E.C. CASHIER'S CL.

Paris - L'Arc de Triomphe

4 rue de l'Ecole de Médecine

Paris, August 1, 1937

My dear Edward,

Your last letter recounting your daily stint
in this hot weather (that is, hot where you are,
for the weather here is most divine) filled me
with extreme compassion for you. Will there be
no opportunity at all for you to get away for
a little while in the country, or at least to
some nearby beach? The weather here has been the
kind that I would order, were there any hope that
my orders would be respected. Cool, balmy days
have been our lot so far, only one day of rain,
and then such a gentle, shy rain, as if it fell
in a tender apology for its intrusion. Not a
crash of thunder, not a flash of lightning so
far. Of course that will come along with the
middle of August, but it is never as fierce here
as at home. These are really what one may call
halcyon days. And yet so ungrateful is the heart

2

of man, that I am not completely satisfied. There
is a great void that cannot be filled on this
side...... A propos of a respite for yourself some-
time this summer, do you think it might be arranged
for you to spend a few days with me in Pleasant-
ville after I return? I ought to get back some-
where near the last day of August or the first day
of September, and after a day or two in New York
I shall go to Pleasantville to stay until the
9th of September. I must report back to school on
the 10th. It would be fine if you could go there
with me. I think Hemby and a friend of his might
want to go also; the four of us could have a great
deal of fun. Do think it over and be ready to
tell me if you can go when I return.....By now
Clinton has received the card you asked me to send
him. I wonder if he was really fixed fooled.....
It is strange and most embarrassing that each
time you ask me to do something I am unable to
comply with your request. My embarrassment is all
the more keen as what you are such simple and
apparently easily fulfilled requests. First of all,
I have not been able to get a copy of Revelation\ any where. Now I must also confess that a copy
of Seul sung by Jean Sablon is not to be procured
for love or for money. As soon as I noted your re-
quest I went to search for the record. I was able to
hear it, but not to buy it. I can see you now
wrinkling your nose and wondering what sense that
last sentence of mine makes. Let me explain. The
French people on the whole live in a most penur-
ious fashion, not that have no money, but that they
are forever saving. One of the consequences of
this thrift is that not many of them have radios
or photographs. To make up for this household
deficiency, there are scattered throughout the
city numerous record shops where for the equiva-
lent of two and a half cents in our money dropped
into a slot machine, they may hear through ear-
phones any record that happens to be in the reper-

3

toire of the moment. I went to one of these places,
inscribed my money and was able to hear the Sablon
record. I could well imagine why you would like
to have it. It was most hauntingly sung. However,
when I went to the sales department and asked to
buy the record, I was informed that there was not
one to be had in the city. It seems that the compo-
ser of the song had some business difficulties with
either Sablon or the company that makes his records,
and insisted that every record of that particular
song be withdrawn from circulation. I have institu-
ted such inquiries among the few friends I have
been in the hope that one of them may be able to
unearth the record from some one, someplace, but
I have no high hopes. This failure makes me most
miserable...... My thanks to you for sending me
the clipping about the exhibition of modern French
Art. It had been my plan to go sometime, but your
letter with its enclosure sent me scurrying there
at once. Some of the paintings were most beautiful,
but as I am not very modern in my taste for painting
and music, there was much there that distressed me
more than it pleased me. There was only one Picasso
that I liked. Some of Matisse's work stirred me,
and all of Marie Laurencin. However, I think what
pleased me most was the work of Utrillo about which
I had been reading some time past. I suppose it
was the simplicity of it that got across to me. But
there was so much that reminded me of a nightmare.
....... I am so happy that you have at last heard
Marian Anderson. When I say that it is altogether
your own fault that you did not hear her last
season, you will doubtless wonder what I mean. You
must ask me when you see me again. But I really
think her voice is the most marvelous I have heard.
There are several of her records in the repertoire
of this shop which I spoke before, and each day I
go in to hear her sing Sibelius' setting of Come
Away, Death, And In Sad Cypress Let Me Be Laid.

