Domestic Archaeology
Nov. 11th, 2008 11:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rhythmaningMy mother left piles of paper. I mean, piles of paper: paper that belonged to my grandfather, who died in 1985; paper that belonged to my father, who died in 1988; paper that belonged to my grandmother, who died in 1990; and paper that belonged to my mother.
She seems to have kept everything. We have found rates demands going back to the mid-1960s; phone bills from the mid-1970s; electricity bills; bank statements on long closed accounts with long closed banks; cheque book stubs going back thirty years; business receipts going back twenty years or more.
A lot of paper.
Some of it was sorted and orderly, but a lot of it seemed in no obvious order – papers from completely different periods sat together.
Most of it was of no interest – phone bills, bank statements, electricity bills – I threw them out (keeping only the most recent). I appear to be a chucker – I want rid of most things; my brother prefers to keep much more, in case it might be of interest. (I take the view that unless there is a clear use or interest, it should go: otherwise it will just sit in a box, forgotten in an attic, until someone else has to throw it out.) My mother, clearly, was a hoarder. The things she kept are, at times, fascinating: she stored some files in the vegetable rack of an old fridge; she kept old envelops and old bits of cardboard, in case they might one day be useful. (She grew up during the second world war and lived through years of rationing, so perhaps keeping things for a time when they would become valuable made sense.)
I don’t find it easy to sort through all this paper. Most of it is boring: another phone bill! Another electricity bill! (No gas bills: my mother didn’t like gas, being almost pathologically scared of it: again, I think this dates back to growing up in a time when catastrophic gas explosions were common, and gas leaks asphyxiated families as they slept.)
Amongst the boring pieces of paper, though, are some fascinating jewels: there is a strange balance between tedium and deep distraction, as something interesting grabs me and I sit and read, and suddenly time has passed. Many of them bring back memories – strong recollections of my childhood and youth.
I knew of the family trees, of course, although seeing one which showed my (paternal) ancestors following a line back as far as 1580 was interesting (although I only recognised the names going back 150 years, lawyers in industrial Birmingham); another supported my father’s claim to be related to by marriage to the Redgraves – a shame I never got to play with my (very distant) cousins. Edit: The same tree showed a similarly distant relationship to an American robber-baron and an Anglo-Irish brewing dynasty. (Edit: apparently the robber-baron's son paid for one of the brewing dynasty to enter a round-the-world yacht race in the 1960s or 70s. In the preparations for the race, the yachtsman's wife was electrocuted whilst using an electric drill on the boat. He carried on anyway and entered the race; he didn't finish, and the boat was never found.)
The most interesting things I came across when I was in Oxford last week were a collection of letters that my father had kept. He was a publisher all his adult life, working for a variety of firms. Some of these letters were from agents, trying to push their authors, trying to squeeze a bit more money; there were several crank letters.
There was a letter from Albert Speer - Hitler’s architect – personally addressed to my father, dated 1973. (It was in German; I don’t know what it said.)
There were legal documents relating to a book about the Krays: the book had to be postponed because of a trial. My father was threatened in Soho by some associates of the Krays, who would rather the book wasn’t published: I remember the police taking an interest.
There was a crank letter to Lady Bird Johnson - LBJ’s wife – who had written a book about her time in the White House. The letter was addressed to her at Claridge’s; I thought it was so funny, I copied it out (I have no idea why I didn’t photograph it!):
There was a signature, but it was illegible, and there was no date; the book was published in 1970. I remember my parents sitting in the sitting room, drinking whisky with a couple of US secret service agents who were over protecting Johnson; one of them showed me his gun – a treat for a ten year old who spent much of his time watching Hawaii 5-0, and for whom a James Bond movie was a cultural high point. (Some things don’t change!) The secret service agents also got my father off a drunk-driving charge by flashing their cards at a poor policeman who dared stop them late on night.
There were a couple of real crank letters; I think these were handed around from publisher to publisher – or maybe they just all got sent the same letter!
The first, from 1965, accompanied a manuscript called “Fluid Evolutionary Philosophy of Controlled Natural Laws”; here are some excerpts:
It descends into gibberish – pages and pages of it.
Another, from 1968, concerned another apocalyptic analysis. The book had clearly been turned down:
There was a third, scrawled in ball pen, twenty five pages of rambling, illegible underlining and capitals, which mentioned Christ a lot.
In another file of my father’s, I found a scrap of paper, bearing a signature – Sarah Read – dated January 22 1792. It was not a name from the family tree, nor a name I have ever heard of. I have no idea why a two hundred year old signature should be amongst my father’s – or my mother’s papers.
Coincidentally, there was a programme on Radio 4 on Sunday about children clearing out their parents' houses after they have died; it was timely and touching.
1The name wasn’t wholly legible – I think it was Puelow, but I thought it might have been Poulson, although the context and sex are wrong, or possibly Recon or Peron. But the time is wrong of either Eva or Isabel; and it was definitely "the aid she is giving..."
She seems to have kept everything. We have found rates demands going back to the mid-1960s; phone bills from the mid-1970s; electricity bills; bank statements on long closed accounts with long closed banks; cheque book stubs going back thirty years; business receipts going back twenty years or more.
A lot of paper.
Some of it was sorted and orderly, but a lot of it seemed in no obvious order – papers from completely different periods sat together.
