For this year’s April A-Z Challenge I am blogging everyday using items taken from the letters written by my grandfather to my grandmother from 1907 to 1912, starting with “A” and moving right through the alphabet to “Z” during April.

Address: Miss Pearl Reed, 2730 Kenwood Ave, City

3/30/’09

In my judgement, the weather today was entirely to cold for our proposed trip, and trust that in that you were not at all disappointed.  I did not write you earlier because until noon I was still planning to come. Why I did not come to see you I think you understand and I will not venture an explanation. Believe me I am very very sorry if you have been.

Do not be angry with me. If you think me careless or indifferent, you do me a great injustice.  I can conceive of no greater pleasure than seeing and being with you. 

Yes I am quite well again but as “lonely, lonely as can be.”  I finished my story – of course it was the usual – woman’s faithfulness and man’s unfaithfulness.  Of course those men and women we read of are the men and women of the past.

Have thought of you continuously this afternoon thinking of possibly I might have been offending you, but I remembered that love was long suffering – endureth all things for its object, then felt sure that you would understand – forgive and forget.

Will make one date that not withstanding the weather it will be possible to keep – will you on Thursday afternoon visit our college with me?  I will be out about 2 o’clock at any rate.

Albert

P.S. Pen, ink & writer all are on the bum.  I hope you can read it.

A.B.C.

__________________________________

Perhaps my grandfather got his “lonely, lonely as can be” line. from this song that came out in 1905. There was sheet music too and I wonder if my grandmother played it on the piano.

I imagine Pearl was none too pleased to receive this last minute cancellation after she had made her way to their meeting place.

My grandmother and her family had been living at 2730 Kenwood Ave since at least 1903.  Her older brother, George owned the house.  He was a laborer and lived there until illness in 1945 forced him to move to Detroit to live with Albert and Pearl and their family.

Albert and his brothers lived about 2.5 miles south of Kenwood at 510 Fayette.  A street car ran straight between them, with only short walks on each end to reach the line. When I visited Indianapolis in 2005, the house on Fayette was still standing and looking good. 2739 Kenwood has been torn down, paved over and was a parking lot.

You can read the letter my grandfather wrote a year later where he references this one here.

For this year’s April A-Z Challenge I am blogging everyday using items taken from the letters written by my grandfather to my grandmother from 1907 to 1912, starting with “A” and moving right through the alphabet to “Z” during April.

Steamer Eastern States
Aug 9 – ’09
…”I am sorry that your mother is not well and I trust that ere this she is in health and spirit what you would have her be.
          Have seen several people from Indianapolis whom I know among them were Drs Hummons & Atkins who were in Detroit the other day enroute to Niagra Falls and Toronto.  To see them come and go makes one homesick.
Sweetheart is real late and I m tired and sleepy will write you a long sweet letter next time.

                                                                                                                          With much love I am
                                                                                                                          your
                                                                                                                                 Albert

In this letter Albert wrote to Pearl in Benton Harbor, MI, where she has gone for a summer visit.  Two of her older sisters, Sarah Reed Busby and Louise Reed Shoemaker lived there with their families.

Dr. Henry L. Hummons was about 10 years older than my grandfather and a leader in Indianapolis’ black community.  He had attended Knoxville College, as did my grandfather and also graduated from Indiana Medical College, which my grandfather was attending. Dr. Hummons had set up his practice in Indianapolis. He took a leading role in starting Witherspoon Presbyterian Church, of which my grandparents and my grandfather’s brothers were founding members. He and my great uncle, Henry Cleage, were leaders in the campaign to get a black YMCA in Indianapolis as the white ones were not integrated.  His name appears in several of my grandfather’s later letters.  You can read more about him in the obituaries below.

“Dr. Henry Lytle Hummons (M.D., Med. Coll. Ind. ’02) of Indianapolis, Indiana, died on April 5, 1956 after a prolonged illness. He was 83. Dr. Hummons was born in Lexington, Kentucky on February 25, 1873, the son of Thomas and Mary Ellen Hummons. He received his early education in the local public schools and graduated from Knoxvillle College in 1896. In that year he came to Indianapolis, and later entered the old Medical College of Indiana from which he received the M.D. in 1902. He served an internship in Shelbyville Hospital in 1903 and entered practice in Indianapolis in that year.

