CATT, Carrie Chapman GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE Peck, Mary Gray 1926-27 Feb 4, 1926 The Roosevelt New York Dear Mary: I had to postpone my early speeches and begin next Sunday in Chicago. Please write me Drake Hotel and tell where in the Bible is the following and the correct wording. We have only a hotel Bible here. May swords be molded into plough shares, spears into pruning hooks and men learn war no more. down with bronchial pneumonia. It was not a bad case but the doctor came twice one day. I am getting on very slowly. No sooner was I up than Mollie came down again and barely escaped pneumonia. She is up now and we are both crawling around. She seems to have more pep than I. We are going to a hot dry country! Where is it? That is a fine picture you gave of country life in February but know it well, having lived from Chicago I go to Rochester, then to Minneapolis. I speak in St. Paul, Duluth and twice in Minneapolis and will be at the Nicollet Hotel from Feb 9 to 13. I leave that night for Chicago, and speak at Urbana Ill on the 15th - then home. I have to do the rest of the lectures in March. We have had the devil of a time. First Mollie had cystitis and had the doctor every day for ten days. She was just crawling around when I came in it many years. In the morning I used to be sent to a cupboard in the the wood shed to bring in a roast of beef or pork and a mince pie frozen like rocks We thawed them out and then roasted the meat and warmed the pie. Mother made dozen of pies in late November if I remember. Love to Eliza, Lovingly Carrie C C. Minneapolis Minn Feb 13 1926 Miss Mary Gray Peck Geneva NY Splendidly cared for at Miss Wells home will be well enough to travel soon sorry to miss opportunity to see how well you can nurse. Carrie Chapman Catt 325 GROVELAND AVENUE MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA February 17th, 1 9 2 6 My dear Mary: - I have this morning dressed and visited the Clinic where I had all kinds of X-rays taken of my interior furniture. I have not as yet received the final report, but I have been encouraged to think that I shall get leave of absence within a day or so and that by the time you receive this letter I will be setting forth for New York. The ear has not yet stopped aching but it is pretty nearly cured they say, but as it is somewhat swelled in the middle ear and there is no room for the swelling, it still aches. I can say no more now, but I thank you most warmly for your kind offer to come and take care of me. I have been well looked after, but I do not want to go anywhere with such an errand again. Lovingly yours, CCC ckc Miss Mary Gray Peck, R D No. 3, Clifton Springs, New York I dictated this to a kind stenographer who came up from the Headquarters yesterday. This morning I have been to the Clinic again and have seen the pictures taken of my ear and all my teeth. The ear is beautiful - the doctor said it. There are five abscesses and perhaps one more on the roots of the teeth! And Ive been paying one man to keep my free teeth free from infection and another who could never tell me why I had neuritis!! It is possible I may tell them what I think. C. C. C. 1 Mch 18, 1926 Thursday Hotel Roosevelt NYC My dear Mary: Where did we leave off? I think the last chapter was the report very graphic of our escapade with the snow drifts of Seneca Falls. Let us hope the drifts have shrunk and the roads become passable. I have been out to the farm for the first time since Christmas and Mollie went too. I should have said we. It was lovely and sunny but not much evidence of spring. I should like to be there however. but - when they made X-rays of me at the Nicollet clinic they found teeth with alleged abscesses on the end of the roots which they thought caused my neuritis. Dentists here changed their system pretty often and one of the grand achievements was to saw off a tooth. bore up to the top of the root, kill the nerve fill the nerve cavity and stick a tooth on with a pivot. These were stationary not removable. I had two such and I recall that they were terribly painful and terribly expensive. Both had abscesses on the roots. My dentist accepted the western diagnoses without a word and advised the removal of those two teeth and then to take a wait and see if I improved. This was a tacit admission that the method had been a failure. So between now and April 1st I am spending most of my time at the dentists. Today I had the first removed I've spent the rest of the day lying on the bed with [the] a good ache where the tooth once was. Ill be all right tomorrow but Monday out comes the other. In view of the fact that I've spent most of the winter in bed I think the experience rather ruin! I got through my seven lectures with credit to my physical self. They were bum lectures but the main thing was that I lived through them. Five more in Ohio and two here, the dates in succession. Now I've delivered my last and have just declined SOS calls from Boston, Florida Penn - Texas Kansas City. Good bye lectures. Salutamus Sabbatical. 2 You know Anne Morgan and some of her Anti Suffragists are going to build a big club house for business and professional women. I've avoided them and said no to all entreaties but today they are having a big blow out and got Harriet T. U. and Maude Wood Park for the program along with Mary Pickford. It is in Madison Square Garden. Both girls are in this hotel and I never saw worse scared orators than they were about six o'clock. Some Anti Suffs were showing them around. We were specially honored by an invitation, but fortunately I had an engagement with this tooth performance. Mollie has gone to sit in a box. Nothing could entice her to stay away from such a female event as that. So you are getting a letter to say that I have finished Barnum today. It was helpful for this kind of an occasion and I did enjoy it very much. I expect that he sowed the infection for a lot of the diseased political propaganda of our day. Many thanks dear Mary. I wasn't grateful when I received the book, but I am now. I am expecting to go out to the farm about April 5 but Mollie isn't expecting to go before the 20th. The crime wave is in such an active state that I