The Wright Sister

by Patty Dann

  June 1, 1927

  WRIGHT SISTER WRITES HER HEAD OFF

  I cannot control myself from writing letters that I usually post myself. But sometimes my dear Harry does it for me when he has time. When he does, he bows as if he were onstage when he takes my letters and says, “Would the madame have me do any other errands this morn?”

  And then he adds, “Now who could you possibly be corresponding with?”

  And then he tickles me.

  Last time this happened, distinct words of the Reverend came to me after all these years. I was at his feet, polishing his shoes while they were on him, as he had to leave quickly, which seemed to happen more than one would think. I believe Mother was still alive, and he said to me or to himself, “A man of faith must keep a table between himself and his parishioners.”

  I have a cigar box full of beautiful stamps that I keep in the drawer next to the bed, and I choose carefully each time I send one to Orv. Although I took so few treasures with me, I couldn’t imagine leaving my blessed box of stamps, including ones from Haiti and Morocco that both have beautiful pictures of aeroplanes.

  When we were children and used to play the game what-would-you-take-with-you-if-there-was-a-fire? Will would always laugh and say, “Myself,” and Orv would look to the ceiling and say, “Now that depends upon where the fire started,” and then launch into explanations of lift and draft and his latest scientific theories.

  I always said, “My stamps,” even when I was a child, but I also said the one photo of Mother, which I have in the cigar box with the stamps. I look like her, same dark hair and serious face. We used to use a wonderful sled that she built herself when I was little. Her father was a carriage maker, and I often think that is where we got our abilities to make things, from our mother. She should be the one to have headlines in the newspapers, THE WRIGHT BROTHERS’ MOTHER, but there are no headlines about the Reverend’s wife. And once, when we were out hanging laundry, and I was staring up at her and the sheets on the line and the sky and birds, she said, “Katharine Wright, you must never let them know it, but you are the smartest child I have, smarter than all four boys.”

  Mother died on July 4, and ever since I was fourteen years old, starting with that day, I cannot abide that holiday. That is not true. I love fireworks, but when I watched them with Orv at the lake house, sitting shoulder to shoulder on the dock, we both felt a surge of great joy and great sorrow. There was a girl at Oberlin from Portugal, which seemed so exotic, although now that I’ve been to Europe perhaps less so. She would teach us beautiful words in Portuguese. I do not remember many, for French is my other language, but I roll the word saudade around in my mouth often. It is this feeling of sorrow and joy, remembered joy, which I now feel for Orv, and for fireworks.

  When I was little, Mother made sturdy paper dolls with an array of outfits with little tabs to be folded over them on the shoulders. Boy dolls and girl dolls, and there were all kinds of clothes she had painted with watercolors—railroad engineers, presidents in top hats, and my favorite, a ship’s captain in a blue-and-gold uniform. None of the clothes were girls’ clothes though. We never thought twice about that, as Will, Orv, and I played with them on the floor of the kitchen as she cooked.

  They’re on a shelf in the big house in Dayton. Must ask Orv to send them.

  June 1, 1927

  Orv,

  I wish I could have shared with you Mr. Lindbergh’s triumph as he lifted off into the Long Island sky just a few days ago. Isn’t it terribly exciting, or are you a little bit jealous? I am jealous! I wanted to be there with you on that field, wishing him well. But also a part of me wanted to be up there with him—or that you, Will, and I could have done this brave flight all together. And I do find it quite unbelievable that he was able to fly in the rain; true it was light, but rain was never our friend.

  Are you saving all the newspapers? I am copying out the best lines, as I always have, although Harry says that I’m “very last century.”

  “I first saw the lights of Paris a little before 10:00 p.m., or 5:00 p.m. New York time, and a few minutes later I was circling the Eiffel Tower at an altitude of about 4,000 feet.”—Charles Lindbergh

  And this after traveling more than 3,600 miles in thirty-three and a half hours. I would like to be in Paris again. Not that Kansas City doesn’t have its charms. Here there are also endless stories about a local man, not a gentleman, and certainly not a flier, named Tom Pendergast, a mob boss! I hesitate to even write his name down, because Harry says he is known to shoot people on their own doorstep if he suspects they are onto him. But everybody is onto him. The whole city seems to be at his beck and call.

