Michelle Ule's Blog, page 94

First Hand Research and Special Collection Libraries

I recently spent several days at Wheaton College’s Special Collections library. As I read through the papers, housed in archival boxes, the archivist asked me what, specifically, I was looking for.

“I don’t know. Just color details.”

I found plenty of remarks, tossed aside comments, diary scribblings (though not in Biddy’s Bible–she wrote her notes in shorthand!), and newspaper clippings. They will serve me well as I write, but they did not come easily. I have to review plenty of material to find nuggets of golden insight.

Research is like that, particularly primary source research.

Back in the dark ages when I attended school, my eight grade history teacher, Mrs. Klocki, stood on her spike heels and animated her painted face. “I don’t know why you read fantasy,” she trilled, “when history is much more fantastic and true!”

She emphasized the importance of first hand information–what did the people who experienced the event think about it at the time? What did they observe?

How did they see things without the hindsight we have today?

Reading through letters, written in the often hard-to-decipher hand of the person I’m studying, gives poignancy and character to the words. I’ve written before about the voyeuristic feelings I’ve had reviewing the private thoughts of a subject:  here. But when you can see the suggestion of tears, note how the handwriting appears–the lines thick and dark, pale and wispy–the letters have a poignancy you can’t pick up from reading the words in a book.

During my genealogy research, I learned to read far afield–to not limit myself only to the person I was studying. I read material collected by relatives. Stories written by friends in diaries about events they participated in, enable me to glean further details. I’ve learned pet names for family members and lip-curling disdain for the hated northerners in a Civil War project.

Such material takes me out of my 21st century point of view. While I knew it was dangerous to move onto land belonging to native Americans, reading an account of one woman’s horror in Harriet Arnow’s Seedtime on the Cumberland brought the danger home to me.

“A woman sent her twelve-year-old out to milk the cow in eastern Tennessee (prior to 1800). The next time she saw him, his head was on a stake being shaken at her as the Indians rode their ponies around the clearing, shrieking.”

See what I mean? I could tell you how frightening it was, but two sentences of a first hand account, shakes you emotionally.

The United States has many special collections libraries, and even has presidential libraries when you can explore history through first hand accounts. Like Wheaton, some libraries have “ephemera,” odds and ends loosely linked to the subject of the library that are not necessarily papers. At Wheaton, I handled Bibles owned by Biddy and Oswald Chambers, as well as one donated by a friend. I touched the typewriter on which My Utmost for His Highest was written, and I even rifled through Biddy’s old purse.

I’m not interested in fetishes, but items that belonged to the people I’m studying give me a sense of who they were–a leather bag in the hand, a high-keyed typewriter, onion-skin pages. A dress resurrected from a relative’s attic and displayed will soon tell me how tall my heroine is. Her ring, chipped from a rock in prison, shows me how much she was loved. A newspaper clipping detailing her trousseau tells me what’s important to a woman in love during the Civil War.

These are the types of items you can see and sometimes touch, in a special collection, a library or a museum.

What makes a character come alive when you read about them? Click to Tweet

How important are historical details in the writing process? Click to Tweet

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Holding Oswald Chambers’ Bible: the (Literal) Book that Changed My Life
Astonishing Research – Madeleine L’Engle

Astonishing Research–Madeleine L’Engle

As I mentioned last time, I recently traveled to Wheaton College‘s Special Collections to do research on Oswald Chambers for a book I’m working on. I made my arrangements in advance and arrived ten minutes early on a Thursday morning.

While I waited for the archivist to arrive, I noticed a table full of pamphlets detailing the other writers whose manuscripts and letters also were in the collection.

Wheaton has quite a selection: Francis and Edith Schaeffer, C. Everett Koop, Irina Ratushninskaya, Susan Howatch, Frederick Buechner (my friend on Facebook!) and, there she was, Madeleine L’Engle.

After I introduced myself to the librarian, I laughed about Madeleine L’Engle. “Gee, I wonder if you’ve got the letter I wrote her a long time ago.”

Archivist Keith Call smiled. “Maybe.”

Caught up in Oswald and Biddy Chambers’ writing–including the thrilling moments I held their Bibles–I didn’t think again about Madeleine L’Engle until I wondered if maybe I could take a photo of Madeleine’s Bible and write a blog post on Bibles (reprising my post on paperback Bibles, perhaps? I see it, too, references Ms. L’Engle).

Keith was working through an archival box at another table, but during a lull in my I-Pad photo clicking, I asked about her Bible.

“I haven’t got it. But I have found her letters from 1977.”

I went totally still.

He smiled. “You probably didn’t have the same name then, did you?”

“It was the summer before I got married,” I stuttered.

“Does this number sound familiar? 1525 West Fifth Street?”

My word.

He had found my letter.

