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TITLE:
Letter from Susan Bittle Myers to Mrs. G. W. Bowman, 25 Nov 1897

SUBJECT:
Correspondence

DESCRIPTION:
Photocopy of a handwritten letter to 1881 Mont Amoena graduate Margaret Catherine Barrier Bowman. Susan E. B. Myers expressed sympathy to Mrs. Bowman over Dr. W. S. Bowman’s stroke. Reflecting on her own life at age sixty-nine, she recounted her upbringing as the daughter of a Massachusetts clergyman and her travels across the United States, noting that the happiest years of her life were spent in North Carolina as the wife of Rev. Daniel Bittle. She fondly remembered her former friends, neighbors, and students from Mount Pleasant and Mont Amoena Seminary, asking about several by name. Myers described her continued work as a governess and teacher following the death of her second husband, Rev. Abram Myers, emphasizing her commitment to keeping pace with modern educational methods. Although she praised California’s universities for attracting brilliant scholars, she lamented what she viewed as the growing influence of evolution and Darwinism, expressing concern that traditional Christian beliefs were being abandoned. She concluded with warm wishes for Dr. Bowman’s recovery and reaffirmed her enduring affection for her North Carolina friends.

CREATOR:
Susan Eustas Biglow Bittle Myers (first principal of Mount Pleasant Female Seminary, 1859-1860), Dunlap, Fresno County, California

SOURCE:
Eastern Cabarrus Historical Society Museum, Mt. Pleasant, NC

DATE CREATED:
25 Nov 1897

RIGHTS:
Eastern Cabarrus Historical Society Museum, Mt. Pleasant, NC

Collection
Eastern Cabarrus Historical Society Museum, Mt. Pleasant, NC

FORMAT
jpeg

SPATIAL COVERAGE
United States

SOURCE INSTITUTION
http://www.ecshmuseum.org

TRANSCRIPTION:

Mrs W. S. Bowman
Care of Rev. W. S. Bowman
Mt. Pleasant North Carolina

Dunlap Fresno Co. Calif.
November 25th-1897

My Dear Mrs Bowman [Margaret Catherine Barrier Bowman]

I was much pleased to receive a letter from you, but very sorry to hear that Dr. Bowman had a stroke of paralysis. Of course as we advance in life, we expect to ecperience the natural ills that come with age, but he has been so active and young for his years, that I had hped he would remain vigorous for at least another decade.

I was sixty nine years old this month. I feel often as though I had lived one hundred years.

I commenced my life as the daughter of a clergyman in Massachusetts near Boston, and have wandered over nearly all the United States. The happiest part of my life was spent as Dr. Bittle’s wife, and in the dearly loved Southern states. I cherish an abiding love for my many friends in North Carolina. Your Uncle Shimpoch’s family and Mrs. Lawson Heilig’s children and Mr. & Mrs Paul Heilig Mrs. Barnhardt and your dear mother [Margaret Boger Barrier], whom I did not know so intimately as I did many others. Your oldest sister Mrs. Rose (I think) [step-sister Martha Barrier Rose] who died young, was a beautiful girl, and died a Christian’s death indeed. Your brothers Wiley & Augustus I knew well, especially Wiley. He was a favorite of Dr. Bittle’s & myself. I would much like to know if Mrs. Laura Barier 9formerly Laura Brown) one of my scholars at Mt Amoena Seminary, is living and where she is , also Mattie Cook & Jennie Shimpoch. I received a letter a year or two ago from Lizzie Heilig. She said she was married. I answered it, but don’t know if she ever received it, nor do I now know her present name.

I have been teaching ever since Mr. Myers died, as Governess and in Boarding schools. I am as strong mentally as ever, and have kept my standard right along with the Public School Manuals and the University Text Books. The methods of teaching are so different from what they were years ago. That one has to study everything new as it appears in order to keep in touch with the scientific men & women of the present time.

In California I think we have collected the brightest and most advanced minds of the age as instructors in our two large universities, and yet I do not at all endorse or admire the infidel tendency of these men who are at the head of these institutions. Evolution and Darwinism have overset the Gospel truths, and not one in twent of the students or the Professors believe in Jesus Christ as the true Son of God and of his miraculous conception and birth. The Bible is practically abrogated in California. Where it will all end I don’t know. I look for terrible calamities to occur when something can be done to convert the multitudes out here who follow their own desires and wishes.

I will be very glad to hear from you at any time, and I earnestly hope that my dear friend of former years may be restored to health & to you God bless you both.

Sincerely your friend

Susan E. B. Myers