Letters From Africa

  52. June 17, 1968 Dear Dad, and Mom too! (Line from Barb) (*air letter decorated for a Father’s Day Card) Hope you have an extra nice Father’s Day, or at least the chance for an extra five minute nap. Looks like we might have a nice day today. The sun is out bright and clear, and it is about 8 a.m. We went down to Embu to the Halls’ house for a movie. (Mr. Hall’s Brittish and teaches at Kangaru Boys’ School) They show the films that come to the school over again to all Europeans in the neighborhood. This one was a World War II film with Marlon Brando and Yul Brynner. I can’t remember it’s name! We had our first fried chicken last Friday. The Bensens are raising some chickens and we got four from them. They were three months old, but about the size of the very first we would eat, out of a bunch at home. A little small, but very good! WE fried the four and just stuffed! We had thought that we would have company, but the rain scared them out. It rained two inches Friday night! Amy ...

  51. June 9, 1968 Dear Mom and Dad, (Line from Barb) We heard on the radio about Robert Kennedy’s assassination a few hours after it happened, and the papers were full of it. It is hard to believe it really happened. I have finally finished Vicki’s sweater, and it looks good and fits! Now I’m going to put together the one I finished knitting two years ago for Diane. I can’t think why I brought it. It must have been one of those days packing when I was throwing in everything I ran across. This week has been the unusual nightly rain storms with one or two exceptions. Yesterday was one. It rained all afternoon instead! Last Monday Diane and I took off for Nairobi to get the wheels aligned on the car and get the flat tire fixed. I wrote about the trip around the mountain last week, and the next morning the rear tire on the bus was flat. I was glad it didn't happen on the way home. We left home Monday afternoon because we could see a storm coming and the appointment for the car as 8 in...

50. June 2, 1968 Dear Mom and Dad, (Line from Barb) June came in here with the most beautiful day! It was the first time we had seen the sun at 7 in the morning for about two weeks!  It was a welcome sight!  June first is a sort of Independence Day, the day that Kenya began to be a republic, not the official beginning. It’s when they declared themselves a republic. The day England recognized the Republic is in December. So there was a big celebration in Embu. We went down but arrived too late in the afternoon to get in on the festivities.  We visited the Whites after we discovered that the celebrating was over. They had been downtown earlier and said it was much like Kenyatta Day, with lots of groups singing and dancing. It was a blazing hot day, and both of them got sunburned. It was also market day at Embu, and while there wasn’t  any dancing going on, there must have been a couple thousand people milling around in the marketplace. It was pretty exciting and as far...

  48. May 21, 1968 Dear Mom and Dad, (Line from Barb) Got your letter and it is seven miles to Embu. Now, who wins the milkshake?! Yes, I did get Mrs. Hansen’s Christmas card and have mailed her a letter the same time as this one. I know I should have written sooner, but just didn’t do it. Wish I could send you some rain. What we have had in the last two hours would really fix you up good. We have fog or rain almost every morning until noon and some showers at night. Martin Luther King’s murder was in all the papers at the time. We listen to Voice of America, and so heard about it real quick. We get good news reports from them, also subscribe to Newsweek, so feel pretty well up on what’s happening. The newspapers here are something else We’ve been clipping some of the more interesting items. I feel bad the pictures weren’t as pretty as the slides but guess that’s just the way it is. We got a refund from Idaho on State Income Tax today, $40.00. It was a nice surprise, and the first ...

  47. May 20, 1968 Dear Mom and Dad (Line from Barb) Last Saturday we went to Nairobi and brought Diane home. Frank decided she wasn’t covering enough, especially in Science to  make her ready for the tenth grade at Madrid, and that on top of everything, moving so slow in class that she had to be first in the class and keep up two correspondence courses, one in Algebra. So she’s home to finish the correspondence course we brought, plus an extra course in Earth Science that Frank is teaching her. We are all real glad! Especially Vicki! I don’t think they have stopped talking since we got home! I suppose it will be just as bad when they go off to Madrid next fall, but at least we are all together now. Lately it seemed every time we wanted to go somewhere we felt we couldn’t because Diane wasn’t along. And when we did go somewhere it was always to Nairobi and to see Diane. Now we are thinking of some one-day weekend trips around here to see the country in some other directions be...