I had tears in my eyes as I took the blue stationery, words written in my then-loopy handwriting on both sides. I swallowed. It was hard to read. I certainly remembered writing the letter (see this post) but not that it was so long.

Madeleine L’Engle had saved it, along with the envelope and a carbon copy of her response. I suppose that’s what you do when you’re a famous author and you get a lot of fan mail.

I lost my copy of her response long ago and I’d not seen my handwritten letter since I dropped it in the mail box.

Here it is, written two weeks after I graduated from UCLA. I was young and I cringe to read this now. But I was, as always, earnest and wanting to connect with someone I admired and for whom I was thankful.

(You’ll note I addressed her by her married name–I knew information like that. Still, I was surprised to see the publishing house forwarded my envelope to “Mrs. Hugh Franklin”).

September 7, 1977

Dear Mrs. Franklin,

I don’t know how many times I’ve been tempted to pick up my pen and write you how much I appreciate the stories and people you’ve shared with me in your books. And each time, except this one, I’ve put the pen aside and said, “No, I don’t want to bother her with something unimportant. I don’t really have anything to say.” But, too bad this time, I want to write and tell you I’ve loved your books.

I’m moving through A Circle of Quiet now for about my fifth time and it’s a new joy each time I read it. I feel like I know you, as if I were one of your young friends chancing in on a conversation at the Cathedral and it’s fun!

I remember the first time I found out you were “struggling to be” a Christian. It was Christmas time three or so years ago (before I’d read A Circle of Quiet or Lines Scribbled on an Envelope). We were casually circulating through the bookstore at our church when I saw a book of Christmas poems (I can’t remember the title, but I suppose you know it anyway). Your name was on the cover with a bunch of others and a light went on in my head as I gasped joyfully, “She’s a Christian!” The next summer, following my first year at college, I read everything you’ve written, many for the umpteenth time. And I could pick out hints of your love for the goodness, the LOVE, and your fearful determination to face the darkness of evil.

I love the light too and I share a horrified knowledge of the blackness coming over the world. And that’s why I’m so glad so many people, so many children, read your works and remember that some love does exist in the world; whether it be family, agapé or Godly.

There are a lot of “I”s in this letter and I (!) feel a little self-conscious because of it. This wasn’t intended to be gushy, but rather a confirmation of appreciation. You’ve taught me so many things and made me really THINK about ideas and attitudes. Your desire to express the vitality of the English language is one I shout amen to. I also love the way you keep mentioning your fallibility. It’s nice to think you’re human too!

When I was in New York a couple weeks ago I had a free day before I caught my plane back to LA. I sat down and tried to think what I’d really like to do now that I was in this important center of so much. I jumped up and thought, “I’ll go find Madeleine L’Engle!” But the city is large and it was summertime and no one really knew what I was talking about when I asked where the Cathedral was so I never found you. Perhaps another time in the winter.

Thank you for taking the time to read my letter and thank you for enduring those long ten years without an acceptance. I appreciate your struggles.

God bless you richly,

It amuses me to see those determinedly underlined titles, THINK in capitals and the accent mark on agapé. I so wanted to be “one” of hers.

Reading it now, I see my youthfulness with different eyes and am surprised, delighted, amazed that some parts of this letter reflect who I still am.

I’ve long been conscious that I adopted some of the parenting traits L’Engle described in her book Meet the Austins. I’ve acted like the mother in that story every time I’ve turned on classical music LOUD when I’ve cleaned. The strange times I’ve chosen to paint things, is just like Mrs. Austin. The reading aloud, cooking, affectionate names–all were part of my mothering style that I did not learn from my mother.

While I was never a member of Madeleine’s young women friends, obviously, I have been the older woman to a delightful chorus of young women floating in and out of our house. I’ve talked long into the night on important issues–just as Madeleine used to. I’ve done stints in libraries.

It took me only seven years of waiting to be published–but I knew not to expect instant acceptance because of Madeleine L’Engle’s writing.

I learned so much from her.

Madeleine L’Engle (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Her response to my letter was generous and gracious.

September 25, 1977

Dear Michelle:

Thank you, indeed, for your wonderful sharing letter. The next time you are in new York, I do hope that you will find the Cathedral, which is at Amsterdam Avenue and 112th Street. It will have to be in the winter, because I am seldom there in the summer.

It pleases me that you think A Circle of Quiet is a friend to you, and I hope you will read the two books which follow it, The Summer of the Great-Grandmother and The Irrational Season.

I have just finished a new fantasy, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, which follows A Wrinkle in Time and A Wind in the Door. I think it is the fantasies which stretch my thinking the most.

I think you might also like two of my adult novels, The Other Side of the Sun and The Love Letters, both of which contain a considerable amount of theological searching.

Thank you, again, for your letter.

Sincerely yours,

Madeleine L’Engle

She must have had some sort of a form–who could keep up otherwise? Like a good writer, she pointed to her other books–all of which I had read and loved.

