said it was a boy bag and i think there are no letters from august to october and i has travelled to the world's fair and to visit her brother in  michigan and after this point in time she begins to address peel as my brother and uses her middle name to reset a sign on and you have to read all the letters to appreciate it but the letter closings are abrupt which is is mary also tell you the story chances are when they're done they're done and she just as good bye that's it oct tenth eight hundred ninety three a very descriptive letter of a train trip home from the fear includes her visit to the higher falls which truly impressed as she actually talked more about niagara falls and she did about there and if anybody's done any reading about the great white city in eighty ninety three that was rather spectacular world's fair i guess first use of electricity and why they called it the white city and thanks to her railroading brother she was able to make connections more easily than most to me at times it sort of sounded like flying today uncertain but she was also lucky to have missed a very serious train accident let's killed a large number of people like yes there were people that came and went to the world's fair all over the place from what i've read an elite i think half country's population went to the eighty ninety three wills there which is pretty amazing when you consider the time she says actually very little about the fair she thanked you for helping her enjoying it but it's hard to tell if the actually accompanied her i just provided advice again it's a problem with intruding on a two way conversation when you can only hear one side of it or see one side of it she does mention enjoying the exhibit there was a special arts building at the fair  and i think that's because throughout the letters she spends a great deal of time creating both water and oil paintings of her own of scenes around the stone one wonders where they ever get to in nov twenty first of eight ninety three and they get to self kicked out of the stephen school for truancy it's a very long that explanation but basically she left to visit another school but not being aware of the rules she was tuned i'm quite  as a lot more of the story than revealed in her letter however she was able to sweet talk itself back into the school's good graces you know the letter she makes fun of miss sophie the constant in the teaching staff who leaves also without permission a lot of tongue in cheek in that one in the same communication she talks of fred building a camp for the window down at the abrupt wish where he and a searles fellow will spend the winter while never really discussed i think they will logging a lot in that vicinity but i'm not sure which one and i have no idea it puzzles me i'd like to know what the camp was built it was a very small camp but it appears from other letters it was a very convenient place for parties and sleigh rides that  winter in fact in december first eight hundred ninety three she's speaking speaking of iraq she says the first ride of the winter is to be there they're going down to be a brook different scamp in december eighteenth eight hundred ninety three lots pre christmas chatter and lots of parties attended and i mean a lot i mean they must have been out for five nights during the christmas season doing some but the plan is developed to get christmas dinner on december twenty village she never really specified but she talked about dances oxter presentations festivals in the entertainments and i think the term entertainments covered a whole lot of ground that's frequently mentioned but without specific definition so anybody knows what the entertainments were they were obviously plenty of them in january twenty first of eight hundred ninety three a letter is filled with mentions of visit the camp fred camp and parties frequently these parties and slayer i did it into the next morning i'm talking like one to two o'clock in the morning the kids are out right now around in sleighs and causes and no lights and yeah that's what's fun about this whole thing and several menges a being locked out of the house and they got home and fred sleeping in the bonnet and her throwing rocks at windows and getting in but no munchen mention of any on a personal level my impression is that anna was her own woman for sure she was very intelligent in this g v s so one of the things that came up since i kind of put this together was just a little box jim sent in the mail and there was a gold medal and a silver medal and and i got a little silver medal will turn this in tonight with the letters that was kind of interesting but again to summarize it's amazing how many activities in both the school and the church that young people in that era participated in it was actually pretty amazing to me two or three times a week all year round they were doing something and she obviously worked as part of the household without doubt it was a lot of hard work when you're talking about feeding twenty twenty five men and paying c s and the house was full of family of course and there were lots of talk of calls being  repaired and made and dishes being done but it was not in a complaining thing was just a that's the way it was so one could also gather that in those times it was apparently ok to work out and play hard and so that's a little bit about the letters of the victorian teenager anybody got any questions they probably can answer well the ones that i covered from one thousand nine hundred eighty ninety four but really a three year period because it was the early one nine hundred ninety four that they kind of ceased to she was trying to get people to come home which i don't think they really wanted to do there yes know that would have been before the trolley line they took the right they took the railroad they take the railroad and again when you read letters like this like of course nobody writes letters now which is unfortunate but if you were to read a letter or a series of letters now you'll probably not find people talking about things like modes of transportation how they got there where they went i mean a lot of it's pretty general and you have to assume what she's talking about because she doesn't mention it specifically for example one i mention the one about people going on vacation you know and she says the cape but you would think cable is about but i think in context of the letter probably cape cod and because a long island is mentioned in the same breath and so people took the train and a lot of places but it's it was made out to anna to resupport us so it would have to been prior to eighty ninety four when she married fred so it would have made her in a teenage years but whether she was ten twelve thirteen fourteen who knows which i guess the building is still there right oh yeah she was a teenager living with you know like i said now he was older then fred fred and an ameri when she was nineteen and he was thirty three i think when she was fifteen my grandfather was like thirty four so all the letters there's no there's no suggestion of romance there's a lot of teasing because she teases my grandfather a lot about his girlfriend he keeps she keeps know the family i think the history of the family is always been one of trying to help out in the community as far as i know i have papers on other situations in the past where they purchased indentured servants that they could be relieved of their obligations in early on the way the town was run the town didn't have a lot of money and i guess the family was fortunate they were pretty good famished for the when there's a lot of mention of them buying clothes for the poor and then when the town hit town meeting appropriated the funds that it paid to family back so family near as i can tell tried to do the right thing in town people and stuff so i think they took over in what the circumstances were i don't know but this if you didn't know what the circumstance was you'd think she was quite literally a member of the family i mean she refers all  is eighty eight letters there and they're all three or four pages long and i don't want to keep you here all night it's already been longer than i thought it would be  oh i think that's right and if you go to the library you will find because jim found a point that i wrote and she called the east gate house the matchbox house the reason because there were a lot of romances put together there and there's a point that's hanging in the library with a picture of the house that's amusing if your family member  know i don't think it anything to do with it i think when he married he bought the lot in that old church was there any move the church from its location to use as a barn if you've ever house yeah yeah there's a long shed which is now living quarters i've not been in the house for many many  i think the people who own it now there are living quarters that they use that is that's in the long she had was nothing but a place to put firewood when i was a get