Most of it was of no interest – phone bills, bank statements, electricity bills – I threw them out (keeping only the most recent). I appear to be a chucker – I want rid of most things; my brother prefers to keep much more, in case it might be of interest. (I take the view that unless there is a clear use or interest, it should go: otherwise it will just sit in a box, forgotten in an attic, until someone else has to throw it out.) My mother, clearly, was a hoarder. The things she kept are, at times, fascinating: she stored some files in the vegetable rack of an old fridge; she kept old envelops and old bits of cardboard, in case they might one day be useful. (She grew up during the second world war and lived through years of rationing, so perhaps keeping things for a time when they would become valuable made sense.)
I don’t find it easy to sort through all this paper. Most of it is boring: another phone bill! Another electricity bill! (No gas bills: my mother didn’t like gas, being almost pathologically scared of it: again, I think this dates back to growing up in a time when catastrophic gas explosions were common, and gas leaks asphyxiated families as they slept.)
Amongst the boring pieces of paper, though, are some fascinating jewels: there is a strange balance between tedium and deep distraction, as something interesting grabs me and I sit and read, and suddenly time has passed. Many of them bring back memories – strong recollections of my childhood and youth.
I knew of the family trees, of course, although seeing one which showed my (paternal) ancestors following a line back as far as 1580 was interesting (although I only recognised the names going back 150 years, lawyers in industrial Birmingham); another supported my father’s claim to be related to by marriage to the Redgraves – a shame I never got to play with my (very distant) cousins. Edit: The same tree showed a similarly distant relationship to an American robber-baron and an Anglo-Irish brewing dynasty. (Edit: apparently the robber-baron's son paid for one of the brewing dynasty to enter a round-the-world yacht race in the 1960s or 70s. In the preparations for the race, the yachtsman's wife was electrocuted whilst using an electric drill on the boat. He carried on anyway and entered the race; he didn't finish, and the boat was never found.)
The most interesting things I came across when I was in Oxford last week were a collection of letters that my father had kept. He was a publisher all his adult life, working for a variety of firms. Some of these letters were from agents, trying to push their authors, trying to squeeze a bit more money; there were several crank letters.
There was a letter from Albert Speer - Hitler’s architect – personally addressed to my father, dated 1973. (It was in German; I don’t know what it said.)
There were legal documents relating to a book about the Krays: the book had to be postponed because of a trial. My father was threatened in Soho by some associates of the Krays, who would rather the book wasn’t published: I remember the police taking an interest.
There was a crank letter to Lady Bird Johnson - LBJ’s wife – who had written a book about her time in the White House. The letter was addressed to her at Claridge’s; I thought it was so funny, I copied it out (I have no idea why I didn’t photograph it!):
”To Lady Bird Johnson (what a stupid name!)
Why should you come over to England cadging support for your blinking book?
(Can you imagine an Englishwoman being allowed to do it in your country?)
Your husband insulted England when he didn’t bother to come to the funeral of the Greatest Englishman in the World Winston Churchill who saved America as much as he did the rest of the world (when England stood alone)
You’ve a cheek. + you’re [sic] country is a disgrace.”
There was a signature, but it was illegible, and there was no date; the book was published in 1970. I remember my parents sitting in the sitting room, drinking whisky with a couple of US secret service agents who were over protecting Johnson; one of them showed me his gun – a treat for a ten year old who spent much of his time watching Hawaii 5-0, and for whom a James Bond movie was a cultural high point. (Some things don’t change!) The secret service agents also got my father off a drunk-driving charge by flashing their cards at a poor policeman who dared stop them late on night.
There were a couple of real crank letters; I think these were handed around from publisher to publisher – or maybe they just all got sent the same letter!
The first, from 1965, accompanied a manuscript called “Fluid Evolutionary Philosophy of Controlled Natural Laws”; here are some excerpts:
”…It is the revelations as contained in the Bible in fundamental principle except there is a sound simple philosophy too… I quite seriously forecast that this will prove to be the world best seller, not that I wan’t [sic] to be an author really, I am merely an instrument of God or Good, but I do not pretend to be a pious sort of bastard…”
It descends into gibberish – pages and pages of it.
Another, from 1968, concerned another apocalyptic analysis. The book had clearly been turned down:
”…but what about considering it to be published when the storm is over? I cannot think that your reviewers have not been affected with the overwhelming evidence in support of my cardinal contention that this is the time of the end. Both major events that are visualised – Rome’s destruction and Russia’s – can be seen lying near the surface of things at the present moment… This is heightened by the Puelow1 incident and the aid she is giving to the Vietcong forces now. You might feel proud to be in the position to publish at that crisis. Moreover, as shown by the accompanying disturbance of trade as shown in the 18th chapter, when “the fruits that thy soul lusteth after are departed from thee, and men shall find them no more at all”, it might be helpful to have an extra job…”
There was a third, scrawled in ball pen, twenty five pages of rambling, illegible underlining and capitals, which mentioned Christ a lot.
In another file of my father’s, I found a scrap of paper, bearing a signature – Sarah Read – dated January 22 1792. It was not a name from the family tree, nor a name I have ever heard of. I have no idea why a two hundred year old signature should be amongst my father’s – or my mother’s papers.
Coincidentally, there was a programme on Radio 4 on Sunday about children clearing out their parents' houses after they have died; it was timely and touching.
1The name wasn’t wholly legible – I think it was Puelow, but I thought it might have been Poulson, although the context and sex are wrong, or possibly Recon or Peron. But the time is wrong of either Eva or Isabel; and it was definitely "the aid she is giving..."