I remember receiving that letter a week before I got married–standing in the living room, shaking with awe that she wrote back.

Of course I never looked her up.

But I’d touched a hero and she’d recognized me if only for a fleeting response. I hope I remember to be as gracious to others in my life as Madeleine L’Engle.

Enough about me, if you’re a Madeleine L’Engle fan, which is your favorite book? Click to Tweet

Mine?

A Ring of Endless Light.

For this exciting experience, thanks be to Keith Call. Thanks be to Madeleine L’Engle. Thanks be, of course, to God.

Tweetables:

Finding a long-lost Madeleine L’Engle fan letter. Click to Tweet

My fan letter as a Wrinkle in Time? Click to Tweet

Holding Oswald Chambers’ Bible: the (Literal) Book that Changed My Life

I don’t know, exactly, when I first got a copy of Oswald Chambers‘ My Utmost for His Highest.

It’s a Barbour paperback, and I’m pretty sure it cost $5. I don’t think I bought it, though. I think someone gave to me, or perhaps to my Sunday School teacher husband.

But about 12 years ago I picked it up and started to use it as a daily devotional. It’s beautiful arranged that way–366 pages including a short verse and Chambers’ thoughts on what it means, with room to write things at the bottom.  I’ve confined myself to birthdays so I remember to pray or even send a card (usually late) on the appropriate day.

(You can also find each day’s devotion at www.utmost.org.)

Over the years I’ve taken Oswald’s wisdom and applied it to a life that rarely lives up to the calling of Jesus.

Oswald, of course, would expect that. You should, too.

Many of you know his famous call to being “broken bread and poured out wine.” It’s helpful to remember that on days when I feel broken, discouraged and as if I have little left to give.

Days like that, of course, are often when the Lord can use me best.

English: Oswald Chambers (1874-1917) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

My attitudes have changed through reading this devotional; I’m a better follower of Jesus Christ as a result. Each day I find myself nodding and challenged anew. I then turn to my designated Bible readings (a Psalm, a passage in the Old Testament, a passage in the New) and feel fit for service in God’s Kingdom–even if I have to confess some sin or realign my focus with my Redeemer’s call.

Often the Scripture passages mirror what Oswald has said, and I’m struck anew at how God engineers our circumstances to speak to our souls. It’s a heady thing.

During a terrible event when I was tormented my prayers had been pointless and wasted, I avoided God for several days. When I finally returned to my discipline, I started with Oswald Chambers’ devotional. The headline for August 28 was “What’s the Good of Prayer?”

Oswald’s signature wisdom restored my faith:

It is not so true that “prayer changes things” as that prayer changes me and I change things. God has so constituted things that prayer on the basis of Redemption alters the way in which a man looks at things. Prayer is not a question of altering things externally, but of working wonders in a man’s disposition.

God let his servant Oswald Chambers answer the questions tearing me apart. Click to Tweet

I love it when God does that.

Chambers was born in the nineteenth century and died in 1917 at the age of 43. He was consecrated to God in ways that sober and thrill. David McCasland wrote an excellent biography called Oswald Chambers: Abandoned to God: The Life Story of the Author of My Utmost for His Highest.

I’m working on a book that includes Oswald Chambers, and so recently I spent two days at Wheaton College’s Special Collection Library going through the Oswald Chambers papers donated by McCasland.

I read through archival boxes of letters, diaries, notes. I studied photos and handled “ephemera.” And then Archivist Keith Call brought out several startling items:

 This is Biddy’s Chambers’ Bible. The poor thing was in several parts, obviously well read and worn.

He also brought out the typewriter on which she transcribed Oswald’s words in My Utmost for His Highest. (Unfortunately, I can’t get the photo to appear right side up!) I ran my fingers across the round keys and felt like I had brushed eternity–both by the knowledge Biddy and Oswald’s fingers had typed, but also recognizing the words that came through the black inked ribbon had affected so many people–including me.

Then Keith brought out a white box closed with Velcro. I opened it up to this:

I turned the thin paper and found lots of pages that looked like this:

This is Oswald Chambers’ Bible and the above are his notes on Pentecost.

As I held the worn leather volume in my two hands, I thought of how this very book, along with the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, had affected Oswald Chambers’ mind, life and ministry. From this very volume, he had written the sermons, lectures and lessons which Biddy Chambers faithfully transcribed and then turned into thirty books, the most famous of which is My Utmost for His Highest.

My life had been changed for the better by, literally, this very Bible.

Both Biddy and Oswald would laugh at such a conceit–they knew, and I know very well, that it’s God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit who does the changing. Oswald, Biddy–and me, too–are only servants.

But it was exciting to hold Bibles both Oswald and Biddy loved and used.

My thanks to Wheaton College, Keith, Biddy, Oswald, and God.