4

Yous shall hear it when I return and tell me if
it is not an excuse for tears. I am bringing at
least seven recordings by her. Prepare thine ears
for a feast....I must confess that my poetic out-
put so far has been very little: two stanzas on a
long poem, two stanzas of translation from the
French of Verlaine, and two acrostics which I tore
up as being unworthy of the name they were to
have represented...I am glad that you are keeping
your book of personalia (is there such a word?);
for I am sure that it will help to keep you busy
and happy. Perhaps I shall be allowed a peek at it
sometime?....I am glad you met Miss White and so
were able to gauge somewhat my feelings of dis-
appointment the day of my departure. I should like
for you to like her. She is really a very fine
person. Her name is White, but on the stage she
uses the name of Carter. There were some things
you asked in your letter that I would rather dis-
cuss with you when I see you. That will not be
very long now, the way the days are going,--and yet
they cannot not fly too fast for me. I have a
keen nostalgia such as I have not had before when
I have been here....By now you must have moved
into your new apartment. I hope it is all that you
and your family hoped it would be. If you can
answer this the same day you get it (or at least
a day or two afterwads) your letter will reach me
before I leave. Yo te.........tan mucho.

Paris - Les Bouquinistes

Paris, August 15, 1937

Dear Edward,

What an impressive list your summer reading makes! I shall hardly know how to talk to you when I see you. You must not expect me to be as erudite as I am sure you are by now, for my summer literature has been of the most frivolous nature. Horror stories! I bought an omnibus of the most hair-raising, horrendous stories imaginable shortly after my arrival here and it has been my custom each night to read a story before going to bed. The result is that my head is filled with all sorts of nightmarish phantasies which only bother me in the day, for at night my slumber is as unbroken as a child's....

How glad I am that you have been able to get away to camp, for a brief respite. The change should be most welcome if the city heat has been at all what I hear it has. The last time I went to a camp for any length of time was when I was hardly past my ninth year, so camp life is most unfamiliar to me. I hope your visit to camp will not prevent

3

The American invasion of Paris
continued unabated. They seem to come in by the
thousands every day, and this is the time of
the year when the Parisians themselves turn over
the city to the foreigners. Every good Parisian
who can afford it, at no matter how great
a sacrifice, goes away for at least two
weeks in August. And Paris without the Parisians
is a little less than its real gay self.

This is church day (my father would
drag me to curch if we were in the wilds of
Africa and there were anything like a church to
be found there), and consequently a rather dull
day. I have just finished cataloguing my summer
purchases and am still wondering if I shall have
to lie to the customs officials about values of
not. I am also worried about getting my re-
cords across without any casualties. I am not the
most adroit person in the world, in fact I am
rather gauche, and something is bound to happen
between here and home. And the records are so
lovely! I bought two recordings by Jean Sablon,
but Seul is absolutely unobtainable.

One of the most thrilling sights I
have witnessed in a long time was the French
presentation of the Divine Passion which was given
here for ten days. The play had Notre-Dame Cath-
dral as its background, with a great raised
stage in front and a huge platform seating about
twelve thousand spectators. A comparison with the
Oberammergau presentation which I saw in 1930 was
inevitable. I believe the French version was more
picturesque, but I liked the German version more.
The French looked only like Frenchmen while the
Germans actually looked like Israelites and
Romans. Of course my father enjoyed it immensely.

2

you from accepting my invitation to pass a week
with me in the country. I am hoping Harold will
be able to come also. It is rather tame down there,
but if one is looking for rest and quiet, tameness
is not to be deplored. The beach is not too far
away, and all the social amenities may be observed
in Atlantic City which is only twenty minutes
distant. I hope you will be able to come.

This is probably the last letter I
xxix shall write you before sailing. We were
finally able to get definite space on the Normandie
sailing August 25th. The Normandie has been shat-
tering so many records recently (the blue ribbon
is hers for keeps, I am sure) that there is no
telling how soon she may land us in New York
harbor. I doubt very much, however, that we will
land before Monday August 30. If you can make it,
it would be nice to see you at the dock. If you
cannot make it to the dock, will you phone me at
my house sometime Monday afternoon or evening? I
shall remain at home until ten o'clock at least,
before venturing out to see how much change has
taken place in Harlem in six weeks.

