 I'm Amy Blossom from Jackson County Library Services, and I welcome you to Windows in Time. Windows in Time is a series of local history talks, a program that's been developed by the Jackson County Library Services and Southern Oregon Historical Society. It is also part of the Southern Oregon History Show, which airs on Thursday nights at 6 p.m. You can also see us live, though, at the Medford and Ashland Libraries, the first and second Wednesday of each month at noon. So are you ready for some history? Let's go! Thank you very much. Again, my name is Stephanie Butler, and I'm very happy to be with you today. During this Windows in Time talk, I've done one other, and it's a great pleasure to prepare for them and to present. Now, can everyone hear me all right? Yep. Okay, excellent. Today, we're going to be examining diaries and letters that are originated here in Southern Oregon that span a period between 1855 and 1925, time-willing, but I believe we'll be able to make that happen. Diaries and letters present an extremely interesting collection to examine and reflect upon. Letters in particular, and maybe surprisingly, can be more intimate than diaries and journals can be, because they're written from person to person, and a person is trying to express him or herself to another individual so they can explain their circumstances, describe what's happening around them, and potentially describe emotions and feelings that correspond with that. Diaries, depending upon the time period they were written and so forth, and who was writing them and the purpose of them, can be anywhere from a daily record, which simply says ironed, mended, visited, mable, made something special for dinner, something very, very simple like that, to what we're going to hear about later in the program. Dr. Francis Swedenberg, who was a physician here in Ashland in early years, which is a daily record of his medical practice, and some intimate reflections tied in, but a lot of information that ties to his patients directly and what his daily activities as a physician here in Ashland were. So it really spans the spectrum. So other letters and diaries reflect travel experiences of people living in southern Oregon, and it's astounding to look back in time and to note that the people here, even though they'd made the arduous trip across the Oregon and Toreal or came around the Isthmus of Panama, that they continued to travel the world widely in very early time periods, and they went from the east coast to the west coast and back again, and leaving diaries and letters that reflect what their experiences were. We're going to begin in 1855, in September of 1855, violence erupted when Indians attacked Teamsters in the Siskius, killing two men. On October 7th, 1855, members of the volunteer militia swept out of Jacksonville to exterminate Indians on Butte Creek and massacred several old men, women, and children. Two days later, the Indians moved along the Rogue River, killing and burning as they went. Fighting continued through the winter at several different locations, but by early spring, 1856, the Indians were subdued and broken and were marched from the Table Rock to reservations in Grand Rod and Salettes. Not one of our finer moments in history here, but a fact nonetheless. Henry Clipple was a German immigrant living in Jacksonville, Oregon at the time. He enlisted the assistance of Mabel Prim, who was the wife of another pioneer settler in that time period in Jacksonville, to help him write what's called a reminiscence of that particular time period and his personal experience. We don't know exactly why she was enlisted to help write it, perhaps because he felt his English writing skills weren't strong enough. Jacksonville was a very European city at that time, with many languages being spoken and so forth in the area as well. So we don't really know why he asked her to help write the letter, but here's what he wrote with her help. October 1855, probably October 9th in that two days after the October 7th massacre, at midnight George Anderson rode into Jacksonville at a breakneck pace. He awakened up the people generally and imparted the news that Indians were on the warpath and had massacred all of the settlers on Rogue River from what was then known as Jewett's Ferry to Grave Creek. Anderson calls for volunteers to rescue Mrs. Wagoner and her daughter, a child of about five years. This was incentive for one of the grandest rides made during that or any other Indian war. Fourteen mounted men responded to the call and were in the saddle and root inside of one hour after Anderson's alarm. We were not encumbered with blankets or provisions. We rode the 28 miles before daylight and found Major Fitzgerald with a company of dragoons from Fort Lane, about three quarters of a mile this side of Wagoner's. His troops was dismounted. We remained with the men for about 20 minutes and then forged on. On our arrival we found the fires had burned out and on examination found the charred remains of Mrs. Wagoner lying across the Stonehearth of the large fireplace and also the charred remains of the little girl about 10 feet off. The Indians had murdered them and then set fire to the house. We got on the north side with all the speed that was left in our faded horses about this time we were greeted with an Indian yell and on looking found a band of Indians in line ready for battle. We were going so fast that I don't think we had any time to fully weigh the situation. At any rate there was no wavering. George Anderson, as brave a man as ever lived, checked his horse for a second to shoot. The Indians wouldn't stand at any longer, broke their line and started to seek safety in flight. Seven Indians were killed. We headed toward Mr. Harris's place a few miles north or south of Wagoner's. We were riding along slowly feeling about as tired as possible for men to get when we discovered two horsemen coming toward us at full speed. Each with a woman behind him. The horsemen proved to be Klaus Westfeldt and Charles Williams. The