Are you familiar with Oswald Chambers and My Utmost for His Highest? How have the devotionals affected you?

Tweetables:

Holding Oswald Chambers’ Bible in my hands. Click to Tweet

Who Wouldn’t Want to Write about Texas?

Bluebonnet photo by Lynette Sowell

What makes you decide to set a story in a place like Texas?

The enormity of possibilities! Countless writers have written about the state from the sprawling Texas by James Michener, to the nine novellas in The Texas Brides Collection.

The seven writers in this collection have a variety of links to the state, from Old Three Hundred descendant Kathleen Y’Barbo, through Michelle Ule’s ancestor’s arrival ten years later, and writers who live there still like DiAnn Mills and Lynette Sowell.

“You can find anything in Texas,” New England native Darlene Franklin explained. “Texas is a state of mind as well as a geographical place. Texans are proud of their home, and rightly so.” Click to Tweet

Another New England transplant agreed with her: “Texas has such a mystique about it. It’s a land of possibilities, open spaces, and big dreams, where you are your only limitation. The state is like a whole country to itself.” Lynette l has lived there 21 years and is happy to stay put.

“I consider myself an ex-pat Texas because I’m living north of the border [in Oklahoma],” laughed Kathleen. “I love the beaches, the bluebonnets, the Texas music scene, Round Top and Gruene and the Central Texas towns like Fredricksburg, the wide open spaces, the friendly people, and the history.”

For Michelle, Texas became a center of interest while examining her genealogy. That’s where she learned her great-great-great-grandfather had first stolen into the land when it was part of Mexico. Her own grandfather always spoke with a twang she’d never quite located until she realized he’d been born in Palestine.

Darlene laughed at the accent stumbles. “I spent a summer in Mexico City as a missionary, and I traveled back by bus. When we crossed the border into Texas, a three-year old girl joined me. She chatted nonstop, but between her heavy accent and childish speech, I couldn’t understand a word. “Send me back to Mexico!” I thought. “At least there I can understand when people talk!”

For those who live in Texas, location and familiarity make it an easy way to do research.

Darlene knew she was writing specifically for The Texas Brides Collection and looked for a story line that linked Texas Rangers and outlaws. “I set the story in San Antonio, since the Rangers were headquartered there. I paired my Ranger with a reformed thief who plays the role of Robin Hood among the city’s poor.”

An early depiction of a group of Texas Rangers, c. 1845 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Michelle also knew the book’s title and just as she did with “The Dogtrot Christmas” in A Log Cabin Christmas Collection, she went to her genealogy for a pertinent story. Remembering how her great-great-grandfather was a surveyor in Anderson County following the Civil War, she looked for a tale that would fit the Piney woods of east Texas.

She combined him with a story from another family line about the 1867 yellow fever epidemic that claimed her great-great-grandmother’s husband eight months before Michelle’s great-great-grandfather was born. “An Inconvenient Gamble” also examines the spiritual way of dealing with temptation.

Kathleen went to the family history books for her stories as well. “Saving Grace” is set on the Brazos River between Galveston and Santa Fe. That’s where my family’s land was (some of it is still in the family). The basis of the story is true, although I decided to give Mrs. Escher a happy ending in the novella. In real life, she remained alone and raised her babies without a handsome Texas Ranger to help her.”

“When researching for Texas, I do a combination of onsite and in-person research,” Lynette said. “For “Reuben’s Atonement,” since it’s in a fictional town, I could make it any way I wanted to, but it had to stay true to late 19th century Texas.”

DiAnn Mills wrote two stories for The Texas Brides Collection and as one features a Texas Ranger, she researched at The Texas Ranger Museum in Texas and has also spent time at the Texas Historical Library near where she lives.

“I lived a bunch of my research, either through family stories or road trips,” Kathleen said. “Some of it came from historical sites. I love the Bob Bullock Texas History Museum in Austin. I could wander around there for days.”

Plenty of stories, plenty of friendly people and lots of great food. Who wouldn’t want to read an historical romance, or nine, about Texas? Or win a copy of The Texas Brides Collection? Click to Tweet

To enter a contest for a copy of The Texas Brides Collection along with a handful of Texas trinkets, sign up for the RSS feed for this blog OR go to Michelle Ule, writer on Facebook and click on the June Brides Tab. Like her page and describe your favorite bride. Random winner will be chosen on Saturday, June 8.

What was that again? How do I enter the contest?

1. Sign up for the RSS feed for this blog

OR

1. Go to Michelle Ule, writer on Facebook.

2. Click on the June Brides contest tab

3. Like her page.

4. Tell me about your favorite bride

IF you’ve already liked my page and/or have signed up for the RSS feed, just send me a comment and I’ll put your name in the hat.

Clear as Texas skies? 

A Bridal Collaboration: Texas-style!