Did I tell you that I had been
suffering with the hives? I think it must have
been the wine that did it, although I was inclined
at first to blame it on the water. It was much
more satisfactory to think that it was the fault
of the water, but after leaving off the wine
(which every body else drinks like water) I
discovered the hives had left me. So I have be-
come, willy-nilly, a member of the Temperance
League for the rest of my stay here.

I wanted very much to send Leon a
card from here, but unfortunately went away with-
out his address. When you see him will you explain
that to him and tell him how much I hope that he
is enjoying himself this summer? That makes you
an emissary of peace. Do you release the role?

Hotel St. Pierre
4 rue de l'Ecole de Médecine
Paris

August 2, 1938

My dear Edward Q.

I am afraid that I have been rather remiss in not congratulating you sooner on reaching your majority. Now you can vote and do something to see that our wretched country is better governed. But really how does it feel to feel yourself finally man? It is a gentle transition isn't it, and not one-half as exciting as it sounds when one is only twenty!.... I hope your mother received your letter from France. I mailed it at once.....My trip over was as uneventful as possible; it seemed that the weather was made to order. Not a sign of an upset stomach the whole length of the boat. I slept a lot, read a lot, played a great deal of bridge, and had not a single adventure......And what a child I am at heart, to find myself thrilled in the same delightful way as soon as my train reaches the outskirts of Paris. Oh, to have money and stay here forever. Not having money, thank God for the job that lets me come every summer. But next summer I have my mind set on Haiti. I am convinced that the spirit there will be French, however, even if a bit sun-burned; and therein should consist its charm.... I have finally been able to secure a Sablon record of SEUL for you. It seems that the litigation which prevented my having it last summer has been adjusted and now all the world may hear for a few pence the nostalgic Monsieur Sablon tell of the distresses of loneliness. I am sure you will like the record if I succeed in getting it back whole....How have you liked the sumptuous Sumter heat (isn't that terrible?!) We are just beginning to have a round of fireworks here; the past three days have been cauldrons. I am sitting here now with all the blinds drawn and as few clothes on as decency will permit, and if it gets any hotter, I shall simply throw decency to the winds.....It is really too hot to write even to you, so all I shall do is keep for you all the things you will want to know when I see you. I shall leave here August 30, arriving in New York either the 5th or 6th of September. I shall hope to see you shortly thereafter.

BRONX CENTRAL

Mr. Edward Atkinson
70 UI-2 Comb's Place
New York City

apt. 3B

May 3, 1941

Dear Edward,

It wasn't sheer prevarication which caused me not to show
up at either of those two places last week, but I simply couldn't
get away. Perhaps you weren't at either place yourself! Somewhere
or other, on some slip of paper which I have in the meanwhile lost,
I made a notation of those evenings you go to school and of
those on which you are free (more or less). Won't you drop me
a note with that information again so I can have it at hand? I
enjoyed so much seeing you the last time, and hope to see you again
soon.

SPECIAL DELIVERY

Mr. Edward Atkinson
70 McComb's Place
New York City

Apr. 30

HALF LETTER

E LETTER

STAT

APR. 30B

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
INDUSTRY AGRICULTURE

BRONX

ANNEX

CENTRAL

FOREIGN
POSTAGE
1 CENTS

FOREIGN
POSTAGE
1 CENTS

Mr. Edouard Atkinson
70 McCombs Place
New York City

Apr. 3 B.

5875

Monday Night

Dear Edward,

I am sorry that your date is off for Wednesday as a first-
nighter. It had given me a warm glow of pleasure to feel that to
some small degree I was going to aid in your having a good time.
But there will be another time, no doubt.

Thanks for asking me to come to Phil's party. I should like
very much to come, but one thing must be taken into consideration
quite frankly by you. If there is to be some one there in whom
you will be very obviously interested, I do not think I'd like to
come; for, whether you believe me or not, that would pain me. You
can let me know, and if, after due consideration, you reply that you
think that after all I had better not come, I will not hold it
against you. I shall still be pleased that you asked me in the
first place. However, if you still want me to come, let me know
when and where.