fear we cannot hire a policeman to stand guard, so I don't know what will happen. I am planning to go to St. Louis but not to Paris. We are both much better and I think I shall pull up if I get through the teeth business fairly well. I can endure little. I get up tired and run down utterly about 2 pm. Now it is 8:30 pm and I'll say good bye and take myself to bed. If you and Eliza have escaped the pneumonia you have been most fortunate. The hospitals are over run here, the doctors tired out and the people very cowed and tired looking. Looking C C C Hotel Roosevelt, N. York, Mch. 25, 1926 Dear Mary: This is Thursday pm and I've just returned to the R-- from the Dentist's too wretched to read and found your letter awaiting me. I am going to surprise you with a reply immejate. It is good to have someone who will listen sympathetically to all one's ills. My two teeth are out. I have a plate with one tooth on it to fit the front vacancy but I carry it in my hand bag and keep out of sight as much as possible. I cannot talk and can only eat soft mushy things. There is a dull small ache in process all the time that prevents serious attention to pressing jobs. I've had three sittings with the portrait painter and there will be another on Saturday. It does not matter that I have the tooth ache because she isn't doing my head just now. Another woman sits in my gown for the dress. The thing is about done - except the head and the inanimate part looks quite well. It will be finished before I go to the farm. Of course I did say I was going to the farm solo. That is the way I'd like to go if I could omit the nights. Of course there are no maids to go with us so we will not go till I come back from St Louis which will be Tuesday morning April 20 -- that is leaving then. Meanwhile some people are looking at the farm but we do not think there will be a buyer this year. The delay in going out will give me a chance to clear up my work -- not much but neglected because of too much bed this winter -- and then by junks I don't mean to see this old town for months and months! Yes come along to St Louis. We'll have a buttermilk bath each night and a pancake breakfast. 2 Wow! that pain in your back comes from that tooth!! Did I tell you about the guinea pigs? Well the Dean of the Dental Clinic of Rochester had one of these teeth and he got the lumbago. He made a serum from the abscess on the end of the root (the tooth having been drawn!) and gave the serum to a lot of guinea pigs and they all got lumbago! I didn't learn how they knew they had it but I suspect the pigs told them so. You are right the whole world hates us and I think they have considerable reason to do so, but if you go where the language will prevent you from reading the papers you won't mind. If you'd go to Europe in August you could attend the International School in Geneva and stay for the Assembly in September, do Italy in October, Greece in November, Egypt and Palestine thereafter. It would be a nice trip. Why not make it? The Orient is more interesting but they don't seem to be in a calm state of mind there at present. If you are going to try to sell the farm you should advertise it now and try to make a sale this spring-- Or so I think. It may take a long effort to do it, but I think you should get rid of it now while you are in your prime. If our place is not sold soon well will be too decrepit to move out! Mollie has been bringing on another cold for the last two days and went to see the doctor this afternoon She came in since I began writing. She is ordered to bed where she now is and I have been shopping and came home with flour and mustard. She is to stay in bed all day tomorrow. So here we go again. This is her fourth We must go away next winter whatever we do--although there has been a pretty bad epidemic. The doctors are worn out, the hospitals overflowing schools closed or running with substitutes on. 3 24 hours later: Mollie is still in bed with pleurisy symptoms and the doctor is coming again to see what is in the wind now. At any rate it is nothing serious as yet, We are both pretty well disgusted with the cold business. Yesterday I visited the dentist and have had the tooth ache ever since which doesn't make life any more enjoyable. These are all the complaints to date. The doctor has now been here and pronounces Miss Hay much better but orders her to stay in bed two or three days more. I will meet you in St. Louis and later at Teheran. It is now Saturday am. I stayed home to nurse and did not get to the studio but I am venturing forth to a Foreign Policy Luncheon and I am going toothless, praying meanwhile that no one will tell a funny story to make me laugh. Lovingly C C C Hotel Roosevelt, New York Apr. 14, '26 Dear Mary, Mollie was much pleased with her bright sweet peas. Clara caught me out when she brought them. As Mollie probably will never get around to thank you please consider that I have done it for her. She still has the nurse and has not yet sat up altho she goes to the WC for all errands there. She is now making marked improvement but she looks as though she had been pretty sick-- which she has. Many many thanks for her flowers. It was sweet of you to send them. Yesterday I went to the Dentists, then to the office for an interview with Mrs. Brown who left in the afternoon, then took lunch with two women lawyers. Dorothy Kenyon and Dorothy Straus. When I got home I went to bed and today the Doctor wouldn't let me outside at all! Tomorrow I shall see the Dentist again, but I'm making no other arrangements for the day, because on Thursday I shall venture to the farm. I am getting well very slowly and still coughing. I shall do no lecturing next year and nothing would please me more than [to?] around the S.W. I've wanted to ever since 1893 when I was entertained at the mouth of a Cliff Dweller's canyon and couldn't go to see it as I was getting a vote for Colorado then. The truth is alas that I can never climb again and one must climb to get at those cliffs. I might sit in the sunshine at the foot while you and some other youthful sprinter would ascend and be prepared to keep the records. I read your letter or that part of it (I am discreet) to Mollie and asked