  And prostitutes. Harry said he interviews them all the time. He says, “Kansas City is a wide-open place, where sin is the name of the game, as wide open as the Wild West.”

  Yours,

  Your sister, Katharine—that’s the name of my game.

  P.S. I have a proposition for you, Mr. Wrong. I have done the calculations. Jeisyville, Illinois, is precisely halfway between Dayton and Kansas City and, as you would point out, also precisely halfway between Kansas City and Dayton. I am happy to meet you there to discuss what ails you. Surely peculiar incidents and subsequent decisions occurring over thirty years ago in our home could not be the reason for your obstinance. Surely you have matured.

  June 12, 1927

  LUCKY LINDY

  The sky was clear as a bell today, so it was fitting that I read about Lindbergh receiving the Distinguished Flying Cross from Coolidge! I wish we had received that. I try not to get caught up in coveting such honors. In fact, when les frères Wright were the toast of the town, of the world, it was often too much for me. And yet, as the sages know, as soon as the spotlight is removed, one hungers for more. I can imagine Orv huffing and puffing about the news. I have heard from Carrie that Lindbergh has planned to visit him. And now it is I who am jealous. I do think jealousy might be the death of me.

  I think my moving to Kansas City has made some things come into focus. First, I wish I had spoken up more as the “Wright sister,” and second, I admit, yes, once there was a moment when I was serving Harry and Isabel a pot roast in Dayton—it was a full house and I had spent hours preparing the meal and polishing silver. There was a moment then, yes, but nothing more. Isabel was charming. Harry was charming. We’ve established that. I admit I did notice Harry’s wrists then, the way they emerged from his cuffs. I don’t know why. I am saying that now, in retrospect, but I did flush at the sight of his wrists and perhaps, yes, also the nape of his neck. So yes, if a reporter were to ask, not that one would now, I did experience a hint of desire those years ago.

  Speaking of dear Harry, he has posed an important but seemingly unanswerable question to me, which is “Why do you persist on writing to your brother when he does not respond? If anyone else did that you would say to heck [although he did not say ‘heck’] with him!”

  Why indeed. What is it about siblings that we have such a desire to be glued to them for life, even if they behave atrociously? I am not a biologist. Perhaps that would be a good experiment—to study the effects on a person when a friend does not respond versus a sibling. I do know that Orv would say, “Clear the decks, sister!” if someone treated him this way.

  August 19, 1927

  SOLO FLIGHT

  It is so stifling hot that when Harry was at work, I pulled off my undergarments and just wore a cotton dress. I even played Harry’s phonograph record of Louis Armstrong and his “Wild Man Blues” and danced in front of the mirror. I am sending birthday greetings to Orv, who is fifty-six today. I am fifty-three. Mother lived to fifty-eight, so I think it is important to dance before it is too late. Harry is taking me to a jazz club on the river this weekend.

  I would very much like to imagine Orv is saying happy birthday back to me, or rushing to the post office to send off a belated book as a gift or even some new kind of gadget for the bicycle that can hold a compass and a mileage calculator. I have not got
ten the mail today, so perhaps there is a card or a tidily wrapped parcel with an origami peacock on the top. Mother always said imagining is an important attribute.

  This is our first birthday not celebrated together and our first birthday without a shared birthday cake. And the first in years that it has not been at the lake. Nine months a married lady and no word from Dayton. Although of course those two birthdays he had before I was born, I imagine Mother made a cake just for him. I wonder if he had one for his third birthday, while I was being born. I never asked Mother that. I should have. Knowing her she would have made arrangements.

