Margaret reads a memo from her father about the sale of their house at 2400 Harrison St., Evanston. It was a comfortable house, well-maintained and clean.
Margaret reads two December 1924 letters from Kenneth about her father's illness and him stopping working again. She describes her father as very melancholic and unable to sleep or work, though he was able to get around.
Margaret's father went back to work after some ten months of interruption for illness. He was the Curtis Publishing Company's credit manager. The company had very high standards and a lot of strain was involved in A.D.'s position there.
The Mortensons' cottage in Stony Lake was built in the summer of 1922. Margaret reads a letter from her father about the building of the cottage and his hope to get back to work after his first stroke.
Margaret's senior year was not a good one: Kenneth was away, dad was ill, so life wasn't fun anymore. Kenneth and Margaret wrote letters quite often. Margaret tried in vain to turn Kenneth on to poetry. Margaret remembers the commencement events and…
Margaret remembers the Wright family who lived next to the Mortensons. The two families were not friends but good neighbors, She remembers the Wrights' house as often dirty. Mr. Wright became a fine professor of chemistry at Wheaton.
The Mortensons moved to Wheaton and bought two lots with the intention to build. The house ended up costing much more than initially planned, and following the death of A.D., Adelle struggled financially with the expenses on the house. She eventually…
When Kenneth and Margaret started dating she once commented about a girl that she thought was pretty, to which Kenneth remarked that the girl's neck was dirty. The next time he saw Margaret her neck was red: she had washed it to the point of…
In the Spring of 1924 Margaret was in a tennis tournament in which she won several games but lost one. She and her friend Ruth also lost the doubles to a pair of girls of whom one was preparing for the Olympics.
Margaret intended to win a scholarship by her good grades. She worked hard in her History class and got 95 on each examination and at the end of the semester the professor gave her 70 because Margaret and her friend had teased him. It cost her the…
Following Grandmother Mortenson's death Adelle sold the family's house in Evanston and moved to Wheaton. Lois came to live with them and Kenneth visited often.
Margaret recalls Russell Graves who was very nice to Evangeline, but the Mortenson family had the feeling that they were country cousins. Margaret eventually found out many years later that Russell had made his home in Washington, D.C., but he had…
Margaret's family made a summer trip to Stony Lake and from there to Minnesota to visit relatives. She remembers how difficult the roads were and all the troubles that this caused. They arrived in Duluth but had to make it back to Racine because of…
Margaret's mother had planned to move to Wheaton long before they actually did. They eventually moved there in September 1923. Wheaton was provincial compared to Evanston, but Margaret was impressed by the quality of people that lived there, which…
Margaret tells about the girls at Wheaton going out early to play football. They would get permission to do so and didn't want people to see them, so they got up very early in the morning and had a "jolly time" together. They got a sense of what the…
Kenneth reads from his journal about Easter morning at the Mortensons that he attended, and the service and his walk with Margaret to join a group of students. He recalls Mrs. Mortenson coming to them driving her new Buick car.
Margaret tells about her family's road trip to Michigan in the summer of 1923. Three tires blew up during the trip. They had to spend the night at the Gales home, the family of Alex, who used to date Margaret. He tried to reconnect with Margaret, but…
Margaret reads a letter to her mother in which she describes her work in the library and what she earned. She tells of her expenses and asks her mother to pray for her so that she would earn more.
Margaret tells about the beginning of the end of her father's life. A.D. had his first stroke during of after one the many football games to which he would take Margaret. His health began to decline steadily after that and working became a struggle…
Margaret had her tonsils removed and a nurse that Grace Van Hough knew came to watch over her for 24 hours. She remembers the nurse commenting on her muscles from head to toes (Margaret had was in sports a lot and had developed pretty strong…
Margaret tells of Grace Van Hough who came to live with them and persuaded Adelle to let her buy a grand piano. Adelle's piano went out but when Grace was leaving she took her piano with her and didn't bother to replace Adelle's piano.