women, Mrs. Harris and her daughter Sophia, the latter wounded in the fleshy part of her arm. The sight of these heroic women made us forget that we had been in the saddle 12 hours or fatigued or hungry. Westfeldt and Williams rode in advance of the main column, found Mrs. Harris and daughter hidden the willows and pulled them up onto their horses. Mrs. Harris, after 36 hours vigil and self-reliance, finding rescue and accomplished fact, asked to be taken to a place of safety. The rider, Henry Clipple, rode up near the front door, jumped off his mule and pushed the front door open with the muzzle of his gun. And instead of Indians, saw Mr. Harris lying dead on the floor. Mrs. Harris, the woman who was rescued, later married Erin Chambers and her daughter Sophia, Mary John Swann Love. Mary Ann Harris Chambers is the maternal great-grandmother of the Hanley sisters Mary, Martha and Claire. Another story begins to unfold in the 1850s, supplying us with a valuable record of life in southern Oregon. Swept along by the tide of immigrants pushing from east to west, the son of a carpenter from upstate New York, Cornelius Beekman, just 22 years old in 1850, left Dundee, New York for California. By 1853, Beekman was carrying express gold dust, parcels and letters between Jacksonville, Waiwika and Crescent City for Cram Rogers and company. When that went out of business in 1856, he bought its stables and began his own express company and for nearly seven years made two or three round trips each week between Jacksonville and Waiwika, crossing the Siskiu Pass on a mule. In 1859, while still a bachelor and when he was already firmly established as a businessman and entrepreneur in Jacksonville, Cornelius visited his home in Dundee, New York and then returned to Oregon. During this voyage, he wrote us detailed letters of his travels. He shared quarters with a man named Wolf. We have no additional information about him. Cornelius booked his passage from New York City to the Isthmus of Panama on a ship called the Moses Taylor. The vessel was 1,373 tons with a wooden hull, side paddle wheels, two masts with an accommodation for up to 600 passengers. It's important to note as we go forward from here that what is referred to as Aspenwall was previously called the city of Cologne, Panama. The city was renamed as Euro-Americans ventured further west and after William Aspenwall who founded the Pacific Mail Steamship Company in 1848 began to provide service from there to California. So these big shipping companies moved in then after that railroads and so forth and they had huge operations to move people from the East Coast to Panama and then on to San Francisco. At sea in 1859, Cornelius wrote to his mother and father as we are now near Aspenwall I thought I would drop you a line before I left the ship and give you a short history of our trip thus far. We left New York on Friday, August 5th and at about 15 minutes past two o'clock. It was raining very hard, got soaking wet going to the steamer. We found after we got to sea that we had about 750 passengers which was about 200 more than the steamer could comfortably carry. Molf and myself went to bed about 10 o'clock still raining hard, woke up on the morning still raining very hard and blowing which caused our ship to roll heavily. After moving around we found about 500 passengers very sick. We are not seasick as yet. Very few at breakfast today. At noon August 6th we have run 212 miles from New York still raining. August 10th we are this morning in sight of sand off the coast of Florida. I like to have forgotten to mention that we have some very prominent characters on board among whom is Bayard Taylor the great traveler and his wife Judge McAllister one of the judges of the Supreme Court of California also. Now Bayard Taylor was a poet and a recognized travel writer during his lifetime. He was the son of a wealthy Quaker farmer and he went on to use the funds that he made from publishing his own poetry to travel extensively in Europe. Accounts of his travels were published in the New York Tribune, the Saturday evening post in the United States Gazette. In the midst of his world travels and publications about his travels he left for the West Coast in 1859 to lecture in San Francisco aboard the Moses Taylor which is what the ship that Cornelius was traveling on. Judge McAllister who was also mentioned by Beekman was a Democratic candidate for governor of Georgia but was unsuccessful. He moved to California in 1850 and set up his private practice there and in 1855 President Franklin Pierce nominated him to a new seat as a judge of the United States Circuit Court for the districts of California. Also aboard Beekman were many naval officers besides many pretty girls and also some backwoods girls and the greatest lot of babes and children I ever saw together. Just imagine yourself a bachelor gentleman in your state room at five in the morning aroused from your slumber by it would seem about 10,000 howling squalling brats from the age of five years and under with their mothers and nurses squealing and gibbering in about the same tone after this manner. Now sorry do be good lovey mama likes a nice baby baby she'll have what it wants. I also forgot to mention that we have on board quite a number of gentleman Phops. How they are going to get a living in California is more than I can tell. Some of them say they have friends in California. If so I suppose they will be dead heads on them for they don't look to me as though they would work. And per Miriam Webster's definition of pop is a man who is concerned with his clothes and appearance in an effective and excessive way. Not kind of Beekman's cup of tea. On Saturday August 13th he writes Mulf and myself visited the forward part of the ship which is called the steerage. There is about four hundred there a full one-third of them women and children all huddled together like so many hogs. Mulf and myself have a state room on this side to ourselves and a very fine one it is. Both eat at the same table. While speaking of