My best to you in all things and at all times.

Mr. Edward Atkinson
70 Uc² Comb's Place
New York City

BRONX
ANEX

Mr. Edward Atkinson
70 McCombs Place
New York City

APR. 3B.

GE
N

Apt. 3B

STAT

apt. 3B

Pleasantville

Friday

Dear Edward,

I am coming in Monday instead of Tuesday. I will leave here on
the three-ten getting into New York at Pennsylvania Station (I am
coming by train) about six-ten. Will either you or Harold meet me
please? I'd rather it were you. Phone Harold and agree on which of you
will meet me. I'll do as much for you someday. All my best.

C.

Mr. Edward Atkinson
70 McComb's Place
New York, N. Y.

Apt. 3B

Pleasantville, N. J.

Augst 26, 1942

Dear Edward,

I think you complained that my first letter to you was skimpy. Happily
I cannot retort thine likewise." Although I had just seen you two days be-
fore getting your letter, everything in it seemed novel and invigorating.
I could almost imagine your saying the felicitous words to me, and your
twist of head and glance of eye with each expression. Young man, you write
a delightful letter, which is a fair recompense, since you write them so
infrequently.

I am sure you do not expect me now to make any direct answers to any
of your comments since these were all gone over when I saw you. Yet a
comment here and there may not be totally amiss. Thanks to your suggestion
about Calomine Lotion, along with its application, in conjunction with
the frantic use of at least three other suggested remedies, I no longer
have athlete's foot....I have not read Past Imperfect but to please you, I
will....I am afraid The Philadelphia Story is doomed not to have a
dénouement soon....I am also afraid (I bless at this moment the distance
that separates us) that there will be no party on my return. Your recital
of the woeful manners of your friend C. O. has put me quite out of mind
of risking having him at Mandalay. I shall probably be accused of never
keeping my word, and because of this defection every affectionate protesta-
tion I ever made in the past will, no doubt, be most vigorously discounted.
I shall spend my days now trying to devise means of making amends.

Do not consider this a letter. Tis but a mere commentary written in
haste in the little time I have to myself while the rest of the family,
leaving only my father and me at home, have gone out with a two-fold
purpose: to catch some crabs and to gawk in admiration at Father Divine's
Brigantine Palace on the Atlantic.

September first will see me back in New York, alone. Although it will
be Tuesday and Canteen night for you, I am grateful for your willingness
(I hope you have not forgotten or repented of it!) to see me after Canteen
hours. I shall stay at home and wait for you. Do you have a couple of
dollars you can put out until you see me? If so, get tickets for us to
see a play together on September second ( that is if you have no engagement).
If you haven't seen ANGEL STREET, I should enjoy seeing it with you. If
you have, then get tickets to something musical. I have seen nothing
gay in a long time.

A new book of ghost stories has just arrived and I am anxious to be
frightened.

Much of what I would say would be only a repetition of things fix to
which you refuse to lend any credence. Therefore until the first of
September a most dignified adieu.

C.

HALF LETTER

TER

BRONX CENTRAL
ANNEX

Monday

D, B.,

There are several things I'd like you to do for me, if you will, nothing especially strenuous, just a little time-taking. First of all, will you by hook or crook, personally, or by messenger, in which ever way is easiest for you, see that I get the scrap-book before Thursday evening. I have a special reason for asking this. Do it for me.

Secondly, I shall be home all day New Year's Day until seven in the evening because my family and I's are coming for dinner. Will you sometime during the day telephone me to wish me a happy New Year and the hope (if you feel that way) that it may be like other years in a way particularly important to me. At any rate, will you let me hear your voice the first day of the year. It will mean a great deal to me.

Last of all, will you arrange to see me Saturday night at G's about nine-thirty. Even if you have to leave later on (as you usually do) for a romp elsewhere, will you do this for me, because it will mean so much to me. I have missed seeing you. Today while at Harold's I wanted to phone you, but I thought this would be a better way of making all these requests. The enclosure is my way of hoping for a quick response.

You do not know to what extent you figure in my fondest wishes and in my prayers.