how she would like such a trip. Her Irish nose ascended and she exclaimed "What go round those dirty places. I wouldn't like it" -- and she wouldn't. The trouble is I have no place to park Mollie. She ought to be in the S.W. where it is dry and warm and that is just where I was aiming to go -- maybe to stay!! At any rate we can read about the excavations and go in the civilized trails, while you and a lively mate could do the climbing I'd like to make that kind of a contract. We will be ready to leave after we have voted against Wadsworth. I might try hard to stay at the farm until Thanksgiving and leave about Dec 1 getting back about April 1st -- 5 1/2 months. I think it would be grand. The Potter weddings are quite overwhelming. I thought Agnes a beautiful girl and I hope she "will live long and be happy" [Francace's?] girl sounds like a wonder but what did so accomplished a lass see in him whose achievements lie before and not behind him. Love is a queer thing and at last has unsettled the mentality of the novelists -- or so it appears from the copies I've sampled. I note that you have settled the crime wave! You have the same difficulty writing for the Citizen that I do -- we just get started when word count is up and we have to stop. Well tomorrow I'd be starting for St. Louis. I have no speech and no spring hat and there has been no chance to get either. I am not fit to start so I am glad I had sense enough to discover it early. The man is here to take orders for dinner after which I immediately go to bed get a mustard plaster fore and aft and work cross word puzzles till 9 o'clock -- then sleep. I'll have a lot to say about the S.W. when you come to see us Better come before you go to Vassar, as you won't want to come after. We'll fix up a scheme then. Do send me another letter Lovingly Yours C C C Carrie Chapman Catt 171 Madison Avenue New York April 26, 1926. Miss Mary Gray Peck Clifton Springs, New York. R.D. 3. My dear Mary: The reason that I did not send you an immediate message by telegram saying that I was crazy to have the maple sugar was due to some extenuating facts, - the first of which is that I bought some sugar last year and have a few jars of it left over. It was not very good, but being a thrifty person, I know it has to be eaten up before any more can be set before my family; and secondly, the Doctor has put down his foot flat and has said that Miss Hay and I must eat no more sugar at all. Molly does not like maple sugar, and I like it better than anything--but between the Doctor and the thrift, it seemed as though it were wise not to permit any friend to send any more maple sugar. Neverthess, if it is not too late, I would like a little, but not as much as you usually send; couldn't you send a couple of quarts? That would not be enough to bring on diabetes. What I would like enormously would be the Kabob. I have no idea what a kabob is, but it sounds just right for an out-door picnic. When you come down, could you not show me how to have one in Westchester County? When and if we sell the Farm, I will come up and have that picnic with you, but I think it is not going to be this year, so you might as well teach me how. Miss Hay is going to the Federation Convention at Atlantic City, and I believe she leaves on May 24. She expects to meet her sister there, and possibly the sister will come home with her. Perhaps you know as much about those Federation dates as I do. At any rate, would it possible to manage your visit while Miss Hay is away? She would then think I was being protected. Somebody has to come and stay with her when I go away, and therefore she thinks I ought to have somebody when she goes away. I was at the Farm Saturday, and I saw a robin, so they have not been entirely destroyed. We are going out next Sunday afternoon, and I am trying to get everything fixed up so that I will not have to come back for anything at all. I will try to give you more definite information about the address later. Hoping you can come at that time, but assuring you that you will be welcome at any time, I am Lovingly yours, Carrie C Catt CARRIE CHAPMAN CATT 171 MADISON AVENUE NEW YORK May 15, 1926 My dear Mary: That Federation meeting begins next Monday May 24, and Mollie goes that morning She does not know how long she can stick it out but will stay over Sunday any way. I am asking Clara to spend the week end with us. You better make a decent visit this time -- not less than a week I should say. When and how will you arrive. I could have a taxi meet you at Harmon. Rigney is the name. You could find it. I recall that there is an early train. I wont try to to come myself. Let me know when to expect you. The maple sugar is here. I have not opened it yet. I feel like a beggar with yours all boiled away. At any rate I'll treat you to some of this. Anticipating the pleasure of seeing you soon. I am Yours lovingly C.C.C. Ossining R.T.D. 2 New York (1) Juniper Ledge, Aug 30, 1926 O Mr. Black Hand, I'm skeart--all of a tremble and lest I see you down this way I write-anything but that! I think it is my form to being with explanations of silence. I forgot how long that silence has been well to begin with I was literally weak the early part of the summer and had neither strength nor spirit to do anything and that ought to be enough of an apology Flora Hay was here three weeks. Nellie Shuler was here and we read aloud all that awful book for errors. Many thanks for your notations, but we would have caught those anyway. There is to be a new edition and we want to make it more correct. The corrections will cost $195 and I will have to pay for them You had your feelings hurt when I said there was no money in a book except a "best seller"-- Well you see how it is. I've been to Phila to celebrate Aug 26th and written my little Citizen articles and kept up declinations to speak &c &c. I've a basket full of correspondence less immediate. Then the working members of the Cause and Cure committee went to Europe and I've been reviewing it. The result is that there is likely (almost sure) to be another Conference in Washington Dec 5.10 All we now need is a few more votes of consent (unanimous to date) some money to pay bills some speakers to pay