Chicago, Feb. 8th, 1864
Dear John,
Since I wrote to you last I have received a letter from
father, and enclosed you will please find
one for you. I shall answer theirs this
week. I mentioned to you in my last of
Frances and Hattie being sick; they have got somewhat better now. Week before last I was taken very sick and I have
not got to my usual strength yet, but I am improving every day.
I spoke to you in some of my previous letters of my little planer. Well it has turned out to be a very good one
and David Goodwillie is very much pleased with it and calls all of his friends
to see it. I am now getting up an
improvement on a shingle jointer. I am
about making the patterns for the frame now.
I went down the other side of the river last Tuesday night and bought me
Appleton’s Dicktionary [sic] of Mechanics.
It is in two large vol. and cost
$12. I am confident it will be of great benefit
to me in getting up machinery. I have
one of the best draft got up for a resawing machine you ever saw and shall have
it in working order next winter. We have
one of the measuring machines in the west, but for all that I have got a most
splendid improvement on it. I shall send
you a drawing of it in course of the summer.
Of course you will excuse me for writing such short letter
for I have so much to do that I don’t even have time think for myself. Mr. Goodwillie made another advance on to my salary
yesterday. He is going to pay my house
rent which is about ($150) a hundred and fifty dollars per year. So you see how much I am thought of here in Chicago. How foolish I have been to stay in a place
where I could not display all my ideas in the business. Since I have been here I am called one of the
best in the city. Mechanics from all the
other mills come here to see our set up and plainers [sic] going with our
resawing machine. We saw from 12 to 15
thousand feet per day. I have sawed
20,000 feet with it.
I have made out to fill this sheet and so I must close for
the present, hoping this will find you all well. Frances and Hattie unite with me in love to
you all.
From yours truly,
Edwin
(write soon)
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