Mulf I would say that not one drop of liquor has passed his lips since he left New York which is very gratifying to me. And I have no doubt but what will be equally so to his friends. And while speaking of reformations I would say that I have not smoked a cigar or pipe since I left New York and have about concluded to quit it for a while. Although we who interpret the Beekman family history know this not to be true. While Beekman does not refer specifically to belonging to a temperance movement it's clear that he preferred not to spend time with those who indulged in alcohol to an excess. August 29th Aspenwall was reached in about a little over eight days from New York City a distance of two thousand miles and he writes from San Francisco to his parents outlining that journey and says that after disembarking from the Moses Taylor that they made their way to the Panama Railroad Station and took cars for Panama City meaning arriving at two o'clock p.m. That trip was approximately two to three hours long riding from the original stopping point where you get off the first ship taking the train through the jungle which is quite an experience and arriving then at Panama City. And then the railroad company provides another transportation on a steamer out to the larger ships that are going to carry you to California. He wrote, took the Panama Railroad Company steamer to go aboard our steamer the Golden Age which lies out in the harbor about four miles. The large steamers cannot land at the Panama dock because they would have to cross a bar which is nearly bare at low tide. On going over to the Golden Age someone half dozen women in the steamer got into a knock down fight. Blood flowed profusely before the battle ended. The fight was between the Irish and Dutch. The latter I believe came out victors. At nine o'clock p.m. we set sail for San Francisco. In going out of the harbor we was saluted by two United States men of war guns fired, rockets thrown and bands of music playing on board of both ships. Rockets were thrown and one gun fired in return from our ship after which we gave them six hearty cheers. Tuesday August 16th got up this morning feeling first-rate after breakfast we all went to the purser's office and drew our table tickets. I am placed or rather drew between two married ladies. Mulf is in the same fix. They are going out to their husbands in California. They are very pleasant and agreeable ladies made their acquaintance aboard the Moses Taylor. So some disappointment that there were no eligible young women sitting at their table. This afternoon spent two hours down in the hole of the ship looking for my trunk. There is thirteen hundred of them down there. Can't find mine and had to leave it there because it is too hot and suffocating in the hole. Can't stand it down there any longer. Finally to get it looked up gave the nigger who has charge of our room an extra two dollars to go and look for it. He succeeded in finding it and bringing it to our room. Think I will put on some clean clothes soon or at any rate in the morning. An important note that among English speaking people the word nigger was not always considered derogatory because it simply denoted a black skinned person at certain time periods in history. By the nineteen hundreds that the word nigger had become a pejorative word or a negative term. So at this particular writing it was simply saying the black servant went to get my trunk. Also interestingly he says he paid the servant two dollars to go and find his trunk in the hole of the ship. In today's money that would be the equivalent to about seven dollars and fifty cents as a tip for doing that. On August twenty seventh he writes the weather is quite pleasant this morning. Wind fell last night about twelve o'clock. Passengers though much better. Many steerage passengers are still lying in their berths at ten o'clock and the captain has ordered steerage to be smoked which makes them leave double quick time to get up on deck. As soon as they get the fresh air they look and feel much better. Though many of them look very dirty and I think are lousy because they have not changed their clothes since we left New York. So imagine these people living in the steerage packed in have been unwashed for the most part since August fifth and it is now August twenty seventh. Sunday August twenty eighth arrived in San Francisco at eight o'clock this morning. Got on shore as soon as possible in fine spirits the city looks quite natural. He married, Cornelius married Julia Beekman about two years later in eighteen sixty one. Her family had traveled across the Oregon and Applegate trails in a preacher's wagon train from Indiana and they married they had three children carry Benjamin carry and Lydia and Lydia their youngest child died due to complications from measles in eighteen seventy three at the age of five and a half and unfortunately this is a very common occurrence during this time period for diseases to sweep through communities and take both adults and children's lives. Just a little tidbit of the letter that he and his wife Julia wrote to his family in Dundee following Lydia's death. He wrote it is with a sad heart that I take up my pen to write to you. We have met with a terrible affliction in the death of our dear child Lydia who departed this life at ten minutes past twelve o'clock on October twenty seventh eighteen seventy three. I never before felt that her death could bring such agonizing pangs. She was our favorite child and we had come to look upon her as the mainstay of our household. She had a very bright intellect combined with a kind and loving disposition. To us she seemed almost a heavenly mystery. Her eyes seemed full of wisdom. His wife Julia wrote she suffered intensely but bore it all so patiently. God only sent her to us for a little while to gladden our hearts and make us fairer and better and then called her home. Now the another family was taking root here in southern Oregon in the eighteen fifties Michael and Martha Hanley Hanley Farm which which