it to and some delegates to hear the speakers! Well that is not so bad for a summer's rest is it? Somehow I've been busy all the time. Now I am much stronger and more vigorous. I've got rheumatism in plenty yet. What is now planned is to leave immediately after the Washington Conference-- say Dec 15 - (might have to come back to N Y and clean up my desk) and go to Arizona where it is dry. I propose hanging around those regions for a couple of months and to go to Cala about Feb 15 and to look over that territory to learn whether we would like to live (2) a little longer and do it there or a little shorter and do it here. I do not mean to get back before the first of April. This is an experiment. If I am unable to shake off the neuritis by climate I might as well stay here where it has been foggy humid and queer all summer. Lasy Sunday we had a fire all day and today it is 90 degrees hot. We left the house at 8 am when we went to Phila and got back at 9pm on Thursday. Today am at 8 I started for New York and spent a hectic day. One event was lunching with Ida Harper with much explanation and a wealth of detail she told me that she is now going to live with Lucy Anthony at Maylan and write a volume about Miss Shaw. Lucy is not satisfied with the Pioneer. She says (Ida H) it will be one volume about the size of that and that it will take six months. She will probably write two volumes and stay a year or two. She certainly is a doughty old lady to begin a job like that. I wrote Rose once you remember that the only reason why I should have a biography is that all the other presidents of the NAWSA had one, but now Miss Anthony has two and Miss Shaw will have two. Harriet has her story finished and I've written a preface for it altho I've seen none of the MSS and I think that will be all the stuff the public can read about an episode that never interested them anyway. I wish you would write a nice obituary. This is an order. Please say here were four presidents of the NAWSA and that they had two biographies apiece with one exception. One president, like the distinguished violet shone in shrinking modesty and wished to be forgotten. Well Rose came. I told her you thought I'd officially said go ahead and do a biography of me. She thought I'd said go ahead and do an autobiography. I was so ashamed that I s[?]d when played false to you both or posed as two faced that I have shrunk from writing to either of you (3) All the time I did not want a biography. There is so little to say and what there is is so prosaic. Now Miss Anthony kept trunks of clippings letters and diaries Ida H says Lucy and Caroline Rully have been working for weeks on her material and have huge quantities all divided into three groups - clippings - speeches - and letters. I have no clippings speeches or letters and a mighty poor memory. If you will do me an obituary - it will be enough. We will have no biography, Mary. Let it be said that there was one suffragist who had not discovered herself to be a hero. If Krishnamurti is right I'll be reincarnated and make it up in the next life. Certainly I have no mood for it now. I could never endure what Lucy will get having a biography under her nose for six months or a year and thats the only way to have such a thing matter. You'd have to come and live with me and I'd have to work with you. I wouldn't mind having you around if the rest of the family could manage it, but work on a job like that whew! I couldn't do it - no let me die in peace. I now think that may be two or three years off and I won't work. I'm finishing off at Washington and going to play all the rest of life that remains I liked Gold I'll return it when theres a minute. Well Mary I love you just the same. Are you mad at me yet? Truly ruly Yours, Carrie C Catt CARRIE CHAPMAN CATT 171 MADISON AVENUE NEW YORK Sept 8 1926 Dear Mary: I have your letter calling me a liar (in diplomatic terms) and I hereby notify you to name place and weapons. I shall defend my honor in the only way it can be done! I am not going to write a biography and neither is Rose. Easton isn't very far away is it? Why do you not drive home by way of Nova Scotia and stop here bringing Eliza of course. My I'd like to take a drive with you! - that is if you wouldn't quiz me about my ancestors about which I know nothing. I think they were all slaves. "Ever yours" CCC. over Lady Astor is speaking Thursday evening and I am actually staying all night. Alas I have a luncheon conference for Friday or Id urge you to come in and play with me. Dear Mary: Please don't hold any feelin's about me till the clouds clear. I am making four Christman speeches the next week. It is the first time I ever had a chance to tell the public what I am thinking about anybody. In that same week we move to the Roosevelt and I have an all day Committee meeting of the Cause and Cure folks. Today the Star station wagon was blown into a blue moon and we do not care since our dear John was not killed. That has to be settled. I guess my week is long. My speeches are 22, 27, 29, 30. We move 24th and the Committee meets 25th. The girls leave the 22nd and I get dinner. There are some other complications but I'll not mention them. Over Just hold on awhile. We shall be in NY till about Nov 20--Washington till about Dec 17--then Arizona &c--without a job for four months. Hastily but still lovingly, CCC Oct 17, 1926 Juniper Ledge Oct 18, 1926 My dear Mary: Today a box smelling deliciously came to hand. I believe a similar box has appeared every year and that you got the acknowledgement with some lame thanks about four months later. This time Im going to be virtuous and do it now We don't raise anything here that smells or tastes like those apples of yours. The two trees you gave me, one Tallman Sweet, the other Northern Spy both bore this year but apples were small. It was due to the drouth in the early summer I expect. At any rate they bore and somebody will get a blessing from them for the next fifty years. No one has yet bid for the place, so perhaps it will be me. I told you last night that I am going to speak for Christman three times next week. That isn't so the Committee think I am but I am going to tell the world at large what I think