Apt. 3B

BRONX

BRONX CENTRAL
ANNEX

BRONX

STAT

Mr. Edward Athkinson
70 McCombs Place
New York, N.Y.

435 Convent Avenue
New York, N. Y.

August 12, 1943

Dear Edward,

I hope you will pardon this prompt plunge into correspondance, but there
was about your card a tone that made me feel that a quick reply might not be
held too suspect. Forgive me if I err.

For me the weather is stormy although to the casual and unburdened eye
it might not appear so. The morning you left I was up playing over and over
Dein Blaues Augen, beginning exactly at eight-thirty which, that morning, was
for me an unforgettable part of time. Certain that the music had been
written to words by Heine, I went grimly and determinedly searching through
my books for my copy of Heine's poems, hoping to find the words there and
to copy them off and send them to you. It seems that I was quite wrong, and
that the words were not written by Heine. I shall make it my business to find
out the author's name, and the translation of the text.

The same day you left I translated a poem from the French of Baudelaire.
I send it to you. read in it whatever you care to. The handwritten copy is
my original translation which, I presume, will shortly find its way to the
hands of C. V. V.

There are too many questions I want to ask you about the army for me to
begin to put them down. I am sure that in the course of the many letters I
hope to get from you, you will at some time or other touch upon every question
I would have asked you. Nothing can be too minute or too unimportant to be of
interest to me. The injections you received may have cramped your arm,
but they did nothing to your script; it didn't wobble one bit. My adieux may
have seemed fatalistic and prophetic to you because I am afraid I could not
help dramatising the situation, but the only prophecy intended was that you
will, after the first moments of uncertainty and silent resentment, be as
happy and as peaceful as any one can be in the army. Let me reiterate, even
to the point of bringing you, that you have it in you to make yourself liked,
respected, and promoted.

Harold came to see me this morning. Shall I confess to a wicked and
yet so human delight that he had not as yet heard from you? He was here all
morning listening to some music that Lucky Roberts is writing for a play
of mine, ST. LOUIS WOMAN, which has been going from producer to producer
to these many years. The music is delightfully swingable, even though the
lyrics (mine!) may not be too singable. With luck you may hear them some
day.

Roi Ottley's new book, NEW WORLD A COMING, is being magnificently reviewed
by all the papers. I am hoping it will make him a wealthy man. Last Saturday
afternoon he was the speaker on the radio program OF MEN AND BOOKS,
Although he was good, the high point of the program was a poem of Owen's
read by the men in charge of the program. It was a beautiful and stirring
poem about the thoughts of a black mother in these times. Perhaps you heard
it, or perhaps even then they were jabbing you with needles, or to your
scarlet displeasure, divesting you of all privacy. Let it not harden you
too much!

2

Last night I thought of you again (but when do I not?) while Dorothy Meynor was singing, so divinely, a program of Mozart arias. I know you did not care for her when you heard her last, but I think you might have changed your mind had you been listening last night.

The program on which the Mayor's Committee was working will open Sunday at one over WNYC. Mrs. Roosevelt will be our first speaker. It may seem now somewhat like locking the stable with the horse out and away, but still we hope that the programs may do a bit of good. If there is a radio near, and the hep-cats are not using it, I hope you will tune in. How can the world be turned to love? I doubt that there is a way.

Monday I go to Pleasantville to stay until the first of September. Perhaps you will not, at the beginning, hold me too strictly to the agreed ratio of a two-to-one correspondence, and will let me have a letter from you while I am in Pleasantville. The address is R. F. D. 1 Box 26, Pleasantville, N. J. Before I go, though, I must go down to Herold's and have him unearth for me some photos which he has been keeping for me. I need to look at them again, now more than ever.

If things as they are seem to me a terrible and odious adversary, I yet have memory as a bright solicitous comrade who bids me reflect and be not too sad.

Write!

Oct. 4, 1943

Dear Edward,

Since writing you last, I have put in my first evening at the canteen, and even at the risk of being unpleasantly self-complimentary I cannot refrain from remarking that I put in a good three hours' work. How well I impressed my captain and co-workers about the possibility of doing as good a job as my predecessor remains to be seen. However I do believe that the naval and military habitués of the place resented me, for while I was in the corner drying trays I could feel some of them looking at me as much as to say: "What are you doing here and where is the little one?"

