[Headlines from The New York Times (page 1, above the fold) to place the letters in context of the world around them.]
ROOSEVELT TRIUMPHANT IN OHIO; 15 DISTRICTS OUT OF THE 21;HARMON WINS, 2 TO 1, FROM WILSON
SUFFERAGE PARADER LOSES TEACHING JOB. Dismissed from parochial school by Parish Priest for Setting Bad Example. NEXT TO SOCIALISM, HE SAID
"The firm of Kirby & Briggs, Cooperstown, N. Y. has been dissolved and the business will be continued by John. R. Kirby."
Editor's notes
We don't know what happened to our family in the first half of 1912 from any correspondence. Of course, John would have no reason to write as the family was finally together in Cooperstown. We do know, through our family's oral history, and a hand-written biography of Elizabeth Broad Briggs that Gail Schongar, her daughter wrote, that the Briggs family did move to Cooperstown in 1911.
From a typed collection of family anecdotes, Louise's (John and Susan’ daughter) memory is that, while in Cooperstown, they all went to 5 Mile Point on Otsego Lake for the day on a big excursion boat. Sue brought a "large picnic basket with lunch, and we would have a real outing for ourselves--swimming, swings, seesaws, games and such." Louise also writes "In the winter there were thrilling rides on the bobsled from the top of Nelson Ave where we lived and on down over the frozen lake and the walks on a Sunday with Dad to watch the men fishing through the ice. Three unpleasant memories about Cooperstown that come to my mind --the day Dad was struck on his head by the barrel at the feed store, the family of unfriendly Chow dogs we had to pass by going to Sunday school and Nan and Lucy Chrysler mortifying me by giving me a bath to help mother when she was busy packing.”
“It was while we were still living in Cooperstown that dad bought our first car the old EMF –Every man’s fool” as we called it , but out of respect for such a grand old car I think we should have named it “ever most faithful” or some such for it did serve us well and long. At this time the children would have been, Marion, 13, Betty, 9, Frank, 7, and Louise, 5. John would have been 39 and Sue, 37 years old. One observation is that, prior to the sale, John spent a great deal of time in his correspondence back home discussing how upstanding and easy-to-deal with Mr. Skinner was. Of course, Mr. Skinner wasn't the person in the partnership--he was only the one who sold the half interest to John. Something must have gone very wrong between John and Mr. Kirby for John to uproot his family and then sell his business interest in less than one year. Gail writes that "The partner was found to be dishonest so [John] went back to the Osborne Co. and they moved to Binghamton.”
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