He was long active in medical, civic and church activities.  In 1919 he established the city’s first free tuberculosis clinic at Flanner House.  he was one of the co-founders of the Senate Avenue branch of the Y.M.C.A.  With the aid of Mr. Henry Cleage, he organized the Witherspoon United Presbyterian Church 49 years ago.  The Omega Psi Phi fraternity, of which he was a member, named him their “Man of the Year,” in 1953.  Also in 1953 he received a pin from the Indiana Medical Association in recognition of his 50 years service as a physician.”

For this year’s April A-Z Challenge I am blogging everyday using items taken from the letters written by my grandfather to my grandmother from 1907 to 1912, starting with “A” and moving right through the alphabet to “Z” during April.

I’m not sure why my grandfather Albert sent this card with the child graduate and no message. His own graduation from Medical school was still 8 months away.  He is using a different address, so perhaps this was a test card to make sure it arrived safely, away from the hostile eyes of Pearl’s mother.  Her mother was opposed to their relationship.

For this year’s April A-Z Challenge I will be blogging everyday using items taken from the letters written by my grandfather to my grandmother from 1907 to 1912, starting with “A” and moving right through the alphabet to “Z” during April.

“June 27, 1909 (On board the Steamer “Eastern States” – Lake Erie)
This is Sabbath night about 10:00 o’clock and we are about six hours ride out of Detroit and about twelve miles from land in the shortest direction.

Surroundings are such as to impress one with his insignificance and emphasize the fact that he is indeed kept by Jehovah’s care. I shall first endeavor to acquaint you with the boat on which I am working. It’s name is “The Eastern States” and runs from Detroit to Buffalo. We leave Detroit one day at 5 PM and arrive in Buffalo the next morning at 8 o’clock, staying in Buffalo all day we leave again for Detroit in the Evening at 5 pm. You see we spend one day in Detroit and one in Buffalo. Today we were in Detroit and would it interest you to know how I spent it? Well, if it will interest you; after breakfast was over about 9 am, I went down to our “quarters” (I suppose you have only a faint conception of what that word means – I describe it later.) and slept until 11:30 – served lunch, after which Aldridge and I walked up town for about 2 hours – smoked some cigars, came back to the boat and took a couple of hours more of sleep. So you see I am putting in plenty of time sleeping. This stuff I’m sure does not interest you and I will not bore you longer but as I promised to say something about our “quarters”

It is one large room about 35 x 40 ft. in which are 32 beds – just think of it!! Those beds or better bunks are arranged in tiers of three and I at the present time am sitting on my bed (the top one) and there are two other fellows below me. What ventilation we get comes through six small port holes the diameters of which are about 6 in.

The fellows are a cosmopolitan aggregation, men from everywhere and at any time you can hear arguments and discussions on all subjects – Sensible and nonsensible. There are several students on board – boys from Howard University, Wilberforce University, Oberlin University, Michigan, and Indiana and out of them there are some very fine fellows to know…  I could talk all night about the desirable and the non-desirable features of my Steamboat experience…”

You can read an earlier and more complete post about the Steamer Eastern States here.

For this year’s April A-Z Challenge I will be blogging everyday using items taken from the letters written by my grandfather to my grandmother from 1907 to 1912, starting with “A” and moving right through the alphabet to “Z” during April.

Will write a letter this P.M.
6/20/09
Arrived in Detroit yesterday at 4:00PM, and left for Buffalo via “Eastern States” Steamer on which I am at work at 5.  Was lucky.  Am well – found two old school friends on same boat.

A.B.C.

My grandfather had gone from Indianapolis to Detroit to get a summer job as a waiter on one of the steamers that went between Detroit and Indianapolis. He was successful and had even found several friends who were medical students at other schools who would also be working on the steamer with him.  It was a good way to earn money for school. Some worked as porters or waiters on passenger trains.

In 1910, just a year later, Detroit’s population reached 465,766. 5,741 (1.2%) were African American.  Cass Technical High School graduated it’s first class of 6 students. Other high schools were Central (located in what is now Old Main on the campus of Wayne State University), Eastern and Western.

Detroit History   “During the early 1900s Detroit was referred to as the Paris of the West for its beautiful gilded age architecture, and Washington Boulevard, which was electrified by Thomas Edison. Detroit emerged as a transportation hub and a growing manufacturing city which prompted Henry ford to build his first automobile in a rented workshop on Mack Avenue. Ford Motor Company was soon to follow in 1904. Other auto manufacturers such as William C. Durant, the Dodge brother, Packard, and Walter Chrysler further reinforced Detroit as the world’s automotive capital and giving it the nickname the Motor City.”