Last Sunday Ida and I want to see the Katherine Dunham Dancers. They were a sizzling treat. I pointed Linwood out to Ida and told her he was one of your friends. She thought he looked a little like you (I don't think so at all) but that he lacked your good looks. Linwood, by the way, was having his special field day, kicking and cavorting with the utmost abandon. It did one's heart good to watch him enjoy himself so thoroughly.

My father came to town yesterday to pitch his tent with us from now on. He came laden with about a hundred jars of sundry vegetables and fruits canned during the summer. So the larder will not suffer this winter at all. Harry has of necessity left us and taken a room at the Y. He and Howard Jordan, who also lives at the Y., plan to take an apartment as soon as they can find one. But that is a problem.

I stay headache ridden most of the time and am therefore most continent in meat and drink, but I believe the best relief I could get would be to use a machete on my head. To the headaches add the constant heart-burn from which I suffer and you have a picture of me in this year of the second World War, beshrew it!

Speaking of pictures reminds me of Mr. Jackman who has in his custody a set of pictures on which I dote. Last week I had him get them out for me to see if the sight of them would not help me divert a particularly melancholy mood. They worked like magic.

But what of you? If no news be good news, then I am content to have it so. But reassure me when you can.

As ever,

Saturday

DB,

My week-end was a most miserable one. Friday I awoke with a screaming headache, in fact I went to bed with it Thursday night. I had to stay away from work and of course could not come in Friday evening. That was the source of my chief chagrin. I could have borne the headache well enough if I had not had to forbear that on which I had had my mind all week. Please arrange for this Friday. I shall keep candles buring against a headache. I'll phone you Friday evening.

In the meantime I have to report that as yet the magazine you wished me to autograph has not put in its appearance. Lost, strayed or stolen I wot not. Or did you by chance entrust it to some one to mail who with the best of intentions may still have it lying around somewhere? Perhaps it will find its way here by Monday, but most things directed here usually wind up here at a more rapid rate than that.

It is unusually lovely up here today, and I have spent more than half the day mowing grass, gathering stray twigs to use as kindling later on when the cold comes, and raking up the remnant of the leaves scattered over my lawn with unappreciated largesse by the recent hurricane.

All things good to you.

P. S. My very best wishes to your Mama. I think she likes me better than you do.

STATIC

Mr. Edward Atkinson
70 McCombs' Place
New York, N.Y.

C. Cullen
41 Grand View Blvd.
Tuckahoe 7, N.Y.

Sunday

DB,

I did not come to see you Friday evening as I said I would, because I suddenly grew angry at myself for soliciting an invitation which, had it been tendered without prompting, would have given me inestimable pleasure. You must forgive me and try to understand that I am apt to be over-sensitive where you are concerned. I was of course deeply disturbed to know that you had been ill, and I do hope that you are perfectly well now. I hope you will simply smile at my childish ways and meet me, if you are well by then, on Friday at G's. At any rate I shall phone you again Friday evening between seven and seven thirty.

I had something mildly exciting to tell you. Perhaps it will still be news when I see you.

C.

Why could you not have said, "Since I am not well, why don't you come up and talk a while with me."? I would have risked my neck getting there.

COUNCIL AGAINST INTOLERANCE
IN AMERICA

ONE NATION
INDIVISIBLE
1943-44

Mr. Edward Atkinson
70 M^c Combs' Place
New York, N.Y.

APR. 30

Sunday

Dear Edward,

The ink-eradicated condition of this envelope
and the one enclosed is an instance of one of my
feeble attempts to economize.

Will you meet me there Friday at nine, and will
you make the arrangements? Let me know.

I hope you have not been too reticent to make
inquiries in the proper circles concerning how
something better might be found.

R

A5

HALFLETTER

hij 't zogervan!  
page mar 2 emarf 14  
___  
___  
___

Mr. Edward Atkinson
70 McCombs Place
New York, N. Y.

Apr. 30B