about that man Wadsworth. I may be locked up afterwards! Mary those apples are wonders and I am individually grateful for each apple. I shall do two a day. I take it this is a peace offering and means forgiveness. You already have said you forgive. Now if you will forget and let us begin where we left off it would be doing the right thing. We are away behind in our work. Our few apples are not picked. We are building a wall and it takes our two men. The trees are wonderful, the weather freakish and generally horrid. More are on! Thanks Thanks Thanks For those glorious apples. Lovingly CCC Carrie Chapman Catt 171 Madison Avenue New York November 8, 1926 My dear Mary: This winter I have decided neither to give nor to receive Christmas presents. As I have already informed you, Moly and I are going to start West to Arizona to bask in the sunshine there for two months, after which we propose to go to California and find out whether we would likt to live there or not. Meanwhile, just to bind our friendship, I am sending you a delicious book--"The Delicatessen Husband". Once upon a time there was a very great event in Suffrage affairs in the city of New York. It was a very successful big meeting at Cooper Union, and the general subject was "Happy Wives and Husbands Speak for Suffrage." There were five wives and five husbands--and all of them are divorced except one pair! I chuckle to myself every time I think on it. One of those who was divorced is the writer of this book. She was Florence Woolston. She has--I am glad to say--married again and is as happy as happy can be. Her book is rich and delicious. Lovingly yours, Over Miss Mary Gray Peck Clifton Springs, N.Y. R.F.D. I have just received your letter and hasten to inform you that it is a delegate's high post that is tendered you. I am delighted that you will be there. I think it will prove a productive conference and we are getting a very good program. Most of those who should work are deserters and I am much overdoing. No time for more. Lovingly Carrie Chapman Catt New Years Day - 1927 (1) The San Marcos Chandler, Arizona My dear Mary: I had planned to write you today but before I got to it your letter came. I'll begin with the somewhat hackneyed wish for a glorious 1927 for you and yours. My business in writing is to thank you for the dearest prettiest hardiest sewing kit I've ever had. You gave me one some years back and I wore it out to a frazzle. This one will see me through to the end. I am sure I am using it and like it immediately. It was a gorgeous gift and I am really and truly grateful. Being domestic by nature, you have made me very happy. Now, Mary, you want to know how it is with us. Fine. The altitude of 1250ft gives just enough stimulus to make me feel good and it has the way of taking the lassitude right out of me. The country is as flat as a floor. I never saw such level country and the first wonder is that we can walk without getting out of breath! We can now do 2 1/2 miles on a stretch and altho we are pretty tired when we get back, the tired doesn't last long. We could do wonderful stretches were it (2) not for rheumatism, neuritis gout and their cousins which possess us. Under the circumstances 2 1/2 miles is a real achievement. In other words we eat well, sleep well, feel well and for myself I can say that I have not a single ailment except the above trio. They are all worse here. I have them in both hands. I never liked to write and I have had a stenographer to do my writing for me for the past forty years - therefore writing is a painful occupation and I cannot do more than one letter a day as long as I intend making this one. I once had a Corona, and I've thought of getting a little machine again, but as the neuritis is chiefly in the upper arm, I doubt if I could profitably use it. There are no stenographers to be had here of course. How much the sun can do for rheumatism I do not know. We have each a porch where the South sun pours in wonderfully. I can sit in it this minute and I will feel like a mustard plaster, but the brilliancy of the light prevents one from reading or writing or doing anything else and that is difficult for me. Next week I am going to go at the fashion article and in order that you may know what I am countering I am mailing you a Forum. I had two I do not (3) know as I can do it. The San Marcos Chandler, Arizona I have already written my form letter to the delegates and my first Bulletin, read the first book in the course, and two novels and we have only been here ten days. I want to tell you about our morning. This will be a day never to be forgotten. Some acquaintances invited us to drive to Mesa [and] to see the New Mormon temple. The reason we were chosen was because the Superintendent of Mormonism in all this part of the country (of course he isn't called that) said he had heard me speak in Salt Lake City. What we saw and heard was amazing. The great temple in Salt Lake City is surrounded by mystery. Outsiders have never been allowed to step inside. Well here a new temple is being erected in what, not so long ago would have been the desert and it is costing $800,000. No church hereabouts can compare with it in calm classical elegance. Marble from Italy Tenn and all the West, has formed it and it is beautiful set in five acres of ground all green and springlike. That they could extract that money out of these simple people is amazing but it is not a church but a temple (4) and a temple is chiefly devoted to services for the dead. The Mormon must be immersed and that saves them but how about all those who haven't had a chance? Well I can be done vicariously and the man I speak of wandered over Europe and got the names of 4000 persons hearing his name and he is doing the "work" to put them into Heaven. It takes nearly a day to do all that must be done but perhaps they can do these ceremonies collectively because he said he had been immersed 98 times in one day for some of these unknown relatives of his. Persons remove their clothing and don a heavenly robe before going through the ceremonies. There is no large hall and the ceremonies are concluded in processions in probably eight different rooms. All his information now given in