Letter from Ellen to Aunt Ellen, April 23, 1943 — inside spread (pages 2–3)
Book 1, Page 526 ·1943
Transcription
[The bifolium opens out to display two pages of the letter side by side. The right-hand leaf is page 2 of the letter (continuing directly from page 525); the left-hand leaf is page 3.]
Right leaf — page 2 of the letter
[Continued from page 525.]
is!
I was so pleased yesterday when a soldier came in and asked for me at the library — he had been in the day before when I was free and so this was his second trip in. He just came in to see what your niece was like — and believe me, Old Lady, you have never had a more ardent admirer, than Mr. Bernard Ryan. He was so afraid that I didn’t really appreciate how wonderful you are — and how brilliant you are — and how great you are, and what every one in Charleston
Left leaf — page 3 of the letter
thought of you! “Why” he said, “I’m prouder to be able to say I know miss Ellen Fitz Simons than anything else I’ve ever done.” and I know you must enjoy his real love and appreciation of Charleston. You have certainly made his time in the South a grand experience for him.
It’s nice to know that Nip, James and family will be up with the Old Man for Easter — and that Frankie may be able to be home also —
AI Notes
The inside spread of the April 23, 1943 letter begun on page 525 — two leaves laid side by side as the bifolium opens. The right-hand leaf (page 2 of the letter) continues directly from page 525 with the writer’s account of a soldier, Mr. Bernard Ryan, who came twice to the Charleston Library Society asking to meet her — Aunt Ellen’s niece — because he so admired Aunt Ellen. The left-hand leaf (page 3) continues that anecdote — quoting Ryan’s praise of Miss Ellen Fitz Simons — and turns to Easter plans involving ‘Nip, James and family,’ ‘the Old Man,’ and possibly Frankie coming home. The closing of the letter is not on this page (likely on the fourth side of the bifolium, not photographed here, or on a separate sheet). Emphasis is preserved on ‘your’ (underlined in the original).
Letter continues on a sheet not preserved in this scan.
The “Aunt Ellen” whose name moved a passing soldier to ask for an introduction is Ellen Milliken FitzSimons (1862–1953), librarian of the Charleston Library Society for fifty years — see the memorial spread on page 534. Bernard Ryan’s reverence captures the wartime aura of the library and its keeper: in April 1943 Charleston was crowded with men stationed at the Navy Yard and the Stark General Hospital, and Aunt Ellen had become a civic landmark for visiting servicemen.