The card was addressed to Miss Lola Bonjour, who, despite her name, was not a French dancer. Instead, she was a farmer's daughter born in 1924 in the small town of Apple River, Illinois (current population 366.) Later in life she taught cake decorating and knitting and crocheting. In fact she still knits and crochets. How do I know? Because I had a nice conversation with Lola who is alive and well. This card went off in the mail to her yesterday.
The message on the back of the card reads:
from jours friend.
Andrew Stuessy
I found an Andrew Stuessy, born in Switzerland in about 1864, who lived across the border from Illinois in New Glarus, Wisconsin. Lola couldn't remember offhand who Andrew was, and since there is no postmark it's hard to pin it down.
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I think I will change my name to Lola Bonjour.
ReplyDeleteHow did you know that's EXACTLY what I'll be doing today? Amazing.
ReplyDeletexox
Susi
I just had an inclination, birthday girl. And I hope your handsome sailor accompanied you out onto the lake.
DeleteWhat a lovely story. Lola does always sound an exotic name, and now I have a Marlene Dietrich song playing in my head.
ReplyDeleteHave a very happy birthday (if it's yours :) ).
Lisa
DeleteNot mine, but I intend to celebrate anyway.
Do you often send old cards to the original recipient if you can track them down? That is awesome. I used to save all the letters I received from my siblings and certain very close friends, which I intended to return to each of them 20 or 30 years later. But I've had to move house too often, and the boxes and boxes of correspondence got to be a problem. Plus I lost confidence that they would even be welcomed back by the original writers. So I finally threw most of them away....
ReplyDeleteDebbie,
DeleteIt's pretty rare that I am able to track people down. The cards are old enough that most of the people and even their children have passed away. I also hesitate to contact people out of the blue, but this was such a pretty card...
Awesome card- although I do hope that exceedingly toasty sun doesn't incinerate the sail- and a fun story about Lola (L-O-L-A, Lola...), I'm sure she was surprised and hopefully amused to hear from you with this blast from the past. Susi, I hope that Mr. T. knows the flag on the buoy means 'buy me some nice jewelery', have fun!
ReplyDeleteHow nice! It certainly makes one thing about having stuff floating around in the universe.
ReplyDeleteWonderful work Christine. It has happened to me once, and there is a feeling of satisfaction when somehow the circle is completed and a card returns to its recipient.
ReplyDeleteOf course I always have a boat of flowers and some lovely jewellery floating by too! How wonderful that you were able to contact Lola; did she give any hint as to why she parted with the card in the first place?
ReplyDeleteWhat a beautiful random act of kindness!
ReplyDelete