My great-great-great-grandfather, Reverend Thomas Hanks lived in Tennessee in the early part of the 19th century. A circuit riding minister for the Primitive Baptist Church, he had the traditional family “itchy foot” and left his wife and children behind to explore new worlds with the Gospel in mind.

His wanderings took him across the swamps and rivers of Tennessee and Arkansas to the fertile land of Texas, then part of Mexico.

True to his calling, “Daddy” Hanks slipped in and out of Roman Catholic Texas, illegally preaching, baptizing and also marrying.

Since he was a Baptist, not a Catholic priest, all the marriages he conducted were illegal. Once Texas became a republic, however, Hanks obtained a legal license in Nacogdoches and rode the circuit once more, to remarry everyone legally.

A Centennial of Texas Baptists notes the response at one lonely farmhouse:

One “bride” was in the cow pen when the preacher appeared with the astounding tidings that she must go through another ceremony if she would be a lawful wife.

She washed her hands obediently, but permitted one doubtful murmur to escape. “All right, Daddy Hanks, but I have a good notion not to have Mr. Gilliland this time. I know too much about him now.”

I thought of this story while interacting with my fellow writers in The Texas Brides Collection. Four of my co-writers were Texas brides themselves: Kathleen Y’Barbo, Lynette Sowell, DiAnn Mills and Darlene Franklin. We drove through Texas on our honeymoon, so the Lone Star state does remind me of romance and a bright future—as it does in the nine novellas in our collection.

Lynette Sowell, perhaps, had the most “Texas-style” wedding in that her husband’s groom cake was in the shape of Texas. The fact it had a Starship Enterprise piped on top in icing was testimony to another important cultural joy in his life. (Lynette wouldn’t let him wear a Starfleet shirt during the actual ceremony, however).

Lynette and Darlene both are native New Englanders who married men in Texas. For Darlene’s family the rehearsal dinner included a lesson in the definition of sweet tea on a steamy June evening. To her mother, tea was a hot drink, but she quickly learned that sweet tea is what the rest of us call “iced tea.”

Kathleen actually eloped to Hawai’i for her wedding–which is where her groom was on temporary duty at the time. But they’re both native Texans (Kathleen’s ancestors go back 10 generations), and they had a wedding reception in Texas, which is close enough in our book!

(Our other “pen pals” include Darlene Mindstrup and Tamela Hancock Murray)

What would makes a Texas Brides story? Click to Tweet

In The Texas Brides Collection, we include tales of young widows struggling on farms, horse ranches and even a river supply landing, when they meet men (un)willing to help them in the 19th century. Lawmen, in the form of Texas Rangers in several stories, represent order and devotion during an unsettled time. The stories also include reformed men and women trying to build new lives for themselves following troubling pasts. Two former gamblers determine to change their lives and live in peace.

Really, all these stories lack is a Reverend Thomas Hanks moseying up to the farmhouses with a slow drawl–though his son does make an appearance in my An Inconvenient Gamble– as a justice of the peace, he performs a wedding in the nick of time.

I’m running a contest this week on my Michelle Ule, writer Facebook page. If you would like an opportunity to win a copy of The Texas Brides Collection, along with a handful of genuine Texas souvenirs, “Like” the contest tab on my Facebook page. Click to Tweet

OR, sign up for the RSS feed on this blog and I’ll enter you in the contest.                                                                                                                               LIKE

Only requirement: sign up and give us a short description of your favorite bride.

Amazing Internet Research: Dolley Madison

My father’s great-grandfather James Steele Hanks was born in 1809–Thomas Jefferson was the president of the United States.

I can never quite wrap my brain around how young the United States is when I think about that fact.

My children knew their great-grandfather–he was 90 years old when my oldest son was born– and was 103 when he died.

My sons knew their great-grandfather, even though my father never met his.

But still; the generations were not that far apart.

I think about how short a span of time our nation’s history encompasses when I look at this daguerreotype taken by Matthew Brady in 1848:

That’s basically a photograph of the wife of the fourth president of the United States. She knew President George Washington–his nephew was married to her sister!

Dolley Madison died in 1849. She had her photo taken several times. I can’t find the permissions for two other photos, but you can examine them through the University of Virginia here and The National First Ladies Library here.

The photo of Dolley at the National First Ladies Library shows her standing with President James K. Polk and his wife Sally, along with President James Buchanan and his niece Harriet Lane who served as his first lady. She appears to be the tallest woman in the photo.

Born in 1768, on the cusp of the American Revolution, Dolley grew up in South Carolina and Virginia on a plantation. She lived until 1849–or– from the founding of the republic to the California Gold Rush. She was 81 when she died, several months after the photo on the right was taken.

(Daguerreotypes were developed in the 1830′s.)

Interestingly, Dolley’s father John Payne, a Virginia planter who probably knew some of my ancestors, emancipated all his slaves after the American Revolution. Perhaps Dolley’s family was more progressive and up-to-date than we imagine Virginians of the 18th century.