Larry mentioned earlier was their home for many years and they came in the eighteen fifties and prospered here. Michael Hanley was a huge landowner. In eighteen eighty three their oldest daughter Alice who was twenty four years old at the time traveled to California with Cornelius Beekman and his daughter Carrie. Presumably to deliver Carrie to Mills College where she was attending in Oakland and they stopped in San Francisco along the way. Alice wrote to her mother several letters from that that trip which are were quite wonderful. She writes it was hard to leave the city for I never tire of going around to see what it is to be seen. I am almost at home as much in San Francisco as in Jacksonville can go any place I wish to. Never had one might of trouble finding my way from the first day I was in the city. Every one of my friends thinks I do remarkable well and say I must have a well developed sense of direction. She also wrote the city is just packed with strangers on market Kearney Montgomery streets. You have to elbow your way through the crowds. I can tell the eastern people the minute I see them. They are so different in style from the western people. There is a large party of English in the city. They are the most amusing to me so surly looking. I love to go from street to street and study the faces and see the different kinds of people it takes to make the world full. Benjamin and Kerry the two older Beekman children grew into adults with being supported by their parents in pursuing higher education. In 1883 Ben became a student at the University of Oregon in Eugene and he maintained a regular correspondence with his mother back in Jacksonville and it was very common. I realized this while I was doing this talk that even when I was in college in the nineteen seventies I wrote to my mother every Tuesday. You know it was that there was a sort of a set time period each week where letters were exchanged between people and such is the case with Benjamin and his mother as well. He was twenty years old living in a boarding house while he was a student in 1883 and he wrote Dear mother the minister boarding here is fine and pleasant a well informed young gentleman. He is about twenty six years of age. He often joins us in our room and chats and jokes with us freely and unreservedly. His wife is a regular baby. She is twenty. Homesick and ought to be at home with her mother. In action she is about as old as a three-year-old child. She is petulant, fickle-minded, whining, a general nuisance. As she grows in years she may perhaps obtain a maturity of conduct. She used to be a flirt and often forgets herself and smiles at us sweetly. And then got into a scrape. Ben was a fine upstanding young man, the very finest and he got into a scrape which we it's sort of a mystery. These are things that letters reveal but they don't give the full account so you always kind of go well what really happened? So we're left wondering. And he's written to his mother evidently and her response is my dear son it is with feelings of deepest regret and anxiety that I read again and again your letter just received. Were it not the plain truth from your lips I could not have believed you would have been involved in any such a scrape. I would advise you to pay no attention whatever to any threats or insults which will in all probability be thrust at you. You have the assurance that the faculty is acting in your favor and no doubt they will continue to stand by you. I am satisfied that the object of your enemies is to lead you into some disgraceful conduct whereby you will be expelled from the university. I admonish you to be very careful not to resent any insults offered avoid as much as possible being on the streets or in the company with this class of persons. Especially avoid being out much at night as you are liable to be challenged to a fight and if so must act in self-defense. Oh how I want to talk with you for a little while. Whenever I have heard your name mentioned it stands high upon the honor role how many have said to me you have a boy to be proud of. Do not misunderstand me that I want you to be cowardly no far from that but use discretion be not too hasty. I earnestly pray that the Lord will direct you that he will guide and keep you in the right path. Ben frequently got sick and he always wrote about it. And in this letter from 1884 he writes Dear Mother the glorious month of May finds me as it did last year the victim of imprudence and suffering under the depressing and dispiriting effects of a bad cold. It's not too dramatic. I have but now just completed a course of treatment which I hope will give me relief. A huge dose of magnesium preparation for our physics followed by a warm foot bath is what I refer to. The assertion once made by a physician when giving advice to a young man I have noted wistfully and look for an effective result. It is this. Trust in God and keep your bowels open and you will be free from pain. Good advice. Now the bequins traveled frequently up and down the west coast they traveled to Europe. They were all over the United States. They were moving about constantly. During the time period in the 1850s and beyond that Kerry visited Europe as a young woman on her own on chaperoned even. And there's bound to be some kind of travel adventure that comes up in the letters and certainly we do have one happening here. Mrs. Beekman writes to her son in 1885 on return from a trip from San Diego. Dear son you have doubtless heard by this time of our return home and have wondered greatly why I have not written you before. We arrived here last Wednesday night about midnight having taken the train at Ashland at 830. We hired a private conveyance to Medford and although the night was dark in the roads in terrible condition I was determined if it was possible to get home that night. I had the misfortune to get severely poisoned by coming in contact with poisoned oak. We'll try to tell you how it happened. An accident occurred which very narrowly escaped being a serious one and