Prelude: This letter was written on July 9^th 1940 from Carl Heck of Buffalo, to Mrs. Brooks. I have no envelope or location for Mrs. Brooks, but have two other letters addressed to Carl Heck, which is how I know he is from Buffalo.

THE LETTER:

Mrs. Brooks,                                                   July 9, 1940

I hope you will accept my apology for not writing to you sooner. I am not very prompt in answering letters but in this case I have an alibi. Although I have been attending work each day, my parents & I have been spending the nights & weekends in the country. It wasn’t untill a few days ago that dad had an opportunity to stop home and pick up the mail. When I read your letter, I felt honored to have been thought of in regard to such an opportunity to enter R.P.I. I’m sorry I am unable to use this help, but appreciate your recommendation. I am sure some worthy person will be found who will fully appreciate this financial help towards his education.

I am glad you believe I deserved the Dartmouth Award. It was a surprise to me and I feel deeply honored to have been selected for the award.

I saw the name of Myron Good in the paper the other night as a recipient of a four-year scholarship to the University of Buffalo. He well deserves such an honor and I wish him the best of luck.

Speaking of wishes, I wish you & Mr. Brooks a very happy & enjoyable vacation and hope to hear from you again.

Sincerely yours,

Carl Heck

COMMENTARY:

What a fine young man Carl Heck seems to be and what a nice letter he wrote. I’m not sure why he did not take the award, but I think it was because he already went to the University of Buffalo. I know this only because I have another envelope that was addressed to Carl from the University of Buffalo that had something called a university record in it. It looks like some kind of report card and it lists grades for three classes. I also have a letter from the Veteran’s Administration addressed to Carl about a disability claim.

Anyway, I like Carl. He is very well mannered to write Mrs. Brooks such a nice letter. Why does it seem like people were so much more polite back then? There seems to be a genuine kindness in people that many lack today. I think we can learn from history and from Carl’s letter that there is always time to be kind and that a kind word can hold a lot of weight.

HISTORY:

There was not a lot of information to go on here. I looked up the Dartmouth Award and there are several to Dartmouth University. Here is a general link: http://alumni.dartmouth.edu/serve/recognition/dartmouth-alumni-award

I looked up R.I.P in connection with Dartmouth and I found one video link. I’m not sure if there is any connection but here it is: https://youtu.be/jL271-ECoYM