Dolley’s fame came during the War of 1812 when she cut Gilbert Stuart’s famous painting of President George Washington out of the frame, rolled it up and stuck it in her bag when she fled the White House just ahead of the British. The British Army burned the president’s mansion, but Dolley saved the day, including original drafts of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

She frequently wore a turban on her head, in the style of the times, and just stayed with it over the years.

I’ve thought more about Dolley Madison in the last year because my friend Mary Tatem has written an historical novel in which Dolley’s a minor character. Mary’s story, Victory Stitches, includes the dramatic scene of Dolley fleeing the mansion during the War of 1812, and provided me with insight into Dolley’s easy way with servants and friendliness–attitudes you can see in her photos with her sweet half smile..

What I appreciate about old photos like this one is they reveal what people actually looked like. The painting at the top of this blog post show a much younger Dolley, of course, but the photographs–particularly this one and the University of Virginia picture–confirm that the “real” Dolley was not quite as beautiful as the painting.

Don’t you wish the photo could talk? Wouldn’t you love to hear her southern drawl?

Tell me about your most amazing Internet find!

Amazing Internet Research: Helen Keller

 I read Helen Keller‘s biography, The Story of My Life, as a child and was inspired by her persistence in overcoming her profound handicaps. Helen was blind and deaf.

Many people have enjoyed the stage play and the movie, The Miracle Worker, about Helen Keller’s meeting with Teacher Annie Sullivan and Sullivan’s determination to turn Helen from an animal into a child with dignity. Helen was nearly seven years-old.

Even as a child, I couldn’t imagine how you would get through to a girl who had neither seen nor heard since a bout with scarlet fever at 18 months. (The only senses she had were touch, smell and taste.) Her mother claimed Helen was a bright child who already could talk–most notably, could say “water” as a very young child.

No one expected anything of young Helen Keller. Once she lost her sight and hearing she was effectively sealed off from her community except through touch and food.

But her mother never gave up hope.

Five years after Helen “went dark,” Mrs. Keller read Charles Dickens’ book American Notes where she learned of another deaf and blind woman, Laura Bridgman–successfully treated by the Perkins School of the Blind. The family sough options for young Helen, even talking with Alexander Graham Bell, then doing research on deafness. Ultimately, the experts led them to Annie Sullivan who certainly worked hard for that miracle in Helen’s life.

Annie Sullivan, herself a sight-impaired former-student of the Perkins School for the Blind, saw something in Helen and worked hard in extremely difficulty circumstances, to get through to Helen and ultimately teach her how to manager herself.

The play and movie demonstrate this masterfully.

 

Helen ultimately learned how to read in Braille, could communicate in sign language done in the palm of Teacher’s hand and eventually learned, again, how to speak.  She graduated, with Teacher’s help, from Radcliffe College, the first “blinddumb” person to do so.

Here is where the wonders of our information age truly leave me awe-struck. The other day on Facebook, a friend posted a video of Helen Keller and Annie Sullivan, demonstrating how Helen learned to speak.

And then we got to hear her:

I hope this is legal–I have hunted to find where it came from. You tube did not tell me. The Smithsonian Magazine was one link on Google. The Youtube video was put up by Transforming Art.

(Transforming Art describes itself as coming out of South Korea in 2007: “A Channel with “Olddies, but Goddies” musical performances (mostly pre-WW2), and sometimes, some videos with Historical contents.”)

A friend put my feelings into words: “This is a thrill for me . . . seeing footage of one of my heroes.”

Thank you, Youtube; thank you, Google; thank you, Mrs. Keller; thank you, Annie Sullivan; and thank you, Helen Keller for demonstrating that faith, hope and love never fail.

A handicap doesn’t have to silence an individual. Click to Tweet

Were you familiar with Helen Keller’s story? What can we learn from her?  Click to Tweet

How to Like a Do-Gooder–in Spite of Yourself

Col. James Hanks, CSA

I spent many hours during the end of the last century, hunched in the dark before an antiquated machine with a big hand crank.

An eye-glaring microfilm machine light shone through plastic strips with faded squibbles, throwing down shadows before me to make out.

After reading microfilm for hours my eyes often hurt, but I persevered: I was on a quest!

Outside the cement walls, the blue skies and glorious ocean breezes of Hawai’i beckoned, but I wanted information and microfilm was where I could find it in those years before Ancestry.com.

One name came up over and over again: James S. Hanks. I examined every mention and started to hate him by the end of long, airless days.

He felt like the Eddie Haskell of 19th century Anderson County, Texas. As the county surveyor, and one of the wealthiest inhabitants, the man was everywhere. As he surveyed the county, he saw the best deals and often was at the county courthouse to snatch it up when property needed to be sold.

