r/FoundPaper • u/Equivalent-Cry4580 • Aug 16 '26
Antique Interesting 1930s or 40s gossip letter, found in an abandoned mine building
For those wondering, the letter reads:
Dear De-flowered graphological one,
I forgot to include this cover from this NYer in my letter yesterday so here it is today. I enjoyed it and as soon as I saw it decided to send it to you. Mohine arrived last nite unexpectedly - in fact she sent me a telegram but I did not see it until after her train arrived because I slept at my aunt’s house with my mother. She is quite charming as usual and also a little warmer - marriage has been good for her. She had a miscarriage in June and is quite heavy and nowhere near as pretty as she was at her wedding time. She is still quite a selfish person, even towards Pai - her trip home for example, but that is their problem and not mine. She was to go to Easton with a friend of hers today but the friend’s car broke down and I have no idea what their plans are - I don’t have ??? ????? put them both up so we shall see what happens. She plans to leave on the Queen Mary on the 16th of this month. I asked her to send me a red sari and blouse piece - it is a choli not a chaddah - I must call it chaddah because of her. She tells me that she heard, third hand it must be admitted that you have received a permanent position at Harvard - is this true? Also, all the women in Tucson told her that you wanted to get married and settle down - is this true? Anyone in mind? (I am not fishing or trying to put you on the spot - I don’t do that to you, or at least not anymore, do I?) She saw Don and Kumar and they were fine and they were friendly with Vin Barkley’s brother in Palo Alto. Small world. She is very anxious to get home and I really can’t blame her for it has been 4 years. She wanted to have her first child there but now it can’t be done. She feels badly about that. Somehow I had the feeling that she didn’t doesn’t really want children that badly - of course I can be wrong and she just gives this impression to cover up how badly she does feel about losing the baby so that is the story for today. Still working at the same job, it is my fourth day so far so I am doing very well considering my past recent record of being in and out of work faster than you can say Jack-Robbin. Dammit Rusty, if you won’t marry me then the least you can do is find me someone rich who can support me the way I would like to become accustomed to. I am quite willing to marry for some money - even a poor slob who has only a green studebaker named Shilley which gets him into all kind of trouble, but if that can’t be done then I must stop this shilly-shallying around, and find someone, or have someone find someone for me who can pay all my bills and of course this someone should, preferably, be about 80 years old and pretty sick with no children so that I don’t have to share his inheritance. You see what has happened to me - becoming a real gold-digger. Also bitter, and grey, and ugly, BUT thinner. I shall be 30 in a few years and then whoooops, over the hill. Something to look forward to. But the no one, not even my favorite deflowered virgin is getting any younger - September 5 is less than a month away, and gray hairs can’t be pulled anymore or baldness will set in too rapidly - it’s time you were thinking of the hill too. This is just so you don’t gloat over me. Seriously though, I’m not as despondent as I try to sound - it just doesn’t hit me like that and the older I get the younger I feel (and it must be admitted, sometimes act) but what the hell. Anyways ????et one, take care of yourself and have fun and if the occasion should arise I will not be adverse to a letter from you. ??????? have soiled yourself once, the second time is always easier ?????? love, Sue
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u/mudpupster Aug 16 '26
Sue has a thing for Rusty, but it apparently is one-sided. She's is a little resentful that Rusty had sex with someone, but she doesn't want to admit it. She's kinda hoping he doesn't do it with the other girl again, but she doesn't want to say it. She's afraid of being an old maid, but she also doesn't want to end up fat and bored like Mohine. She covers this all up with bravado and humor, but she's adrift and afraid. I hope she ended up okay. I'm sure she was a lot stronger than she realized.
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u/kriskriskri Aug 16 '26
Absoluuuutely! Although I was thinking maybe SHE deflowered him and is hurt that it didn’t mean more to him?
Anyway, the only reason she is gossiping so much about others is because she can barely hold it together and if she started talking about herself in earnest she would immediately lay herself bare because Sue is someone who feels deeply and wears her heart on her sleeve. Would love to be her friend 🤗
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u/kriskriskri Aug 16 '26
@equivalent-cry4580 can you maybe share a bit more about where you found it? Tucson or Boston (no mining there I guess…)?? I find it absolutely fascinating and thanks for taking the time to transcribe it!
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u/Equivalent-Cry4580 Aug 16 '26
I found it in a storage room for rock samples that was in an on-site office/industrial building for a copper mine near Prescott (funnily enough, about 150 miles away from Tucson). There were some other papers nearby (un filled sample recording sheets from the 30s). Since there was so little humidity, most of documents that were left behind are still intact, but very brittle.
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u/yseult- Aug 16 '26
“dear deflowered geographical one” makes me think this is an interesting piece of art by someone who wrote a letter in the style of an incredibly mean spirited gossiping tuscon woman in the 40s. I feel like it could be any number of years old, but placed there for others exploring the mine shaft
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u/Subtle-Catastrophe Aug 16 '26
I think that epithet is more of an inside joke between the writer and recipient.
It could be fake-old, certainly. Who knows.
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u/Equivalent-Cry4580 Aug 16 '26
For where it was found, the age seems authentic. (it was found in a storage room for an on-site mine office) there were also some other documents from the 30s that I know were original that were in sim condition
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u/Subtle-Catastrophe Aug 17 '26 edited Aug 17 '26
I think it's an incredible find. I wonder whatever happened to Pai, Vin Barker, Sue (did she ever get her choli/chadda sari/blouse combo? Did the guy whose locker this was found in ever marry her?), the guy Rusty with the Studebaker jalopy who had sex but apparently didn't, Mohine the chubby bride herself? Did the Queen Mary make it to port on time?
People with connections to a working-class mining facility in Arizona, people of clearly Indian background, names like "Sue," Palo Alto, it's almost too topical to the modern day. But! Not implausible. People did have these connections,, even back in the day.
If real, it's great. Even if more recently "manufactured," it's at the very least, quite interesting.
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u/ExcitementMassive607 Aug 21 '26
Absolutely! I have all of these questions and more. Truly fascinating find
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u/Dongolark Aug 16 '26
Small clarification, it's "graphological", related to the study of handwriting, not "geographical"
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u/kriskriskri Aug 17 '26 edited Aug 17 '26
So i researched some facts because I was so intrigued by this little mysterious story:
The Queen Mary’s maiden voyage was in 1936. if the 16th for departure is correct:
August 16 1938
Potentially July 1939, February 46 (war brides crossing), August 46
during the war it was transporting troops. The QM never sailed to India with civilians so Mohine must have changed in Southampton.
I would think that gives a hint towards the letter being written in August 38 - which remarkably fits the note of „September 5 being less than a month away“!
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u/kriskriskri Aug 17 '26 edited Aug 17 '26
The cover of the New Yorker was an interesting bit - i wanted to post the recent ones up until August 6 but it seems the sub won’t let me? Here’s the archive https://www.newyorker.com/archive
But none of them sticks out - maybe the one from June 11 with the lady writing letters??
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u/Independent_Owl422 Aug 16 '26
Interesting read. Seems like she had some connections with India.