ADDRESSED TO: Mrs. A.J. Stage, Orient, Pickaway Co., Ohio
FROM: Friend, Maria Frost, Missouri
Mirabile Feb 12 1891
Dear little Friend Hellen
Your welcome letter reed Jany 1 Am ever so glad to hear from you and your Mother When I reed your the Old Gentleman I am staying with was very sick He has the asthma Some nights sits up most of the night He tried to put wood on his fire one night and fell in the fire Burnt one of his feet very badly You can imagine what a time I had pulling him out of the fire That was about the middle of Dec He is now just getting able to walk on that foot Has been helpless as a baby all winter I thought I'd try once more to find Harry1 before I wrote to you 2 weeks ago I wrote to the Post Master at Sheridan, Wyoming and this morning reed his answer saying that Harry lived in Sheridan was in a butcher shop in business for himself You cant think how glad I am to know that he is well and doing well I have been very uneasy about him for a long time While Mr. Frost lived he came home every other winter and made us a good long visit but now he feels as if he had no home to come to in Missouri and Pa. is so far off I cannot bear the thought of comeing back East without seeing him My business is settled at last and yet I dread the thought of leaving Mo. I have lived here so many years I fear I shall not be contented when I get back among the hills after living in a level prairie country This is a beautiful country We have had as nice a winter as I ever saw while in Pa. they are snowbound, last winter it was rain and for the past to (2) years very sickly. I havent had a cold this winter for all I have been up more or less every night with the old man here He is my husband's oldest brother, 85 years old Well what shall we do to Harry to make him write to us We ought to give him a good scolding I am now going to send him Mr. Frosts picture then perhaps he will write me but boys when they get so far away from their friends get very careless about writing and I sometimes think he gets homesick when he hears from his friends very often but I know you will write to him when you receive this as well as to let your Mother know where he is I know she will be glad to hear that he is well and doing well So not that we have found him he will hear from us all Its possible I may come East sometime the comeing Spring but as yet I am not sure but if I do your Mother will be apt to see me if she lives in Mansfield I would think you would be lonesome so far from your friends and your husband gone so much but then you have two little ones2 which are worlds of company and comfort But must close hopeing to hear from you again With love to yourself and family as ever your friend
Maria Frost
Harrys Address is Sheridan Johnson Co. Wyoming.
Notes from the peanut gallery:
1) William H. Wood went by Harry to his friends.
2) Tessie Viola Stage (b. 1888) and Nellie Avis Stage (b. 1890)