“Jimmie Hanks” served one term in the Texas legislature–but someone convinced this perpetually civic-minded man  he needed to stay home with his ailing second wife and second batch of children.

Everywhere JS Hanks lived he started a school; he had ten children by his two wives, not to mention two Bell step-sons whom he loved. The James Hanks Schoolhouse was a polling place in the 1846 election. He was a trustee of the Mound Prairie Institute. After he had four daughters in a row, he founded of one of the first co-educational schools in Texas: the Stovall Academy.

James S. Hanks signed deeds, wills, probate reports and served on the school board. He was the postmaster of Tennessee Colony, Texas and owned a gin and mill factory, storehouses and a general store in the surrounding communities of Plentitude and Nechesville. He founded a Masonic Lodge.

Of course he was a Master Mason as well as a member in good standing with the Missionary Baptist Church.

His good works were too much, even to me.

When I wrote my novella An Inconvenient Gamble, I included James S. Hanks as a central character–using his surveying role as the avenue for Charles Moss to work and find a new home in 1867 Anderson County.

My heroine Jenny Duncan, who inherited a horse ranch on a prime piece of real estate, was justifiably suspicious when Hanks and Moss came to survey. I put my own annoyance with Hanks into her words and spilled a lot of my irritation with this upstanding citizen.

We want do-gooders to be hypocrites, don’t we? Click to Tweet

But something happened in the writing of An Inconvenient Gamble. As I “allowed” my James S. Hanks character to roam the story, he began doing unexpected things.

Charles Moss respected him. Jenny Duncan responded with begrudging gratitude when he helped her.

Indeed, my own irritation with him began to thaw.

Colonel James Steele Hanks was merely trying to be a helpful member of his community when few others stepped up. When he saw a need, he responded to it.

What’s wrong with that?

Maybe he was a little high-handed here and there. Maybe he manipulated Charles Moss –but it was for the good of all and no one was hurt.

Certainly Jenny Duncan benefitted both physically and intangibly.

Hanks’ original home in Anderson County

By the time I finished writing the novella, so help me, I liked the man. Click to Tweet

“They” say not to judge a man until you’ve walked a mile in his shoes.

JS Hanks died in 1898, I can’t walk in his shoes except through my imagination.

But it worked. I’m proud to be his great-great-granddaughter.

Even if his hair cut is ridiculous. 

If you’re a writer, has writing about your character made you like him/her better? Click to Tweet

Putting a Story to a Face

Take a look at the woman to the left.

What color is her hair?

What type of woman do you think she is? Tall? Agile? Efficient? Industrious?

Is she wearing glasses? Is she, perhaps, some sort of ancient librarian?

When you write historical fiction, you often choose your characters based on photos–or in my case, out of your family history stories. You look at a face and imagine things about that person and apply creativity to constructing their story.

As to the woman, her name was Louezer–maybe plain Louisa with an odd pronunciation (it’s how Louisa is pronounced in a number of Jane Austen films).

I’m one of her name sakes.

She was my great-great-grandmother. I saw her face for the first time two nights ago.

I’m not over the thrill yet.

Growing up in southern California, one of the few family stories we had was a possible link to Abraham Lincoln through his mother Nancy Hanks. When I researched and wrote my massive family history at the end of the last century, I specifically sought information about that connection.

How were we related to the Great Emancipator? If we’re related to him?

Through Louezer’s husband James S. Hanks, whom I’ve written about elsewhere.

Because of that possible Lincoln connection, I’d always seen myself as a Clara-Barton type: handsome (not beautiful), efficient, strong Union supporter.

And then I dug up Louezer’s history.

Clara Barton?

What color is Louezer’s hair?

What if I tell you she was the daughter of Isaac Dial and Permelia Cunningham of Laurens County, South Carolina?

Her hair was red–a color not seen again in my family until eighteen years ago when my niece was born.

Okay, so Louezer had red hair and was married to a stuffed-shirt man with an odd haircut related to Abraham Lincoln.

What else can you surmise about her?

Here are some more facts:

James Steele Hanks was her second husband, 24 years her senior. He owned a cotton plantation at the start of the War of the Northern Aggression, along with 21 slaves. Louezer’s first husband, Dr. Nathan  Bell,  was a handsome doctor who died young. Her last husband, P.W. Ezell, was a successful merchant, one of James’ pals.

Clara Barton?

Genealogically speaking, I’m closer to Scarlett O’Hara!

Louezer was a small woman, raised on a plantation, married to successful men. She bore seven children, five of whom lived to adulthood.

When you write historical fiction based on real people, truth becomes important. I take the basic facts and then I embroider them with my imagination and my knowledge of history. (That’s how I found her photo; I was researching someone else and casually took a tour through my ancestry data base).

In my novella An Inconvenient Gamble set in 1867, James Hanks refers to his wife as being pregnant (with my great-grandmother it turns out), and not able to cook.