46. May 14, 1968 Dear Mom and Dad, (Cochrane from Barb) Got your letter today and I guess we don’t say enough about what goes on here. I mean with regard to the floods around. There are plenty of them, but none real close by, and only one minor one on the road to nairobi. There is a valley on the way to Nairobi that was flooded, but the road goes around it instead of through it. In fact, I think the guy who built the road between here and Nairobi did his best to see how far up and how far down he could go at every turn. It is an uncomfortable road to ride because the pavement is full of dips and bumps, similar to small frost heaves, but Frank says it is just poor road construction. And while there are many curves and uphill and downhill, it seems to be fairly easy to drive.  Some of these African drivers are something else, but you don’t worry about that, you just drive with extra caution. On the way to see Diane last Saturday, we saw two wrecks. One, a bus was laying half way down...

  45. May 13, 1968 Dear Mom and Dad, (Line from Barb) Well, I’m pretty late with my Mother’s Day greeting. I hope the pictures got there and since someone (Me) forgot to put a note in them, that they will convey the greeting. Seems like our forgetters have been working over time! We even neglected to get a letter to Frank’s dad on his birthday. Looks like I’m doing a good job of putting off myself. It is Tuesday now. About the time I got as far as I did, Milt woke up with a headache, and Ellias arrived to go to work. So after putting the sick back to bed, feeding all breakfast, and issuing the orders for work for the day, I started back to the typewriter. No luck. Milkman arrived, Amy started her lessons, and Ellias had to have a refresher course on how to run the washer. (It’s finally here!) Then I pasteurized the milk, put the dishes to soak, got a cold cloth for Milt’s head, explained to one of the workmen that there is no medicine left (at the dispensary), and comforted Kiva, w...

  44. May 11 Dear Folks, (Cochrane from Frank) Another week has passed. The time seems to be really rolling on. Monday we started classes again and this time we are in session until August 5 or so, with a mid term break sometime. Diane has her first exit tomorrow, so we are going down today to spend the night and pick her up in the morning. These exits are a real drag. She can’t get out until 10 Sunday morning and she has to be back at 6:30 pm, so we have to drive home after that time. We intend to take her out of here tomorrow if she wants to. The school isn’t that good, and if the promotion she got didn’t improve things, then we are through with it. That is if she wants to. When you read White Fang for literature in the tenth grade, there is something wrong. And only two periods of science a week … she can do much better working on her own. Enough of that! I was sorry to hear that all of us let you down so badly on your birthday, Dad. It was pure neglect on our part that we didn...

  43. Sunday, May 4, 1968 Dear Mom and Dad, (Line from Barb) I am getting started late, so I’ll write instead of type as the noise keeps everyone awake. This house really echoes. It must be the concrete floors and walls. Frank is finished with the institute, so it’s sort of like Christmas Vacation again. Everyone is gone and it’s very quiet, extra quiet because there is no generator noise. How we do enjoy the twenty-four hour electricity. Ice in the water to drink, hotcakes on the electric grill, made one chocolate today, and we’ve had orange, lemon, and pineapple, no vanilla yet.  We have had rain every night this week, one night 2.75 inches. The road down the hill to our house was a real mess, as it is shaded part of the way, and doesn’t dry very fast. Saturday Frank hauled a load of gravel which helps a lot. This morning we went right up with no trouble. Saturday I went to Embu to the market, and there were more people there than I’ve ever seen. It was lots of fun to visit ...

  41. April 25, 1968 Dear Mom and Dad, (Line from Barb) After my last letter you must think I’m really rattle-brained. I sure felt that way. Guess it was the speed with which things happened there for a while. Especially after feeling like things had dragged down almost to a halt. We are back home now. We came home last night in the middle of a pouring rainstorm. It lasted from the city limits of Mombasa to this morning around five Fortunately for us it had been raining only about two hours when we got to the last seven miles from Embu to home. We had put the chains on in Embu, or we never would have made it. As it was, we ended up stuck in the front yard! During our absence, they dug up the old electrical wiring and it made a nice trench right across the yard and carport, and when Frank turned in, he hit it at an angle and there we stayed! They had filled up the trench, but after that much rain, ti was nothing but gook. We unloaded only the necessary things and spread plastic over...