Frank's Niece!

[Cathy]

Ayn loved Christmas, which she thought of as an excuse for people to give each other presents.

Thanks for the info about what Mimi died from. I also wonder exactly who "the family" are referred to in the letter. Did AR mean Frank's whole remaining family, or was she talking more specifically about Mimi's immediate family?

Do you know yet if Mimi had children? Or any of Agnes' other children?

Ellen

I believe MiMi had one son...David. Marna had had 3 but Marta (the letter was about) died at 25 of heart disease, now she has a son and a daughter, and Connie had 5 children. I don't think Lee had any.~Cathy~

[Ellen Stuttle]

Looks like Mimi's son was named after her husband.

I was looking in the Letters for some items I haven't yet gotten to (pertaining to AR's first meeting with Nathaniel), and I noticed a letter dated December 2, 1945, to Mimi. It contains references to Marna and to Connie and, I surmise from information in Heller's book, to Ayn's providing funds for Marna to return to high school. I'll quote the whole thing since the first paragraph makes reference to Frank Lloyd Wright. The second paragraph starts the material pertaining to Frank O'Connor's family.

Note, Ayn signs the letter "Your Auntie," but the name which followed - "Alice" or "Ayn" - isn't given.

This is the first letter to Mimi which is included in the volume.

The bracketed inserts are the editor's.

To Mimi Sutton, AR's niece, a daughter of Frank's sister, Agnes Papurt

December 2, 1945

Dear Mimi,

Thanks for your letter. I'm answering hurriedly, but not too late as usual. We had a nice trip back--though the Superchief did shake unmercifully. The weekend at Frank Lloyd Wright's house was extremely interesting--it would take an article to describe it--but Taliesin looks magnificent--I am more crazy about his architecture than ever--and he promised to design a house for us, even without our having bought the land; he'll design it in advance, for the future--and that made me very happy. We found our home here in perfect order and have just about settled back to rest after our vacation in New York. Frank feels and looks wonderful--and is delighted to be back with his chickens.

I hope you will be happy in whichever of the two jobs David decides to take. I wish him a great success and lots of happiness to both of you.

I'm glad that Doc [Mimi's sister Marna, a.k.a. "Docky"] approved of our plans for her--I hope she'll work very hard--and don't let her marry the first boy she sees--I strongly suspect that she's much better than that and she should not end up as a housewife before she's even started to live. Let me know when you're settled and all the details.

I presume the poetry which you said was "by my dear little sister" is by Connie [Mimi's other sister]. We howled, reading it. It's really not bad at all, you know, in fact some of it is quite good--but it was very funny to see her writing about "Time changes us all until only a fragment of the old is left"--at her great old age.

Tell the family to look for the illustrated condensation of The Fountainhead in the Hearst papers beginning December 24th. I think they'll get a kick out of it because the artist has done a wonderful job of making Roark look like Frank. I've seen the advance proofs, and everybody here gasps, seeing them, without any warning from us, "Why, it's Frank!" Don't tell them about it--let's see if they discover the resemblance themselves; I think it might be a funny surprise, particularly for Connie, if she's movie-struck and such.

Your Auntie,

Ellen

[Ellen Stuttle]

This pertains to AR's family, not to Frank's, but I was struck by it as indicative of how worried AR was about the possibility of her family in Russia getting into trouble through connection with her.

It's an excerpt from a letter to a cousin named Vladimir Kondheim. She's trying to set up a way of sending food packages to her Russian family through him.

The all-caps is as typeset.

EDIT: I've put in the date, which I forgot to include when I posted the excerpt.

August 6, 1946

Dear Volodia:

[....]

I do not know the address of your family, but I suppose that you have already sent something to them. If you haven't, and would like to, let me know, and I will be glad to pay the cost of another package.

I am told that mail is now allowed to come through from Russia, but you can understand why I am afraid to write to them. If you have written to your family and heard any news, please let me know.

