Letter from the Past

Submitted by Caleb G Teffeteller

The following letter was found by Jack Chastain in the 1970s while demolishing a building in Hammond, Indiana. It was addressed to:
Walter Wholen or Whalen, 85 Sibley Street, Hammond, Indiana; from: Miss Marie Timberlake, 635 Maple Avenue, Newport, Kentucky, April 10, 1917:

Dear Walter,

I am going to answer your letter right away. I was so glad to get it. I am so lonesome for you. I was looking at your picture last night and I cried like a baby. I was wishing you were here or I was there. I have not been out with anybody. I wish you would not wait so long to answer my letters, as I am homesick for you. And when I get a letter from you, it makes me feel like living.

No, it don’t seem like the country, for it is a town as big as Hammond. I wrote your mother a letter. She will have a girl by the time I can get back. I can’t be back there for a month yet, but that won’t be so long to wait will it? I am ironing now. I have to cook, do all the house work in seven rooms, and do the ironing, the washing for $3.50 a week. I am going to get a place next week that pays me $7.00 a week. And believe me, I’ll be right on the spot down there in four weeks.

I guess I will close for this time, so I can do my work. I am crying as I write. Please don’t wait so long to answer.

Answer Soon, Marie Timberlake