which proved the occasion of my misfortune. Bear in mind that the night was quite dark. That seems logical. Suddenly I was aware that the stage was going very fast and I said to Papa I thought the horses were running away when suddenly we stopped and the driver called to Mr. Beekman to get his wife out quick. I was out before Papa came to my assistance. He having gotten out on the opposite side. I then began to scramble up the bank which was steep in order to get out of the reach of the horses and the stage and in doing so called hold of a small bush which no doubt proved to be poison oak. And I remember now distinctly that when I sat down upon a large rock which lay there I broke off a little twig from the bush and unconscious of the effect broke it into small pieces. I soon learned that in going down the grade a very narrow one and more than 200 feet above the Sacramento River the horses were inclined to get too near the outer bank and the driver in order to bring them in touched one of the leaders with his whip. When the horses sprang forward and broke the lead bar which holds the two together thus leaving only the lines with which to control them. He told us afterwards that he could keep them from running off the grades only by throwing the leaders down which caused the stage to stop so suddenly. The following day about noon my eyes were quite inflamed and when we got to Wairika at five the same evening the small pimples began to appear on my face. When I got home my right eye was swelled shut and the left one almost. Papa says he could not be induced to take that trip again in the winter time. Now in her cookbook Mrs. Beekman has a little note about a poison oak remedy that was given to her by a Mrs. Day and it supposedly would be applied after an incident like this. It's one half teaspoon of Lobelia to a tablespoon of full sweet cream applied to parts affected. So perhaps she used this herself. Now we're going to move to a different time period. We're going to move into the 20th century. The Southern Oregon Historical Society Research Library has a collection of diaries by a woman named Millie Pearl Hodges Walker and very interesting and different type of a narrative than we've just been hearing about. Millie was born in Sam's Valley, Sam's Valley, Oregon in 1892. She married Leo Walker who was born in Kino, Oregon in 1889. And the diary begins in 1910 when Millie was about 18 years old and she was living in Gold Hill at the time. They provide us these diaries with a very interesting look at day to day life kind of on the level of what I referred to earlier about a daily record more than a diary which expounds about her feelings and thoughts as much as she writes what she did even as simple as it might have been as walking to the mailbox and writing a letter to somebody. She records those perfunctory facts for us. And the information that she provides us gives us sort of a bird's eye view into what a person's day to day life was, the regular folk, so to speak, and what her daily business was in her home and around her home. It also, the diary is important because it reflects on a certain time period when World War I began and her husband enlisted in the war and came home as a wounded soldier. But very interestingly, people in these more perfunctory diaries are very low-key about big events. And for example, in 1916, she writes December 14th, Thursday with no prior mention of this before in the diary at all. Foggy, married today at 12 o'clock to L.O. Walker at Jacksonville by Reverend Robert Hutchins Methodist minister. Okay, now she's mentioned L.O. before but not in any romantic context and not in any context in terms of being engaged or planning to marry or any of these things. Just boom, I got married. War my blue suit, a bunch of violets atop the cake. We had dinners about two, just mama, the girls, and Ralph to the wedding. Very low-key affair. We do have a photograph of Millie in her wedding suit at the Southern Oregon Historical Society Research Library. December 15th, the following day, she wrote, we came up here today at Butte Creek Orchard's Eagle Point. Rather hard giving up home but hope to be happy in our new home. Came up in the truck, dreadfully cold, lots of sticky snow. We'll stay with John and Lucy until we can get the house ready. The truck broke just as we got it into the shed. No honeymoon. On December 19th, just a few days later, she wrote, and in her, she refers to her husband continuously as L.O. That's his, that she doesn't use the word Lee anywhere in the diary, it's L.O. She writes, L.O. went to Medford today and J.Vill, got his release papers from the draft, so we'll take examination from Marines Friday, then leave for Portland. Feel so disheartened, though I do think it's better to have L.O. go than to be drafted. So he volunteered his service. He did not wait to be drafted. And she wrote so lonely when I think of L.O. leaving. In 1917, the following year, she sometimes does this in a regular fashion, which I find fascinating and no rhyme or reason, no explanation for why, she will record her weight. And on Wednesday, January 10th, 1917, she wrote, weighed 112 with heavy clothes. Snow melting, quite a bit. Walked over to Evelyn, foggy this evening with frost, a card to Mildred. Colonel W.M. Cody, Buffalo Bill, died in Denver, Colorado today, born February 26th, 1846. So that's a very typical entry for Millie. And sometimes a little tidbit of national or international news. Friday, March 17th, St. Patrick's, a card to L.O. this a.m. Ladies, head of St. Patrick's, Tee here at our house this afternoon. I made ambrosia, went to church tonight to hear a lady speak. April 9th, 1917, Sunday, Easter Sunday, to S.S. Now this is one of the things you encounter when trying to transcribe handwritten diaries is what is the handwriting? What is the pattern of their thought process? How do they refer to certain things? And when they initialize something like, went to S.S., you have to figure out what this means. And you usually do it by going forward and then backward in the diary and getting a perspective and how this repeats. So S.S. means Sunday school. So when she says went to S.S., it means went to Sunday school at Easter services. Also church this evening. Seven more boys enlisted today, 10 boys all together. L.O. and friend went back on number 16. This is a train. She refers to the trains as went back on 53, mama came on the 16, L.O. left on the 53, and so on. So you get again that information coming to you figuring out what she's trying to say. And she wrote, hugeism died about noon consumption. In April 16th, 1917, the U.S. entered World War I. She makes no mention specifically of that in her diary at all. She goes on and later, a little bit later in July to talk about preparing for a big camping trip for the 4th of July to Ashland. 