Please keep this confidential between just the two of us, and burn this letter after you are through with it. If you write to your family, DON'T REFER TO ME AT ALL EXCEPT to say (if you wish) that you have seen cousin Alice, and that she is well. Above all don't tell them anything about my success as a writer, don't refer to my writing career, don't mention where I live, and don't ever use the name Ayn Rand.

[....]

Ellen

Edited May 20, 2013 by Ellen Stuttle

[Ellen Stuttle]

I'm often struck when I'm looking things up in the Letters by how much "nicer" the pre-Atlas Ayn Rand comes across to me than the post-Atlas.

Ellen

[ginny]

Lord, yes. I think a life surrounded by yes-people ruined her quite a bit. Of course, she demanded yes-people. Catch-twenty two. She was so full of two-sides. She admired beauty and feminity, and that was the one thing she didn't have. She wanted individualists, but drove them away. So, so sad.

[Cathy]

Looks like Mimi's son was named after her husband.

I was looking in the Letters for some items I haven't yet gotten to (pertaining to AR's first meeting with Nathaniel), and I noticed a letter dated December 2, 1945, to Mimi. It contains references to Marna and to Connie and, I surmise from information in Heller's book, to Ayn's providing funds for Marna to return to high school. I'll quote the whole thing since the first paragraph makes reference to Frank Lloyd Wright. The second paragraph starts the material pertaining to Frank O'Connor's family.

Note, Ayn signs the letter "Your Auntie," but the name which followed - "Alice" or "Ayn" - isn't given.

This is the first letter to Mimi which is included in the volume.

The bracketed inserts are the editor's.

To Mimi Sutton, AR's niece, a daughter of Frank's sister, Agnes Papurt

December 2, 1945

Dear Mimi,

Thanks for your letter. I'm answering hurriedly, but not too late as usual. We had a nice trip back--though the Superchief did shake unmercifully. The weekend at Frank Lloyd Wright's house was extremely interesting--it would take an article to describe it--but Taliesin looks magnificent--I am more crazy about his architecture than ever--and he promised to design a house for us, even without our having bought the land; he'll design it in advance, for the future--and that made me very happy. We found our home here in perfect order and have just about settled back to rest after our vacation in New York. Frank feels and looks wonderful--and is delighted to be back with his chickens.

I hope you will be happy in whichever of the two jobs David decides to take. I wish him a great success and lots of happiness to both of you.

I'm glad that Doc [Mimi's sister Marna, a.k.a. "Docky"] approved of our plans for her--I hope she'll work very hard--and don't let her marry the first boy she sees--I strongly suspect that she's much better than that and she should not end up as a housewife before she's even started to live. Let me know when you're settled and all the details.

I presume the poetry which you said was "by my dear little sister" is by Connie [Mimi's other sister]. We howled, reading it. It's really not bad at all, you know, in fact some of it is quite good--but it was very funny to see her writing about "Time changes us all until only a fragment of the old is left"--at her great old age.

Tell the family to look for the illustrated condensation of The Fountainhead in the Hearst papers beginning December 24th. I think they'll get a kick out of it because the artist has done a wonderful job of making Roark look like Frank. I've seen the advance proofs, and everybody here gasps, seeing them, without any warning from us, "Why, it's Frank!" Don't tell them about it--let's see if they discover the resemblance themselves; I think it might be a funny surprise, particularly for Connie, if she's movie-struck and such.

Your Auntie,

Ellen

Thanks Ellen, that was a nice letter. The reason Marna's name is "Doc" is because when MiMi was born, she was beautiful from the first cry. Then Lee was born and he was a boy. Then comes Marna, which was a homely baby and her father said, she's going to have to grow up and become a doctor because no man is ever going to marry her! So from that day on she was Doc or Docky. ~Cathy~

[Cathy]

This pertains to AR's family, not to Frank's, but I was struck by it as indicative of how worried AR was about the possibility of her family in Russia getting into trouble through connection with her.

It's an excerpt from a letter to a cousin named Vladimir Kondheim. She's trying to set up a way of sending food packages to her Russian family through him.

The all-caps is as typeset.

Dear Volodia:

[....]

