Dearest Auntie:
Pierre Loving is here spending a week or more with us, and I must say the consistency and method with which he works is quite a lesson to me and should be to Manuel. However he is writing an article on Chicago as a Dramatic Center. And we took issue, he and I, over the priority of the Hull House Little [Theater] and the one at Lake Forest. This latter started in nineteen twelve and if the Hull House [Theater] wasn't going full tilt years before that I'll eat my hat. Not only was it welcoming such artists as Mary Shaw in such a play as Ghosts when to do so really meant giving it a hearing, but Mrs. [Pelham] and Miss [Nancrede] were giving premieres of interesting and up to that time quite unappreciated plays -- weren't they? And wasn't Prunella given there by Miss [Nancrede] long before Winthrop Ames produced it? You know, Aunt Jane, of all the things you have done it seems to me the conception of that little [theater] and all it stood for, is -- well, I almost said the most creative. Perhaps that is too strong, but certainly it was and is one of the noblest of all your splendid gestures. I told Pierre that you were America's mother of Little [Theaters], and it seemed an utterly new thought to him, one which he didn't intend to accept either until he had some data. Now, Auntie, please do get your secretary, or get Mrs. [Pelham] or Miss [Nancrede] to give me this data about the [theater] and have it sent to me right away -- just the main facts -- they can all go on one typewritten page -- because he has to get his article off this week. [page 2]
We are enjoying him a lot, and he simply adores the farm. I am hustling this off before breakfast with Henry and Alice both talking to me, so never mind if it is a bit incoherent. Oh, my dear! I haven't written to you since Manuel came home from Chicago. He had a [beautiful] time. He said you were perfectly adorable. And he enjoyed the times at Hull House with you ever so much. He likes Weber, too.
Hastily yours, but with heaps of love,
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