Tuesday, January 13, 2015

Hannah's Heirship Letter

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Transcription:
1735 Thorndale Ave.
Ravenswood Station
Chicago

April 18, 1929
Dear Folks All,

I received Frank's letter written early in April, and also the one with the heirship proof that papa had made out last year this morning.

I am very busy packing up my things to get them ready to put in storage. I have no help from anyone unless I hire them at $1.50 an hour for labor, and that counts up pretty fast. I can get the Janitor to help me carry heavy things upstairs but real help comes very high. I sometimes wonder how people can charge and pay such high wages. It cost more to put things away and pay rent on them than it does to buy new things, almost, only the new things are such poor stuff. You pay a big price and get little back in value, compared to what you got a few years ago.

Am glad Mabel got through having her baby all right, and am anxious to know how the baby is getting along after what you said about its throat.

Am so glad you got Mr. Lorenz to let you have the ground you wanted. Guess he wanted to be as sure as he could be that he wouldn't be gypped by a dishonest man again. He had experience in, I believe So. Dakota, and Florida and lost quite heavily. He wanted to go slow the next time. Clarence wrote your mother while she was east on her visit about them drilling for oil in or near Elkhart. Can you tell me what is going on and what the prospects are for oil?

A conducted trip such as I am going on is ideal in many ways especially for one travelling alone as I have to. We have guides in nearly every port we stop. We are put up at first class hotels and am sure of good rooms without the worry of hunting rooms in a foreign city. Don't have to worry about changing our money into the coin of the country we are in. Guides take us to the most interesting and important places. The company we go with get Visas for us for every country we visit, (that is a permit to land in these foreign ports), furnish all means of transportation for us while we are ashore, and especially in Palestine, and Egypt, and Syria. We are to have a guide who instructs us from the Bible. We study each day from the Bible the places we are visiting and in that way places and events will stay with us better.
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Many say its cheaper in the end to travel as I am going considering the service they give us, and the protection we have. I would hesitate to go on a long trip such as I am going on, from June 18th to Sept 10th (from New York back to New York) all alone for if I got sick, who would look after me? Living and travelling alone has many disadvantages.

The letter you sent me from Mr. Wehking in St. Louis simply means, it takes a lot of money to fight a case in court especially the higher W.S. Courts. Most of the officers of the Emerick Heirs Association are poor men and they have it the money to take out of their own pockets and fight the case alone. The Association should come forward and each one contribute toward this expense. If the court decided the case in favor of the Emerick Heirs, then there will be one grand rush of heirs to claim a share. They are not willing to help pay for the fight and take a chance of losing but they will want a big
share in what others have fought for and won.
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Cora Bircher, in her last letter to me says there is a J.D. Butcher in Pennsylvania who can give dates of Alexander and his wives. If that is true, then that is a big victory for Alexander & his heirs getting in on this claim. She also says she was told that Attorney Hay, who is lawyer for the Emerick Heirs Association, is going over to Holland, to Amsterdam and search the records for to see what he can find out about the estate in Holland. That will be interesting if its true for he knows how to go about it, and I would not know the first step to take. These are things I hear and I pass them on to you as I hear them. Ellsworth says he wants to join the Association but I haven't written him about it. Now that I have the papers papa made out, I can, when I get time send him a copy of what papa sent in.

Many names are misspelled in the paper papa had made out. I shall spell them correctly when I send them to Ell.
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Quite awhile ago, but since Christmas I wrote Uncle Henderson and Ray that I would like to have them pay the note Ray owes me. Neither of them have written me a word in reply and I do not know if he is going to pay it or not.

I wish you would write me at once for I may not get your letter if you don't. I don't know yet where I am to stay until I leave Chicago about May 30th so I can't give you any address to send me mail later than Apr. 26th I have to look around for a place to stay until I go away.

I hope you Frank and Lawrence are planning to pay up the loans I made you last summer. I will be away from United States when they fall due. The way Lawrence kept me uneasy last summer over not paying up when he promised me faithfully he would has cause me to be uncertain as to what to expect of him this summer. The letter you wrote me two weeks ago you never mentioned your mother's name as to how she was or how she was getting along since she came home. I will send you the Heirship Proof papers in the near future.

Love to all,

Hannah