The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-08-08
LETTERS ARE DECREASING
From the Indianapolis News

From the Indianapolis News
 .HHERE has been much lamentation
 of late years over the lost art
 A of letter writing. The blame has been pretty evenly divided between the innocent post card and the useful tele- phone, and, reading the plaintive com ments, we almost weep over the ter rible state of affairs. A recent experi- nlent, however has changed our views on this particular matter. Moving from a big house to a small one, we found it necessary to do lot of con densing and some eliminating. and, among other things, it seemed best for trunkful of old letters to be elimin- ated. Of course, we waded through all of them, for fear some valuable
 document might be lost. There were letters to represent all ages. Simple
 childish affairs; foolish sentimental epistles; long, sad pages of admonition
 Old fashioned letters from kinsfolk {?
 Yes. scores of them. You remember
 now they ran. The first page was giv- en over to taking the pen in hand to let you know they were well, and hop
 ing you were enjoying the same great
 blessing, if not they would be very sorry to hear of it. On the second
 page. your cousin informed you that
 father had been suffering during the
 winter months with rheumatism, and that mother had also been quite poorly. tBy the way, what has become of the poorly" people? On the third page
 she stated the piece of plaid gingham inclosed with the letter was like her new dress The red piece was like
 Emma Janes new dress, and the blue
 and the yellow were like Mary's chill orens new dresses. On the last page she invariably wound up by saying that she must close because her hand was growing very tired. She ask ed you to excuse the bad penmanship,
 and write soon, etc. And postage was high then too!
 But the old-tim love letters, ah, me, and ah, me! No wonder many of them required excess postage. Sweet stun | usually~i is heavy. We were thankful that we had plucked up the courage to eliminate them. It would have been great pity fof posterity to waste | time going through them. Lost art, eh? Thank goodness that some phases of 1t have been lost. We'd rather our | boys and girls made dates with a few l jerky sentences over the telephone. | slammed up the receiver and hustled out to the croquet grounds or tennis court out in the blessed fresh air and sunshine. doing their courting in whole l some. healthful 'fashion, instead of sit | ting mewed up over a desk, nibbling | penholder while studying up stuff
 with which to disfigure highly tinted
 and scented stationery. Life Is too short to waste any of 1t on unneces- sary letter writing, and, besides, we | change our minds too frequently now adays to risk putting our thoughts
 down in black and white.
 1 Don't wisunderstand and get the mo- 1 tion that we are frowning on all kinds | of correspondence. Don't stop writing s l tU mother-that kind of letter will all
 ways be in good style. And mothers
 don't stop writing to the boys and 1 girls away from home. They hunger l for the home news and the assurance of your unchanging, undying love
 And sweethearts, separated by long dreary miles-write sensible. helpful
 cherry letters. Pure, strong love let