I noticed in the Thresher story from yesterday’s post that the president of the sophomore class accompanied Dr. Lovett on the trip to bring Warren Goss’s body home to his parents. The sophomore’s president that year was Otto Eisenlohr, whose letters to his girlfriend back in Dallas while he attended Rice now reside in the Woodson’s vault. On a hunch I went and looked.
What I found was a letter from Mrs. Goss. I can not imagine how she sat down to write this letter. Her grace and dignity, her generosity, her insistence on maintaining gentle manners in the face of what had to be emotional desolation–I find these to be truly noble. The final paragraph is devastating to me–Oh lucky Mrs. Eisenlohr, who still has a son to visit with!
A hundred years later I am sorry for her loss.
