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Home / 📁 Harrington / 📄 Letter, Katharine Tone to Preston Harrington Jr, December 15 1931

Letter, Katharine Tone to Preston Harrington Jr, December 15 1931

Katharine Spofford Tone (1904-1983) wrote to Preston Meeker Harrington Jr (1904-1980) while they were engaged. In this letter she expresses happiness with her engagement ring and relates the party at which her engagement was first announced.

Enclosure: Card reading with a ring attached, reading

Katharine S. Tone
Preston M. Harrington, Jr.

P. M. dearest --

It seems like sucn an eternity since you hopped on the train at East Liberty Sunday night, and as I didn't get a letter written to you last night, it seems twice as long. The one thing I wanted to do was to write to you, but it just couldn't be so. I'm going to send you a telegram in the morning, so, if you did write to me last night it won't look as if the mutual telepathy didn't work at all! Because when I think about only you all of the time, whenever you think about me, its sure to be mental telepathy! The reason for not writing last night was that I didn't get home until eleven o'clock, and was put right to bed with strict orders by a stern parent, who said I was to stay put!

I'd been catching a cold all day Monday, and by eleven o'clock that night, daddy was sure it was going to be a bad cold, and insisted I get ten hours of sleep. So after making me drink a quart of hot lemonate, I was sent promptly to bed. His treatment worked, and almost cured the cold. I though, myself, that it would be a good idea if I got some "beauty" sleep the night before Aunt Helen's party! Tonight daddy's orders were just as strict-- but he wasn't so stern about it! When I told him I just had to write to you he said all right but don't stay up too late! It's now ten thirty, so you can judge by the length of this letter how well I obeyed orders! But am I forgiven for not writing Monday?

Do you think you and I will ever, ever enjoy saying "good bye"? Sunday night was just about the worst time so far.. The train seemed to come so quickly, and by the time we had walked up to your car, there wasn't a minute, and I thought once it was going to go off without you, and I felt as if we hadn't really said goodbye. There must have been a lot of people travelling on that train, because as I walked back to the steps, there was one group after another waving after the departing train. I hope it was on time in New York, so you really got back early, as that's what you went for! One word that we seem to overthink is "perfect", but there isn't another one in my vocabulary which decribes the days spent with you. Two more perfect days here have been added to the number we've had together. So thank you, darling, for coming out again.

When daddy and I got back home, we had such an amusing time with out hall clock. He hadn't wound it up so he did that and was setting it, as it was a few minutes fast. So he stopped it for a minute and then as he was setting it at quarter past ten-- the clock struck eleven! And it wouldn't stop striking eleven-- at the half hour, at quarter to, at the hour, and as he wound the hands around to twelve and one, it still struck eleven! He finally got it adjusted. I don't know what he did to it. Then it had to be set again at the right time, moving the hands around and striking each quarter hour. It took exactly fifteen minutes to strike it around-- and we got the giggles over the whole procedure. It was really rather good for a few minutes to have something to take my thoughts from recently departed you! I showed daddy my ring then-- and he thinks it a very lovely one, too.
That's just one thing I have to talk about-- my ring. It's just so utterly perfect that I have to send you a written thank you, too. I'm so crazy about it, I shall go right on thanking you for it forever. It really is a dream come true, because it's just as I wanted it to be-- every one isn't as lucky as I, in having something just as it's always been desired, but you did understand and got just the right one. I'm wearing it now, and will be so happy and proud to wear it all the time after our engagement is announced in the papers. I wore it to the party this afternoon-- and kept it successfuly hidden by simply carrying my bag in my left hand, until after the engagement was announced. And there were heaps of compliments afterwards on the ring, too.

Monday afternoon I spent at the home of a friend helping her get dinner for her S. S. class. She's older than I, first of all a friend of my sister's, but she's been awfully sweet to me and I've really gotten to know her much better than E does. Her class is a large one, about thirty in number, and all young women. I'm really not a member of course, just sort of a complimentary membership mine is-- there are three such members. The class meets once a month in the evenings, usually at the church, btu this time Eleanor had it at her home. She's the person whose husband is an R.P.I. graduate. We've always had lots of interests in common-- so now there's another one! I've been waiting to tell her for the longest time. She came to the party today, and I finally could. She was one person who is a little suspicious-- and she said she based her suspicions solely on the way I had acted the night before! Anyway, she apologized for having worked me so hard the day before, and said she never would have, if she had known. But I was glad to have something to keep me busy.

Daddy finally got the announcement sent to the papers this evening. He wasn't home Monday all day, and I wasnthere to help him Monday evening. So the earliest it could be published, would be Thursday. I hope you'll approve of the way he wrote it up. He simply followed the form that's used here-- and I hope it's similar to the way Eastern papers do it-- if it wasn't they'll probably change it. For your sake, I hope they spell my name right! He sent it to three papers in the ast-- one in Brooklyn and two in Nyack. Also he included it in our R.P.I. and N.P.S. connections-- he wanted to, and I really didn't care.

Now, about Aunt Helen's party for me today. Of course, I've just been popping to tell you all about it ever since I started to write -- but I've waited until last so I'd be sore to get in everything else I wanted to say, too. To begin with, it was a huge success, all of it, and especially surprising people. It really almost took their breah away, and then they all began to talk at once. And it was all such heaps of fun. I had an awfully good time at my own party. I hope you have as much pleasure and fun explaining about me, as I had telling 'em about you. And you've got a gran ally in Aunt Helen -- people who sat at her end of the table, said she gave you an awfully good write-up. Do you want to know just how Aunt Helen announced our engagement. You've probably already guessed from the enclosed card, but I'll supply the details.

It was luncheon, with bridge afterwards (everyone forgave my rotten playing -- and they all talked more than they played anyway) at the Twentieth Century Club -- you know where that is. Aunt Helen didn't announce our engagement until after everyone had sat down at the table -- then she had these little cards passed around by one of th waiters. The cards and the rings and the ribbons were her idea and she made them up herself-- and I really think she's unusually clever. I almost hesitate to send you one, because you may get the idea that the ring could be used for a better purpose later on-- and it really didn't come from such a reputable store! I went along with Aunt Helen when she shopped for them-- and the expression on the girls' faces in the Five and Ten, when we asked for twenty-nine wedding rings, was pure astonishment! She got five extra ones, so I could send one to my sister, one to my aunt in Ellenville, one to Mary, one to you-- and the other one I'm going to send to your mother because I thought she might like to know about it, too.

The announcement was totally unexpected, and it was fun to have it a surprise. I've had enough best wishes to last us a hundred years. They all of course are much interested in meeting and seeing you. When some of my friends learned I have your pucture, they insisted I should have brought it along to the party! Even the weather was good-- cold and lots of sunshine. Someone said to have the sunshine is a good omen-- so maybe our luck isn't so bad! So maybe the day will be sunshiny, too! And incidentally, darling, I'm quite the happiest person going! It's nice to have people knowing about us-- it was nice the other way-- but somehow it's nicer this way, and I'm sure you'll think so, too. And I love you-- may I tell you in a letter, too-- and am so proud of you!

After driving Aunt Helen home afterwards, and when I was coming out the boulevard I noticed the new little crescent moon for the first time this month. And there it was, softly over my right shoulder. So I wished hard our wish-- and someday now, whether its near or not so near, it doesn't seem so far away and indefinite.

This evening the telephone has been ringing, some friends calling me up. So now what you and I think of one another is no longer a secret here. I want your friends to be knowing all about it too-- and I do hope the announcement is made by Thursday. Please tell 'em I'm really quite nice!

Much, much love,
Katharine

December fifteenth

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