Letter from Josephine to Swan May 24, 1891 - CARLI Digital Collections Featured Image

In a time when the United States Postal Service has publicly discussed cutting hours and stopping Saturday mail in order to curb spending and make up budget deficiencies, when postal mail is considered "snail mail" and a last resort in communication, it is refreshing to read these letters between an affianced couple in the late 1800s.

Swan is in training to be a pastor, and his fiancee Josephine is far away at home, necessitating long letters to keep in touch. The words within are lovely, inspiring, and descriptive:

"One should not completely dispose of dreams. My dreams probably do not have any importance, for I dream so much and on top of that, the dreams are very childish. It would take a genius to think as stupidly as I dream. The other night I dreamed that you became tired of me. It is love that is fearing. It is one's own unworthiness that intrudes." (Swan to Josephina; Feb 12, 1891)

I spent a full day reading these letters back and forth between the couple (mostly from Swan) who married a few weeks after Swan was ordained, and while I don't necessarily feel as though I know them, I absolutely loved reading their words of love to each other, and discovering that even though over a hundred years have passed in the meantime, the business of love was very much the same then as it is now.

--Written by Julia Thompson, Library Specialist at Western Illinois University.

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