Getting personal
In this episode: meet "Linnie"
It’s officially summer, which means that I am back on Vinalhaven and happily installed in my family’s beautiful 1896 Victorian home. I’m enjoying the sunny weather, reuniting with people I haven’t seen for a few months, and getting back to work on local projects—but mostly, I’m thrilled to be back in the world of “the House family,” some of my favorite people to research.
It’s been a little while since we had an episode of the House Family Saga, so I’ll refresh your memory: since 2020, when I was trapped inside and looking for a project to keep me busy, I’ve been researching the lives of the family who built my family’s home on an island in Maine. I thought that the project would end once I found out their names and a little about them, but oh no—now I need to know everything about them. Everything.
The problem is (I’m sure I’ve complained about this before) that I only know things about them that are public record. That’s still a fair amount, especially in a small town where regular social movements are reported in the newspaper. But as I got to know the cast of characters, I found myself wishing I could go a step beyond those lines in the newspaper or entries in the census records. I want to know about them as people—and the only way I can do that is through personal records, like diaries and letters and photos and memories. Unfortunately, I just don’t have access to those things, if they even still exist (I don’t think they do).
Sometimes, though, I get a little crumb that gives me the smallest but sweetest detail about one of my House people. It’s never much, but it’s one step closer to feeling like these people are my family. The other day, that came in the form of a lovely little diary page in the collections of the Vinalhaven Historical Society (thanks, Hal, for always being on the lookout for Manson References).
The diary didn’t belong to one of the House family, but one of their friends and neighbors: Maria Dolloff Webster. Maria’s diary provides brief synopses of her daily activities throughout 1892—and as luck would have it, she seems to have known the House family well, or at least participated in many of the same social events. In the autumn of that year, she traveled to a political convention in Washington, D.C. with both Adel and David (more on that later, it needs further research). She mentions paying calls on Adel throughout the year. But most exciting to me? A tiny mention of Adel and David’s daughter Evelyn, about whom I struggle to know anything concrete.
Evelyn Estelle Manson was born in October 1873, the first child of David and Adel (and Adel’s third). I don’t know much about her personality, but I know that she was a very busy lady. She was an active member of social circles on Vinalhaven, was a dressmaker by trade, traveled extensively throughout New England, and had a core group of friends that she seemed to do everything with. Her great passion and talent was declaiming—she loved to give readings at major town events, including her own high school graduation. As an unmarried woman, she never left the family home, making her one of the three House family members to have died here (eeeek). Unfortunately, her 1936 obituary provides a lot of what I know about her, but it stops just short of describing her as a person—she was a valued and loved member of the community, etc etc, but nothing else to work with.
Imagine my delight, then, when I come across a mention of the elusive Evelyn in the Maria Dolloff Webster diary! On Sunday July 3, 1892, “a terrible foggy and rainy & windy day,” Maria attended church and reported that Evelyn (along with her usual band of girlfriends) was confirmed into the “universal church,” aka Catholicism. A big day for her, certainly, but what interested me more was that Maria referred to Evelyn by a nickname I didn’t even know she had: “Linnie.”
Why be excited by this? Because now I know a detail about a woman that, never having met her, I wouldn’t otherwise know. She’s that much closer to becoming a real human being in my head. Maybe we can really be friends now, despite the age gap.
Things are getting personal!
How personal it is to know her nickname!
Every new small detail is a treasure!