I don’t know if Louezer was familiar with the kitchen at that time, I took the idea of her inability from A Centennial History of Anderson County, Texas:

The average Southerner before the war of 1861-65, could not vision an existence void of slaves. The housewife had never learned to cook and scrub, no more did the husband till the soil Nature (to their way of thinking) created the negro for menial tasks.

I’ve posted a picture before, from the East Texas Genealogical Society website which is not currently functioning. The photo notes the people are Dunns, Poseys and Bells, so I know I’m related to everyone at that picnic. I just don’t know who anyone is. Take a close look. Do any of the older women look like Louezer?

Perhaps the woman in the middle with the little girl on her lap?

Maybe I’ll know someday.

What do you think?

In the meantime, I have found a little more information about Louezer that slipped into the newspapers at the traditional time in 19th century America.

In 1884, she was noted as having provided a delicacy for a local barbeque. In November 1905, an article wrote about her marriage to P.W. Ezell: “both the bride and groom have a large circle of relatives and many friend who offer congratulations to them.”

Two and a half years later, she died of pneumonia, “which had a quick and fatal termination. . . . The death of this good lady was a great shock to her family as well as a large circle of friend . . . Mrs. Ezell was a splendid woman, and was loved by all who knew her.”

I look at the photo of a woman with red hair and wish I, too, could have known her. I’d like to have heard her voice–no doubt with a South Carolina drawl–as well as her stories.

Have you got an ancestor or relative who has caught your imagination?

How far back does your oldest family photo go? Click to Tweet

How to embroider an old photo with imagination Click to Tweet

What to do with Grief?

Even though he’d been ill a long time and it was not unexpected, when I got word my father had died I felt numb and shocked.

Indeed, my brother expressed it best: “How did that happen?”

Even in the midst of the sadness, I felt a touch of humor: “Well, you remember he’s been sick for seven years?”

He’d lost so much: our mother, his health, his independence, his ability to speak by the end. We’d had such a difficult time as he battled mortality, and yet all I could think was, “I want to curl up somewhere for a week and just mourn. Don’t the Jews call it ‘sitting shiva’?”

My husband didn’t know.

But life needed to lived in 2002 and I could not slow down.

I should have.

Several years later, a counselor listened to my stories. She set down her pen. “You have a lot of unresolved grief in your life.”

I sobbed.

No one had recognized that before.

She was right.

But what to do with grief? How do we process it and get through it?

In Matthew 14, Jesus is told that his cousin John the Baptist was killed by Herod.

God in human form–the one who wept, the one who felt pebbles in his sandal, the one who knew the taste of wine and listened to birdsong–he lost a member of his family. What did he do?

He withdrew in a boat to a desolate place by himself.

Jesus needed space and time to contemplate that loss of John.

But like me when I had children needing my attention, Jesus, too, was sought after by others, folks who may not have known of his personal anguish.

So after a time, he rowed himself back to land where the crowds waited. Compassion for them surged–Jesus, of course, had emotions raw–and he healed them.

Jesus did not avoid his job.

That night the disciples, who surely knew of John’s death, came and pointed out the place was isolated and the people were hungry.

Jesus told them to feed the crowd.

This story is told in all four gospels, so it’s obviously important.

The chief mourner gave instructions and when his helpers couldn’t follow through, Jesus got up and performed a miracle–the same day as his great personal loss.

At the close of the event, Jesus sent everyone off –including the disciples–and he again took time by himself to pray.

More miracles occurred after this event (including walking on the water that night), but perhaps on that first night Jesus needed the reassurance that only focused prayer with His Creator could provide.

Maybe he needed a little more time to mourn, to reorient himself to a world without the man who had been sent to announce his coming. Maybe Jesus needed to contemplate the realization of his own death.

Quiet time alone with the God who created me and the people I loved, a time where in essence I can crawl into God’s lap and weep, sounds like the right response to grief to me.

What about you?

For those struggling with grief, many resources are available. Grief comes in waves and our reactions to it alters over time. Click to Tweet.

It often sneaks up and strikes when I least expect it, even after many years.

I cry more easily than I did 17 years ago. If something makes me feel sad, I let myself accept that emotion and experience it. Tears of grief acknowledge the importance of that person in my life. Click to Tweet

Similarly, if I remember something humorous or a foible about someone who has died, I laugh.

A friend of my mother’s told me, “Laughing is the closest thing to crying and it honors the person you love.” Click to Tweet

So what to do with grief?

I give it to God. I weep. I remove myself for a time and prayer. I acknowledge the pain. I feel the emotion.

Often, my next reaction is to feel compassion for everyone else who has experienced loss.

Just like Jesus.

What you have you learned about grief? Grief isn’t just about the loss of people you love, but also the loss of dreams, careers, ideas, plans, sometimes even hope. What have you found that works for you?