  This past Saturday, I went into town to get a new bathing cap, and the young clerk asked if I really should be seen in public in a bathing costume, and then she said, “At your age.” Only moments later, in that same store, I heard two young girls talking about how if you don’t bob your hair, you’re a dinosaur. I’m afraid I am a dinosaur, but one that loves to swim. Swimming is the one thing that soothes my restless bones. Now we swim in the river, and there is a public pool that has the most dreadful chemical smell. I still have the urge to swim the English Channel. How is it that I was stronger at swimming than both boys? Harry talks often about Electric Park, which had so many tantalizing rides and “the best pool around,” he claims, until the fire of 1925 destroyed most of it. Every so often he was assigned what he calls “puff pieces” about the park. But I don’t want any electric park. I want to swim in our lake.

  Last night when I could not sleep—because of the heat, I would say, although I always seem to have some excuse—I drew my dressing gown around me and reached for the divine Eveready flashlight Orv gave me for my last birthday. I tiptoed out of the bedroom, down the stairs, and into the study, where I shined my nifty light on the bookshelves and took the U.S. and Canadian atlas off the shelf. The moment I opened the book to Ohio, I traced my finger around the state as if it were my lover. And then I turned to Lake Huron and I could not find our island, but I touched the outline of the water just the same. It’s possible it was my nighttime madness or simple exhaustion, but I thought I could see tiny black terns flying around the study. The afternoon Orv first spied one with his binoculars was one of the rare times I saw him jump for joy or jump at all. I wish I had a photograph of that. ORVILLE WRIGHT JUMPS!

  I sat in the study in the heat and switched on the electric fan. I sat there perspiring, missing Orv and our dear lake.

  But then Harry came down, and we sat there perspiring together and more!

  August 20, 1927

  WOMAN FOUND LIVING IN BATHTUB

  I would like to go on record that along with being in bed with Harry, I am currently only comfortable at night sitting in the cool empty tub. I’ve been reading some curious old articles in the Star, from the messy stacks Harry insists on saving. (I even had the thought of throwing away all his stacks of paper while he was downtown one day. But I think he would come home and hurl me out the window, which perhaps would not be a bad thing.) In my straightening I did read one article about “Pet Night,” in which children won prizes for showing the largest, smallest, and most peculiar-looking pup. Another contest was for boys to make the best wood carving, and the winner got bathing trunks.

  I know for Orv, our lake is the only place to swim as well. I believe that lake was the first place we ever had a “real vacation.” Of course, we traveled for work, but we never really did take a vacation, the way people here are always talking about going on vacation or “on holiday,” which feels like a foreign term to me.

  In my heart I am at Cliff House, although I still like to call it “the cottage,” looking down at the rough water with that wild wind. And that little train track we concocted. I try to explain to people how we used to carry supplies up and that time we even tried to carry guests all the way to the house, but I think I need a photograph. No, I think Harry and I need to return, that would be the solution. I have the clipping with the pictures of us cutting a ribbon at a restaurant in Cleveland and that ridiculous headline—THE WRIGHTS, FROM SKY TO LAND!—but I could use more photographs to make this house my home.

  I am missing Will these days too. How he loved our combined birthday parties. I don’t think we ever complimented him enough, but he was quite a good baker. He once confided in me that had he not been an inventor he would have been a baker. I can imagine the Reverend’s response to having a baker for a son. He would have not loved that. His son, in the kitchen.

  I asked Carrie to send my aprons, which just arrived today—and they smell of cinnamon and apples and home!

  August 22, 1927

  THE TELEPHONE TEMPTRESS

  It is so hot I am sitting stark naked in the bathtub. I love the cool porcelain on my skin. Harry sleeps like a rock and he snores a bit, which I am still not accustomed to, but then I am not used to sharing a bed with anyone. I think I like sharing a bed when we make love, more than when we are sleeping. I don’t know if other women feel that way, and I am certainly not going to ask.

