Mar 21, 2024 - Sale 2663

Sale 2663 - Lot 71

Price Realized: $ 375
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 600 - $ 900
(BUSINESS.) Elijah H. Holmes. Letters of a Texas college professor who dreams of becoming an blacksmith in booming Boley, Oklahoma. Pair of Autograph Letters Signed ("E.H. Holmes" and "Lige") to "Bill" (said to be to William Baxter Mathews), plus one partial letter; mailing folds, minor wear. Wisconsin and Texas, 1902-1906
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Additional Details

Elijah H. "Lige" Holmes (born circa 1868) was born in Georgia, attended Atlanta University, became an assistant in the mechanical department there, married Clara E. Davenport in 1890, secured a patent for gauges in Prairie View, TX in 1895, and served as a professor of drawing in the mechanical department of Prairie View State Normal College in Texas through at least 1906.

The first letter was written on 2 July 1902 while he was studying engineering for the summer at the University of Wisconsin: "No Negroes here except myself. That is, in the school. . . . Nearly all the people are German or are of German descent. They do not know color. They do know a dollar. My wife does not take kindly to having white servants. She loves to see her people and one sees very few of them here."

A partial letter dated 23 December 1905 is written on his departmental stationery at Prairie View. It lacks the final page and signature. He discusses plans to quit teaching and open a blacksmithing and woodwork shop in "Creek Nation, a section in the northwestern part of the Indian Territory."

This is elaborated in his 24 February 1906 letter, offering advice on teaching positions in Texas. "Do you mean to continue in the school work or try something else? If you want to go west, try Kansas City and St. Louis, they pay well. . . . I do not believe that you would like school teaching in Texas unless it was in some one of the large cities. I would not advise to attempt work in any of the towns. . . . I do not recommend this (P.V.) place to you. It is a hard place to live, and it would be harder for you and your family coming from Atlanta. . . . If you want to open up a business such as dry goods and shoes, I would recommend my little town in the Ind. Ter. The town of Boley is new and settled largely by colored people. . . . I hope to leave Texas this fall and embark in a business in the Territory. We hope to start a variety shop doing general blacksmithing, wood work, building and a hardware business."

We have been unable to trace the remainder of Professor Holmes's career after this 1906 letter--whether he remained a professor or became a small-town blacksmith.