advance has not been revealed in Salt Lake. When the temple is dedicated no outsiders will be allowed to enter it and so I regarded the experience as unique. The Millenium is coming. There will then be two Headquarters - two great holy cities - Jude - prudence. Mo and Jerusalem. Independence because Joseph Smith got it in a revelation. They have 3000 missionaries each paying his own expenses and without pay, winning over new converts in all the nations of the world. Now where is there a devotion like that except Mormons and Catholics. (5) The San Marcos Chandler, Arizona Maybe these two revaled religions will one day confront each other in a battle royal. Mesa was founded by B. Young. This is not the desert as I thought but is an irrigated highly cultivated country - begun by the Mormons. Fields with hundreds of sheep each ewe with her lamb, fields of cotton, wheat, garden trucks are the familiar sights. They have shipped 2000 car loads of lettuce out of this valley to the effite East, half of it within the last ten days. Figs dates oranges grape gruit &c grow here. Now the most wonderful tale of all the Mormon told us They found irrigation ditches built by a prihistine[?] race that watered 96 square miles. Some of them, they cleaned out and are using. Some of them had been put through cuts through stone of 10ft depth! Isn't that wonderful. The fanaticism of these people! Think what it has made them do! There future through eternity is all planned and fixed - nothing to worry about in this world or the next. Do you want to be a Mormon? I am pretty sure I am going to want to live down here somewhere. Arizona is too hot for summer but joyful in winter. I am going to my head for a sale in the spring of Juniper Ledge. There is no use keeping it. We cannot walk the hills we now [???] and we might as well escape the mists. Mollie has no enthusiasm and lapses into silence When I mention it- dreaming of the white lights of Broadway I [???]. We stay here til Feb 9 after which for at least two week we shall be at the Women's Athletic Club Los Angles. It would be glorious to have a car down here. A cheap driver is the problem. Want to apply? Now I take my pillows a light blanket and lay me down on my sun porch-it has now passed the spring bed-and take a blessed nap and rest my gout. At 4 I shall arise and we eat an "Arizona pure gold" orange which cost half what they do in New York. We did not bring summer clothes and may wish we had- Lovingly, C. C. C. CARRIE CHAPMAN CATT 171 MADISON AVENUE NEW YORK April 30, 1927 Miss Mary Gray Peck R.F.D. 3, Clifton Springs, N.Y. My dear Mary: I have never written you to thank you for the box of delights left at the hotel; and now I think I have two letters, one awaiting me upon my return to the hotel ytesterday. I have two excuses. I do not know whether it pays to take time to enumerate these excuses, so I will merely say that [*it*] I simply could not get around even to acknowledge the box. I thank you most cordially for all its contents, but I don't think you should squander your money in ways like that. The gloves fit the deer swells sweet and has all his legs yet which is a miracle and the easter egg has been eaten by a several [*???*] I have not had much chance to play, but this afternoon, but this afternoon I am being taken to a matinee by Mrs. Parsons. I am to see "Spread Eagle", which is a war play. She has been planning to take me for the last nine months, and now it is to come off this afternoon. Yesterday I had Jimmie come down from the country and I loaded his car from floor to ceiling with all kinds of things that had to go up. There wasn't room for anybody to ride but me. I found the country beautiful and quite a good many blossoming things at the farm. Two dear little calves, as pretty as can be, occupy a little stall, and there are about fifty-five peeping chickens running around. I enjoyed it very much, but when I got back at five o'clock I had to lie down on the bed and was not able to get up again. I am about as miserable as anybody can be, old neuritis having taken me in hand again. I am supposed to be leaving New York about the first of July and sail, I believe, about the 6th of July. That is not much of a trip. I approve of your purchase of the Encyclopedia Britannica. I looked at the advertisements of it with a good deal of envy, and than I bethought myself of my old edition on which I was paying storage and all the books I had, and I concluded I would not invest in any more until I had a place to put them. The Koo article to which you refer is the best article in general on China I have seen. I have met that little chap since. He is about 30 years of age; made his address in a brocaded blue silk dress and looked too sweet for anything. He is very clever. I believe you are right about the Cause and cure Conferences - with the exception of crediting me with everything good that is done about it. I am not the only toad Miss Mary Gray Peck 4/30/27 2 in the puddle, nor the biggest one. We are, however, building up acquaintanceship with each other and with big ideas that is useful. We are giving the program a considerably different turn next year and I am hoping that it will be extremely useful. I will let you know about it when it has worked out a little more fully. There is to be a committee meeting on it next week. I find that everybody is much troubled about the propaganda against the Joint Committee, - The League of Women Voters, the Federation, etc., and I have concluded to run a little campaign of my own; but I don't think I am clever enough to do it properly. Don't you want to help? I am beginning in the next Citizen with an article entitled by Miss Roderick "Lies at Large". I am then reflecting upon trying to write an open letter to the Anti-suffragists and another one to the D.A.R. I wish I had some of the cynicism being thrown around loosely by some of the correspondents, as it makes a very good lash. To answer your questions, - I don't think there is the ghost of a chance of selling the farm this year. I am thinking of allowing Kellogg to remain where he is. I am not going to vote for Al. Smith for President. It is just as well that you could not get any maple sugar this