I have many, many letters from our family’s very own Will & Kate. That’s my mom’s uncle Will Buswell and his wife (also born “Catharine”). Will and Kate left the Sioux Falls, SD, hometown area and moved to Washington State shortly after he graduated from his training as a builder, I think.

Will was writing back home to his mom (my mom’s grandma) by 1910. He was a jack of all trades and a _very_ smart guy. He was a carpenter, an architect, an arborist (fruit trees), a sort of ad hoc urban planner in Toppenish, etc., etc. He also loved photography, apparently, as he was the only one back then who was taking photos of his projects, his friends and neighbors picking fruit, the progress on the house he was building, and much more. I don’t know much about Kate, but I’m sure we’ll learn more over time.

When mom’s mom died, she had quite a collection of letters saved by her elders over the years. When my mom died last year, the collection relocated to our house.

As far as I can determine, Will & Kate never had children (at least none who lived). It would be nice to give the current generations in her family access to the letters, as well. So… the plan is to share the correspondence online, a little at a time.