CCC Vol. 4 p.14 Iva DEATS Sayre

As I have not written a letter for the Campbell Cousins Correspondence before, I hardly know what to write that would be of interest to you, although I always like to read in mother's book your letters which come from so many different places.

This is Sunday evening and my husband and I have just returned from spending the week-end with Aunt Minnie and Uncle Will Clark. Uncle Will is not feeling very well at present.

We have not had very nice weather here for a while back. It has been terribly slippery. It rained one day and part of the night. The ice then started to go out of the river, which runs in front of our house, but jammed up between Osceola and here, also between Nelson and here. This caused the water to run across the road by the river bridge, making it impossible for us to walk over town¹, because it was nearly three feet deep, but it has gone down now.

Kidon, my husband, works in the Finishing Department of the Elkland Leather Company. It is the largest Sole Leather Tannery in the world².

We are at home on River Street here in Elkland, and if at any time any of the cousins should come to Elkland we would be very pleased to have you call on us.

I hope that sometime I may be able to meet all of the Cousins and attend one of the good Dinners.

With best regards, I remain

1. I'm always intrigued by the terminology of "Center City", "Downtown", "Uptown", and now "over town". Lots of places use "downtown" to refer to their central business district. in Manhattan, the Southern portion is "downtown" and the Northern portion is "uptown". Philadelphia has "Center City". It's "Central LA". But this is the first time I recall encountering "over town".

2. At the peak of Pennsylvania's tanning industry, 5,000 acres of hemlock trees were cut each year to provide the bark used for tanning. The company stayed in business til 1873 and was a major polluter. Because of the tannery waste dumped into the river, Nelson was called "Stinktown" by Elkland kids. I can remember the river still being brown from the waste. When the Campbells arrived, the river contained trout, but the tannery waste was too acidic for any fish or vegetation to survive.