4th of July in 1970, 17 in Ashland was as big as it is now. She wrote, Monday, July 2nd, dreadfully hot, still getting ready, cooked bread, mama, let's see, and Nora left this morning with outfit in the truck, meaning all the camping gear. L.O. went down with them to help fix the camp. So they made a trip to Ashland to set up their camp and then everybody followed after that. Hattie and I left this afternoon, loaded down, came as far as Medford, arrived here at Ashland late this evening, train was late, tired, hut. L.O. got back before we started, preparing for tomorrow. We went over this afternoon and got 10 gallons of cherries, stemmed them, also canned seven quarts. 4th of July, the glorious 4th of July, parade, very good. We celebrate here three days, nice warm day. John and Lucy ate dinner with us, ever so many GIs and people here, about 3,000 people here. Fireworks in the evening in Lethea Park. Saw lots of people, hadn't seen for years. Nora and I went to the train to see the crowd off, tired, lots of confetti, got sunburned, dreadfully. Then in 1918, there's a very busy period of four days here that happens at the end of April. She writes, Friday, April 26th, L.O. went to J.Vill and came back a soldier. He gave me his service pin. He will leave here the 30th. So he's being shipped overseas starting on April 30th, 1918. Spent the day with mama, and until 11.10 p.m. and at 11.35, the angels took her with them. She had suffered so very much and was nearly gone all day. It was all so terrible, pitiful. So her husband's preparing to ship out after just being married a short time and her mother passes away as well. Sunday, April 28th, mother was buried this afternoon at Sam's Valley besides Papa. Funeral was at home. The casket was gray and everything was as near like Papa's funeral. Lots of lovely flowers. Songs were abide with me and beautiful Isle. Reverend Belknap officiated and his wife sang. Ms. Katie played. There was lots of people there, both at the house and at the cemetery. The night before her husband ships out, she wrote that LO was trying to get all legal things straightened out before he leaves. We were all busy all day. LO and I went for a walk in the evening. It is so dreadfully lonely, but we are so glad mother isn't suffering. We'll never get over wanting her, how we did want her to be well and happy. On the April 30th, she wrote, we three hustled around and left home this a.m. Got here at Ashland before dinner. LO left at 2 p.m. for Medford from there to Camp Lewis. Went as acting sergeant to a bunch of 20 men. It's so lonely, I can hardly stand it. Then, LO writes to her a series of letters from his voyage overseas, and he tells her things, but he doesn't tell her really what's going on. Effectively what happens is that he writes that he's in the hospital, that he's sick, and this comes at a time when it's right around the Christmas time, December. Remember, he's left in April. And then he's in the hospital and he's hoping to get home for Christmas and so on and so forth. And then finally, she gets a letter, December 19th, 1918, from the War Department saying LO has been wounded on September 26th while in action. So he was wounded and didn't mention this to her. And again, he writes at the end of the month saying he's hoping to be home soon. It won't be until almost the year after he actually left to go overseas, April 25th, that he actually does return home. She also receives a letter from him, sort of a bizarre little aside in one of her entries saying that he wrote that he was wounded and gassed. And so he comes home at the end of April 1919. And she says, so wonderful to be with my soldier just one year ago that LO left here. Skipping ahead to December of 1919, she wrote, dreadfully sick last night, was better for a while but this AM, but this afternoon I lost that which I've carried only two months. I have been so happy planning on the tiny mites arrival and I'm so very heartbroken. Doctor says I must stay in bed several days. So she miscarries her first child after he gets home from the war. LO never really fully recovers from his injuries, whatever those were, whether it was PTSD or what we don't really know, whether it was from the gassing, we're not really sure. She writes often that he's napping, he's not sleeping well. There are references to his state of being, but nothing again really specific. They don't get too personal in here. And he did pass away in 1922. So very early. And she didn't pass away, Millie didn't pass away until 1964. So she lived well beyond him. They did have a daughter after she had the miscarriage. She did have a successful pregnancy and later a granddaughter, but just a slice of life from that time period. And now we're gonna skip over to Dr. Swedenberg who most of you will be familiar with the Swedenberg house now called the Plunkett Center which is on the SU campus on the corner there on Siski Boulevard. And Dr. Francis Swedenberg was born in 1867 in Gothenburg, Sweden and came to the United States with his parents when he was just six months old. He eventually ended up here in Ashland as a practicing physician at a very interesting time in our medical history. It was when doctors were not only your personal physician, your GP as we