  Harry was peeved with me today. When he walked in, which was admittedly a time he is rarely home, 2:00 p.m., I was talking on the telephone under the stairs. I had just dialed the operator and she said, “Who is calling, please?” and when he appeared next to me, I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to be rude to the operator and there was a chance Orv would actually pick up the phone, so I stayed on the telephone, even when Harry kissed me on the cheek. He obviously wanted me to hang up, but I did not, so he stomped up the stairs and slammed the door of our bedroom behind him.

  After speaking with the operator and she did ring the big house in Dayton, nobody picked up, not Carrie or Orv or anyone else. I waited for eighteen rings, which was my custom. I thought this would always be sufficient, even if Orv was deep in a book or taking a nap, which he rarely did, or if there was a chance he was taking a bath, which he did only at 9:09 every night, or if he was standing by the phone wanting to pick it up but lacked the courage. In any event, before the nineteenth ring I thanked the operator and hung up.

  When I went upstairs, I knocked on our bedroom door, which seemed a ridiculous thing to do on one’s own bedroom door, but when nobody answered I went in and Harry was taking a nap, or at least pretending to nap, facing away from me with his eyes tightly shut, and I left him alone. I returned downstairs and called the operator again. I feel I have become hooked to the telephone like a morphine addict.

  August 23, 1927

  Dear Orv, Orv dear,

  There was such a fierce thunderstorm today that I could not stop thinking, “I hope Orv is not flying today,” which of course you are not. But while most women are concerned with getting the clothes off the line in this weather, which I still am, I am also always thinking of people trapped in flying machines as lightning pierces the air.

  On another note, I’m determined to concoct a way to send you my deviled eggs through the mail. “A risky endeavor, but the reward would be great!” as you would say. I think we should invent a refrigerated envelope that can be sent through the mail, but I think it might be easier to send you live hens. Would one be able to send deviled eggs via carrier pigeon? Of course, to do that I would have to obtain a pigeon—and then you would have to care for the bird first. I would have to pick him up from Dayton, take him to my new home in Kansas City, and make sure he then would fly back to you in Dayton.

  I can hear you on that long-ago day, just as we put on our goggles, just before we went up. You shouted into the breeze, “I don’t want to be a mere carrier pigeon! I want to build a machine that goes two ways!”

  Instead of my deviled eggs (which you know you are missing), I could attach one of my letters, which would fly directly to you without risk of mashed eggs being dropped on an unsuspecting farmer along the way. But alas, I have been doing research and those dear birds cannot be trained to fly more than one hundred miles, and Dayton is six times that. Perhaps you could invent some kind of relay race for carrier pigeons, my boy. I have complete faith in you. Until then, I will use
the old-fashioned postal service.

  With affection,

  K.

  P.S. A friend from Oberlin has just been in Amherst, Massachusetts, and she says the town is abuzz with talk about Emily Dickinson’s brother having been the lover of the woman who has brought Dickinson’s poems to light. What my friend says is that nobody bothered Emily’s brother, but it was this woman, Mabel, who was shunned.

  Will that ever change?

  August 24, 1927

  A WOMAN’S PLACE

  I picked three baskets of strawberries today and now my fingers are stained with a combination of ink and strawberry juice.

  And now I am thinking often of my friend Lucy, whom I did not speak up for when I should have, who was not thrown from a horse but whose husband took his hand to her. She kept a wooden stool in her room at Oberlin, and once I saw her carrying it out of her room, down the hall. As she was leaving, I inquired where she was going. “My fiancé’s mother is visiting,” she said quietly. “I’m meeting her at the railroad station. She does not have long legs.”

  I often think of Lucy, placing the wooden stool down on the platform as the train pulled in, reaching up one arm to help her mother-in-law-to-be step off the train and the other to carry her bag. I never knew where the fiancé with the harsh hand was at this time. I think often of Lucy, who was not thrown off a horse ever, carrying that wooden stool.

  I had thought that all would be right with the world when we got the vote, but the lingering verbal lashings of the Reverend ricochet through my dreams.