NAWSA GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE Bragdon, Elspeth MRS. MARSHALL H. BRAGDON B THE SPRINGFIELD REPUBLICAN SPRINGFIELD, MASS. My dear Miss Blackwell, Thank you so much for your beautiful Easter message. You always say one bit especially for me, it seems. This time it was "Parting is not separation." Now that father and mother are gone I need do hold on to that. I am about to become first Vice President of The Springfield League of Women Voters - wouldnt that have pleased mother? She was President for so many years. Gratefully, Elspeth MacDuffie Bragdon Thursday Dear Miss Blackwell, I hope you "know in your bones" how much your greetings at Christmas and Easter mean to us who receive them. I send you loving and grateful thoughts on each occasion, but right now I want to put it into words, and to wish you a joyous Easter. Ours will be especially so as my father has been very ill since Christmas and is just showing real signs of a full recovery. He is nearly eighty and has taken my mother's death and the sale of the school with great courage and sweetness. He is magnificent and we look forward, my dear husband and I, to having him live with us next year. I have fallen heir to a good deal of family correspondence and among mother's letters from Radcliffe I found the enclosure which I think probably refers to you! I am sure you will be amused by my mother's youthful observance of "style" and will forgive a slight accent of criticism when you notice how warm and admiring her feeling about you was. I send it to you with my love - and all good wishes. Elspeth Bragdon (Mrs Marshall Bragdon) As from: The Springfield Republican Thursday Friendly Relations Committee "and I am writing & speaking about the whole tremendous problem of human relations - if you see Parents mapazine youll be interested in my editorial in the Christmas number " Joy To All People". I feel as if I were doing what my mother would have rejoiced in and that gives me courage! You give me courage too! My blessings and good wishes and affection always. Beth MacDuffie Bragdon (Mrs Marshall Brapgon) Marshall Bragdon 921 William H. Taft Road Cincinnati 6, Ohio [*(spld Repub family*] 29 High Street Springfield Dear Miss Blackwell, I had every intention of making an immediate and joyous response to your request for a copy of your essay. But I have been ill, with a reluctant session in the hospital, and the response has been delayed. But here is the little essay, very poorly typed, I am afraid, but sent with my gratitude for your letter and your understanding interest in the fat green volumes of "our young folks". Mother and I were made very happy. I don't know why i feel so timid about writing, not that I have your reply! With cordial good wishes for the coming - or recently-come - New year. Elspeth Bragdon (Mrs Marshall Hurd) From "Our Young Folks Magazine" - October, 1890, under the heading "Prize Essays" PURR AND HER KITTENS I have been fond of cats as long as I can remember, and they soon find out that I am their friend. One day my aunt came to see us with a large basket in her hand, the cover of which was carefully tied down. It was easy to know what was inside, for the angry mews and vain scratches at the sides and cover told me at once a cat! The basket was opened, after doors and windows were shut, and out sprang a half-grown kitten, which, before I could get a good look at her, dashed under the bookcase and disappeared. She would not come out for any amount of coaxing, and only spit viciously at the broom- handle as it was pushed against her. At least mother proposed that a saucer of milk should be set on the floor to tempt her out. while we kept very quiet in a distant corner. We did so and remained watching. Presently a head was put out. and the body followed little by little, until at last the kitten reached the saucer, and began lapping as if half-starved. When her hunger was satisfied she seemed a little less wild, and lay down on the carpet, still, however, keeping a watchful eye toward our corner. We succeeded in taming her, and she became fond of me. I thought, and think still, that she was one of the most beautiful cats in the world. Her head and back were striped with black and dark grey, while her breast and feet were pure white. She was so cheerful when she became accustomed to us, and expressed her satisfaction so loudly, that I named her Purr. She came into bed with me every morning, and when the doors were shut climbed the horsechestnut-tree before my open window, sprang through it from the bough, and woke me by rubbing herself against her cheek and purring softly in my ear. But one morning she did not appear [at] until breakfast time, and as soon[as] as she finished her milk., scampered away towards the barn. I foll- to the unused manger, where I found her looking very proud and happy, with three tiny furry balls beside her. I was wild with delight, for they were PURR AND HER KITTENS...2 the first kittens I had every owned, and I took nearly as much pride in them as their mother did; I visited them at all hours of the day and dreamed of them at night. Two were black over, one black with white feet, and a small spot of the [smae] same color on its breast. What was my dismay when I peeped into the manger one morning to find it empty! As I ran toward the house to tell my mother, my eyes suddenly fell upon the kittens, crawling around Purr in the corner of the flower-bed. The cat had thought they were old enough to crawl about, which they had for some time been trying do in the manger, and had brought them out that they might have more room. This was very well when the weather continued fair, but one day it began to rain, and I rushed out to see what my precious kittens would do. Purr was mewing and trying to cover them with her own body, but she could not keep off the rain, and they cried piteously. I took them to their old nest in the barn, but Purr brought them right back to the flower-bed, so at last I put them in my apron and carried them into the house. When the rain stopped I arranged a large wooden stool in such a way that it would protect them in the next storm. I think the kittens remembered how I had taken them, out of the wet, for the next day, and a good many other days, whenever I passed by the flower-bed they ran and followed me like three little dogs. I called them "Enterprise" because it was always the foremost; another "Stay [Sat]-at-Home", because it was the most backward; The one with white feet was "Florence", for my cousin. One day Purr moved her Family again, and took up her abode under the kitchen door-step. When I wanted them I sat down by the hold, calling, "Little pussies!" and out they ran. I loved them very much, with all their cunning tricks; but we were going to the seaside for the summer, and I was obliged to intrust them to a friend, who promised to find homes for them. When we came back in the autumn Purr ran to meet us full of joy at our return but all the kittens had been disposed of. I cannot Tell you what became of Puss, as she is still alive a plump and venerable cat. Roseville, New Jersey - Alice Stone Blackwell, age 12. Transcribed and reviewed by contributors participating in the By The People project at crowd.loc.gov.