would call them, they were the surgeon, they were the psychologist, they were doing surgeries in your home and it was now moving over to when hospitals were becoming more the norm. And there was a hospital here in Ashland quite early. So he speaks frequently of going to the hospital and so forth. Also was a time period where people were not just treated in their homes but they were brought to or sent to the hospital. So this is the beginning of that whole time period in the 20th century when hospital medical stuff was changing rapidly. And Swedenberg was definitely a surgeon. He did many tonsillectomies, many apendectomies. It's really repetitive in the diaries. And there are about 30 little, tiny diaries in his very difficult to read handwriting in the Hand and Library archive, which are quite wonderful. And I just did excerpts from his 1919 diaries and we'll hope to do more at another time. And just a patient disclaimer for the people who we're gonna mention here. We don't have those privacy laws at this time. And so he mentions people by name. I am going to mention people by name as well and not to offend anybody, but it's just his manner of writing. He would, how he would record that, but just know that you're gonna hear some personal details you might not wanna know otherwise about these people. He wrote Wednesday, May 28th, 1919. And this is sort of dovetailing from when Millie's diary ends again that same year. He wrote, had a checkered day, did up my calls this a.m. and in this p.m. was called out to the country for this stork case. I have been waiting for, I have been waiting for owing to complications. I brought her to this hospital and delivered at 5.20 p.m. Now, one of my greatest frustrations with Dr. Swedenberg was that he would write about this case and there would be this word that I couldn't read. I'd be like, what's the word? And trying to figure out the lettering and the cursive handwriting and it was repeated often and I'm like, why did I figure this out? And I finally figured out that he referred to pregnancies as stork cases. So we had a difficult stork case. So that was the word I was trying to decipher. I mean, this again is getting into the mind of the writer and trying to figure out what are they trying to say? And this is a common thing. Millie referred to a woman in her diary who the stork was gonna come in five months. So the stork became a big thing around 1919, for some reason. And Dr. Swedenberg uses that. Anyway, so he had a difficult stork case and brought this woman to the hospital to deliver. June 2, 1919 was up early planting some beans, attended to my hospital patients and made some calls, had to give up this Franklin case who was later sent to the sanitarium. There were some mental illness issues there that he felt were beyond his capabilities. June 9th, operated upon Genevieve. Now he had two daughters, his wife was Olive and his daughter's names were Genevieve and Eleanor. So he's operating upon his own daughter in this instance. He wrote, operated upon Genevieve, removed a badly inflamed appendix of having been preparing for future uprising. She got along fine. This ordeal was strenuous for me. Weather has turned out very cool again. The other patients are all getting along fine. So having his own daughter under the knife was stressful for him, obviously. On June 12th, operated on Mrs. Burkholder and Mrs. McKay, both repair of perineum, tearing from childbirth. Got along fine. Patients are all getting along splendidly. June 14th, Genevieve came home feeling fine. And on June 13th, Genevieve got up today and is feeling fine. It really makes one rejoice about the work this way. We have been blessed in its progress. So he's proud of the fact that the medical care that he can provide is the highest caliber for his daughter. Monday, June 30th, took care of all little dressings at the hospital, removed the stitches on the perineum patients whose work was, in all respects, very satisfactory. So no, these two women we just mentioned who had the stitching done, they were in the hospital more than 18 days to recover. Now think about, we go to hospitals and leave the same day for surgery. This was your in bed for 18 days. Then he cleaned up the car and looked after the details of his office. On July 1st, he wrote a warm and uneventful ushering in of July. Work was not very brisk, but kept busy throughout the day. Collected a little on ACT. Now, this happens again frequently, like the stork cases, it was a mystery. What does ACT mean? Well, he's always talking about how he has to ask his patients for money to collect on accounts because not everybody always has the money to pay him. So again, this is a practice that doctors were carrying in their own business. They were having to take care of all these other details, including asking for money. So he frequently mentions that he's successful in getting money or he's not successful either way. He wrote, set an arm for a little Shaw whose mother, much to my surprise, paid cash. Friday, July 4th, young shooting accident last night in the little Ralph school girl, was gun to death, was called to the hospital by Doctors Brown and Greg, had the case in hand, but it was hopeless. So a little girl killed in an accidental shooting on the 4th of July. July 6th, slept till late, made the rounds. This Indian girl was brought to the hospital in this morning, made a couple of examinations in the PM, read up on some legal part of this divorce case that I am forced to work with. July 9th was up bright and early, did two operations after 9.30, Mrs. Short and Mrs. Slack, with two tonsillectomies all before 11 a.m. Olive, his wife, and Eleanor, his daughter, drove over to the falls, Klamath Falls, that is, after Genevieve, so that felt a little lonesome, went to bed early. So he felt sad when his wife and daughter were away in Klamath Falls. July 10th was up early again this morning, operated upon Mr. Lausley, fixed up his hand and arm, got along fine. A bit of office work and collected a little on ACT, looked over the