year, because if you had, some of it would have come my way, and probably too much sugar is what's the matter with me. I think the scarcity of maple sugar may have saved my life. Mrs. Parsons has given us two bottles of honey made by their bees; therefore we are supplied with that sort of thing. You cannot give us any sweet this year. I am glad you don't like novels -- and I know why you don't. I know it scientifically, but I haven't time to tell you about it now. Lovingly yours, The play yesterday was remarkable. It is so bold no one dares to stop it. An oil magnate finances a Mexican rebellion with the idea that there will be ??? and put down the only constitution that stands in his way, then he sends a foolish nice boy, the son of an ex president down to his mine because the ??? killed here ??? He does get killed, the nation goes to war but the play stops before the Mexicans gets beaten and the magnate takes his pretty daughter in a special train and goes down to see the war. The dead ??? turns up also, calls him a thief and a murderer and scared him stiff that the boy and daughter long in love ask his consent to their marriage and here it ends. It certainly is up to date. CCC. CARRIE CHAPMAN CATT 171 MADISON AVENUE NEW YORK October 1, 1927. Miss Mary Gray Peck, Clifton Springs, R. D. 3, New York. My dear Mary: Last Saturday the good postmaster of Ossining telephoned me to say that a perishable package addressed to me was in the post-office. In about a half hour we had claimed it and a nice juicy apple was inside of each of us. My, but they were good! I took them out to my sleeping porch for protection and the next night I could not get to sleep. I went into the house to get to sleep. I went into the house to turn on the light. Mollie came into the room to see if I was ill. She found me eating an apple1 Very many thanks for them. I return your two splendid letters to the President General and her not unworthy swat at you. Blessings on you. I am not sure but that I have sold the farm and just at present I cannot take time to tell you whether or not I have. I owe you some letters and some day they will get answered. Lovingly, Since dictating this letter I've turned down the first real offer I've ever had for the farm. We are going where some baked salmon ??? off your ??? for dinner. Carrie Chapman Catt CLARA HYDE 441 LEXINGTON AVENUE NEW YORK CITY TELEPHONE VANDERBILT 3390 November 7, 1927. Dear Mo[??]g: The Chief got off on Saturday mornings. The entire Ancient and Honorable Order of Catt Secretaries was there to see that she did it right - Hay, Schreiner, Hyde, and Wald. Mabel is an honorary member of the Society. She was there too. That was the whole company. The Chief looked weary and felt weary. The farm was sold, and they had to get out of it on short notice. The two old dames worked like dogs to get everything out, and cleared up for the new occupants - a man, his wife, and two children. Certain books and pictures are to remain on the farm until they can be moved. The price was $66,000. which I do not mind telling you, as the Chief herself announced it before the assembled secretaries. John is to stay on the place until May 1, of next year. That is the date the new owner takes title. Mollie said he cried like a baby when they left. I think he cried to very good purpose when he was able to sell his eight acres for $13,000. That cost him $2550. He says that he is going to go wherever they go whether they want him or not. I would too. Mollie also tells me that they have given their Real Estate man a commission to find a place in the neighborhood of New Rochelle or Scarsdale. They will use their new place for an all year round residence. The doctor says that if they will go to a warmer climate for this winter, he thinks they will not have to go succeeding years! You can fight that out with Mollie. She is the man who gave it to me that way. Mollie looks fine, although she squealed as usual over the heavy labor of the past two weeks. I'll bet she superintended the job. She gave orders to the Chief not to dare to bring Rosa back. The Chief tells me there was a threat of a visit. She is not going to encourage it. Now that you have both sold your farms, you ought to grow younger by the minute. With love to both, Cloy. I'm going to hear Borah Sat eve. under Law Enforcement auspices. They say they wd have filled hall 3 times over. 11/5/27 Optimists are taking great delight in the findings of the Geological Survey that of 30,000 earthquakes a year only thirty-one are catastrophic. It is cheering to note also that of the others all those which take place in California aren't even earthquakes. Begun Nov 7, 1927 __________________ Written on board steamer en route to Amsterdam, Holland To attend a special conference of the InTernat. Alliance to consider topics on the agenda of the approaching Economic Conference of Sp. of Nations at Geneva, Switz This was CCC's last trip to Europe. M.G.P. _______ My dear Mary: Those three important questions certainly ought to be answered since they trouble you and they ought to be answered by an unimpeachable authority like me. 1. Is the Human Race going the way of the Dinosaurs? Certainly - with a difference- they didn't do anything but lay eggs [toh] more dinosaurs and they left the eggs [beh] them to prove that they had lived. 2. Why or why not? We will cut off the he "why not" because there isn't any The "why" is that the H. R. (Human race) is committing suicide and will get it committed before another million years. Most of it that amounts to anything lives in zones where artificial [?] is necessary and works in caves called offices where artifical light is obligatory. It is necessary in this climate that it more clothes and have shelter and have food. Cabbages sell in R[?]uh ab 10 cts per head and lots of folks can only pay 5 cts while tons of these delectable vegetables (when served with a boiled dressing made of eggs the poor cannot afford) is rotting in the fields at Geneva. All this happens because the human race whose middle name is efficiency doesn't remr enough to get the cabbage of the producer to [?] 