The Walt Whitman Archive
Life & Letters
Correspondence
About this Item
Title: Walt Whitman to Alma Calder and John H. Johnston, 6 January 1890
Date: January 6, 1890
Whitman Archive ID: owu.00027
Source: The Bayley-Whitman Collection, Ohio Wesleyan University, Delaware, OH. Transcribed from digital images or a microfilm reproduction of the original item. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
Contributors to digital file: Blake Bronson-Bartlett, Ryan Furlong, Ian Faith, and Stephanie Blalock
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Camden
Jan: 6 P M 1890
Dear Alma Johnston & John & all the girls & children big & little
A word at any rate to show I think of you (as I often do & deeply)—Am here yet in much the same condition as the last year—good spirits (sort o') but physically disabled almost utterly—Fine sunny days I get out in my wheel chair1 for an hour or two—generally however am anchored here in my big ratan chair with the wolf-skin spread over the back—have two daily good curryings (massages) & appetite & sleep continuing fairly—
Alma, I suppose you rec'd the little ed'n of L of G. I sent—
Love to you all—
Walt Whitman
here is a little scrap I just cut out for John—
Correspondent:
John H. (J.H.) Johnston
(1837–1919) was a New York jeweler who became a close friend of Whitman's.
Whitman visited Johnston's home frequently, and Johnston assisted with raising
funds for the aging poet. Alma Calder Johnston was an author and John's second
wife. Her family owned a home and property in Equinunk, Pennsylvania. For more
on the Johnstons, see Susan L. Roberson, "Johnston, John H. (1837–1919) and Alma Calder" (Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and
Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998).
Notes:
1. Horace Traubel and Ed Wilkins, Whitman's nurse, went to Philadelphia to purchase a wheeled chair for the poet that would allow him to be "pull'd or push'd" outdoors. See Whitman's letter to William Sloane Kennedy of May 8, 1889. [back]