ground of the accident and saw the remains of the poor fellow who was killed last night. Again, no information beyond that, but we could potentially look back to other records, newspapers, to find out what accident he's talking about. Operated on Harry Harvey, removing one of the world's worst appendix that I have ever seen for a long time, got along fine, had a bunch of work in the office, but found time to take in a good lecture and part of the evening lecture. Had a hard, stork case in the evening, finishing after midnight. July 20th, another warm day, found all patients doing real well. Mrs. Short left the hospital, Burns Kincaid also left for home this evening, took in the Chautauqua in this evening, had a very good entertainment. July 21st, Monday toil found everyone getting along fine at the hospital. Mr. Crowd and Mrs. Burns left for home. My long delayed stork party left off at 6.45 p.m. Found Harvey a little weaker this morning. The outlook is not good as we had hoped, found the gang green of the bowel ascended, collected on some ACT and made calls, attending lectures in the p.m. and evening. Then July 24th, 1919, poor Harvey passed away a little after midnight. All of the other patients are doing very well. The girl with the deranged mind is gradually quieting down, and I think it will not be long and her mental vision will clear up. So there was some hope for her. There are in the Southern Oregon Historical Society research library a few letters from Dr. Swedenberg's daughters, Genevieve and Eleanor, that were written to him in 1925. The two daughters actually studied in Sweden. They went for two years together to study abroad. And in 1925, their mother joined them in Europe to do a tour where they saw Sweden, Germany, France, Italy, Holland, Belgium, and England. And a few of these letters survive, as I said. Genevieve is more clinical in her descriptions. Again, the personalities of the writers come through as you begin to read these things. And she actually went on to become a physician and she took over, well, she ran her own practice here in Ashland as well, never married. Her sister, Eleanor, did. And she lived in the house at 996 Boulevard, the big house Genevieve as an adult, and so forth. So Genevieve writes from Florence. It has ranked every place we have visited so far. The weatherman has been kind enough to give us one beautiful day to leave us a good impression of the town. As it began raining so in Vienna, we didn't see so awfully much, but got a good impression of the city. The parks were lovely. We visited Mozart's museum where we saw his piano and original pieces of music he wrote and other things in the museum added later on. Venice excels in everything in grandeur I have ever seen or heard of. They're having fireworks near here, celebrating something, I suppose. Sounds just like 4th of July at home. Mama's in bed now and Eleanor is undressing as I guess I'd better close and get ready to. Now, daughter Eleanor has a little bit more of a lively personality and she writes on the very same day, dearest papa excerpts, in Venice, I wrote, I love to ride in the gondolas and I'm sure if I lived there, I would have plenty to do. It's only a shame that they have motorboats now. They should have prohibited them. We all think the same. My wasn't the Grand Canal nice. When we were going into the station, there was a man that had had a little too much wine and he was very happy. He was singing. It's a long way to Tipperary and flirting with us. We all laughed so hard. Goodness, I should think he would tumble down sometime. At first when I arrived at the hotel, I expected it to rock like a boat but it never quavered but Venice does look like water lilies on a pond. We bought some nice straw hats and they are very cute. We certainly enjoyed going to those old market places because they start with such extreme prices and keep coming down until one is almost ashamed to take them. Our hats cost about 50 cents a piece and they are really beautiful. They are handmade and have beautiful colors. Things are very well done here. We did not stop at that hotel baglioni because a man on the train referred us to the Patria which is all right and much cheaper and very reasonable. Have had very funny experiences but nothing disastrous has happened so far. Just a note that the hotel, Grand Hotel Baglioni opened on August the 12th, 1903 and it had been converted from a 19th century palace. It still exists today and is considered one of the finest historic hotels in the city of Florence. The Patria also still exists but its reviews reflect a much lower standard more like on the long lines of a family hostel. So maybe it was a similar type of thing there as well. Now just to wrap up the Swedenberg story and to wrap up my talk here, Dr. Swedenberg did travel to Europe again in 1937. He and his wife went over and they went back to his hometown Gothenburg where he was born. Unfortunately on the ship over in the dining room he had a chicken bone that lodged in his throat and by the time he reached Sweden, gangrene had started to form in his lungs and he did not survive to return back to Ashland. So there are ample accounts in the Ashland papers about a beloved doctor, Swedenberg had died suddenly and unexpectedly and nobody knew why yet. They hadn't sent the cable to explain what had caused his death. So everybody received the shocking news that he was dead and then a couple of days later you see the newspaper account explaining what actually happened to him. So his wife had him shipped home of course and she came soon after. But he has prolific in his writings and again I took tiny slivers of information that these people have left for us. There's still lots of detail that I didn't even get to cover. I had to cut out significant amounts but it's fascinating. I hope you've enjoyed it. I hope you've enjoyed the look back and if you have any questions I'm happy to answer them if I can. So thank you for coming and joining us this evening and open your eyes. Remember history is everywhere.