2 consumer. Oil and coal are being exhausted as fast as the HR know how to do it. Word with which the HR race built houses is already exhausted and it now builds of sand and glass. These will go soon. By and by there will be nothing left to build shelter with, nor of which to make clothes. The H R will have eaten up the sheep goats rats and tats. It will have put food where cotton and flax once grew and having no fire or light, it will trek to the South where these things are unnecessary. There will be a g[?] then over the Humans that want to around. The fields will be covered with the dead and starved and these will product a germ epidemic that might kill the rest. 3 Will insects succeed us? No there will be no succession. The inside of the Earth is cooling down alot more and bye and bye its heat will be gone 3 and it will become a cold dead planet spinning through space with nothing on it. One by one every living thing on it will die, turn to dust and ashes and any chance relic of art architecture or trunk left by the H R will never be found because no creates from another place can get here. I am glad to be able from the fount of my wisdom to relieve your mind on these points. [?] you might tell me if you know (1) Where is the HR going, or where has it gone when it disappeared from this planet? Does it cease like the worms you step on in the garden? 2. If it goes on, where does it perform? 3. How do do you know? Three for you. I am having the time of my life. I don't know a soul and there are few souls on board anyway. I have a bath room and a room for them all to myself. The steward and I have different ideas about the porthole - otherwise all is perfection. I breakfast at nine, am and retire at 9 pm. I have 18 books 20 maga 4 zines and some papers. I leave a big suit case with my steamer rug, coat and dress in it, a case of books, a number of papers and a fourth of odds on board and go to Amsterdam with my good clothes only. Ten days of this blissful life but it will not be enough to take out of me what that moving did to me. That fellow such an offer on Wednesday eve. I retrieved a counter one We didnt' get it fixed till Saturday morning. We were out by Sunday 3.30 But we included all furniture rugs. We left pictures and books till spring. We kept a box for going four days. That is available factor. Better being now. We sent three bix goxes to the thrift shop. Better send yours before spring. Saturday Nov 12. I got so far on Monday I think. Then i went to bed with a bad cold. I was a bit scared lest it get to pneumonia [?] not good. I had some store mustard plasters 5 and after applying 24 got up. I guess I am safe now but the process was not very resting. I'd go back to moving. I'd advise you to write all the cousins and relations you may have to pay you a visit like the one you told me about especially those with attics. Divide up the antiques kiss them all good bye, sit up nights and write me their history and let them go. I have not the slightest idea of where we will go or do. I am still too tired to think. I'd like you for my neighbor but I don't suppose you'd like any place I would, now that I'd like your choice - Plainfield for instance I never liked N Y - I think it is due to the trouble of getting over the ferry Maybe Plainlanders/can go through the tunnel though. At any rate I am staying at the Roosevelt until Jan 1. On that day I go to Washington and stay until Feb 1. The doctor things we should not stay in N.Y. during Feb and Mch so I've picked out Jamaica to stay in. That's hot and humid. Mollie is going to look it up. On May 1, I'm to land over 6 the deed and get some money. I cannot buy a place until then. I've turned all my liabilities into assets I received $15000 on first papers and had to pay $3250 to the agent. but I'd been saving up so I invested an entire $15,000. The man will put a $25000 mortgage on the place and give me the money in May. He will pay $15000 in July which gives one $55000 in cash and I carry a $10,000 second mortgage for two years. He pays 6% on all but the 15000 he paid. My price was 70000. I had to fall to 65000. He will pay 1000 for the furniture in Feb and $250 for the little car. It wasn't so bad was it? All the expense gone and the investment brining in returns! I'll enjoy that idea for this minute anyway. I'm going over to Holland to tell my former fellow workers that there are six continents not one and that Europe isn't doing all the thinking these days. Thats sassay but time You will probably not hear from me again before February. I shall expect you at Washington you need that Conference to finish off your education I have six speeches before xmas (one at Albany) I have to do up gen Pershur(?) for the Citizen and write two magazine articles one on what helped me to live a successful life. It was such a surprise to know that I had that accepted on the spot. Lovingly CCC Carrie Chapman Catt 171 Madison Avenue New York December 31, 1927 My dear Mary: I have been reading about Trader Horn and promising myself that when there was time I would get a copy and read him. Now that I have a copy I shall look forward with great anticipation to the pleasure of going through it. Of course, in the midst of all the mischief I am now engaged in, I could not take time for such a book; I must defer it until my vacation. Thank you a thousand times. I would like a letter to tell me how things are going with you. I shall be dreadfully disappointed if you do not turn up in Washington. If you are coming, you can tell me all about it there. I long to see you. We could do some good gossiping if we had a chance. We have made no definite arrangements about what we are going to do, but the Doctor says we ought to go South for the hardest winter months. We have concluded to do something a little less adventurous, and to Florida, moving about somewhat; as yet there is nothing definitely fixed. We have done a little looking around for a new home but as yet nothing has emerged. I am as full-up with business as a wild-cat; and this is only a reallly formal and official thanks for your kind consideration of my mental needs. Lovingly yours, Carrie Chapman Catt All places felled and [pr?] gone [lnke?] printer Transcribed and reviewed by volunteers participating in the By The People project at crowd.loc.gov.