I do not know the address of your family, but I suppose that you have already sent something to them. If you haven't, and would like to, let me know, and I will be glad to pay the cost of another package.

I am told that mail is now allowed to come through from Russia, but you can understand why I am afraid to write to them. If you have written to your family and heard any news, please let me know.

Please keep this confidential between just the two of us, and burn this letter after you are through with it. If you write to your family, DON'T REFER TO ME AT ALL EXCEPT to say (if you wish) that you have seen cousin Alice, and that she is well. Above all don't tell them anything about my success as a writer, don't refer to my writing career, don't mention where I live, and don't ever use the name Ayn Rand.

[....]

Ellen

I never heard her mention her family...it must have been just awful for her worrying about them.

[Jonathan]

Jonathan, regarding #535:

Yes, I think that is one strand of personal hostilities towards Rand.

I don't think that it's always "personal hostility" so much as simply replying in kind. It's more of an acceptance of the tone of discussion that Rand chose. Basically, "You wanna play rough? Okay. Fine with me."

Also, Rand seems to have had a karate view rather than a boxing view -- she seemed to believe that the single powerful blow that she delivered with Atlas Shrugged would be enough to knock out her opponents. When they got up and fought back, from both sides, it seems to have surprised her. She hadn't prepared for a 15-round fight. Instead of fighting back, she went into a funk and threw a long self-pity party.

I certainly built up some personal hostility towards Nietzsche as I was getting acquainted with his writings and his shabby views of other people.

In the ’70’s many of my activist libertarian associates and friends had become hostile towards Rand personally. These were people who had gone through an initial sweeping captivation by Rand and her ideas in first exposure. For some reason I could never figure out, as they changed their views, I had the sense that they came to feel as if they had been betrayed by Rand in what she had put down in her works. It was strange. Maybe she had led them onto bad ways of seeing and treating people around them, and they blamed her. I don’t know. By 1982, when Rand died, I did not have one person with whom I could share my sorrow.

One of the hazards of calling libertarians filthy hippies of the right, and falsely accusing them of stealing ideas and not giving credit where it was due, and otherwise collectivistically declaring them to be monsters, enemies and cranks, etc., is that you'll alienate them, and they'll treat you as an enemy. So, again, the lesson is that one shouldn't pick fights if one is going to cry about others punching back.

Those of us who were gay had a variety of responses towards Rand finally coming out, after her split with Branden, speaking her own say in the ’70’s against homosexuality. By that time, her views on such things were simply irrelevant to me. I’ve continued to have a positive feeling for her all the same. Concerning the widespread personal interest in Rand’s person from those not hostile towards her, but affectionate towards her, I imagine it often goes back to a personal liberation her writings brought to them and perhaps good life-choices and rich happiness she helped them win.

I think that's a part of it, but there's also legitimacy in people exploring if she practiced what she preached in her own life. A philosopher's personal deviations from her own philosophy are legitimate grounds on which to question the practicability of the philosophy, and its view of the nature of man. Objectivism is often sold as a tool for living, and any discrepancies in Rand's life are potentially informative of Objectivism's being a realistic philosophy versus an utopian one.

Personally, I have a very positive overall view of Rand, but I've never been awestruck or starstruck by her, so I never left myself open to being devastated by her errors or occasional nastiness. I don't identify with people who made her into a saint and then became extremely upset with her unfair judgments and irrational opinions, rather than just laughing at how ridiculous they were.

J

[Ellen Stuttle]

I never heard her mention her family...it must have been just awful for her worrying about them.

I forgot to include the date on the letter to Vladimir Kondheim (Volodia) from which I quoted in post #578.

It was dated August 6, 1946.

In the part of the letter which I left out, Ayn says:

[The "them" refers to Gimbels. She'd seen an ad in a New York paper listing types of parcels which Gimbels would deliver to Russia.]

Have them send one package to my sister, Nora, and the other one to our cousin, Nina.

I assume she'd already received a letter from Marie Strakhow which she answered two days later.

To Marie Strakhow, a longtime family friend from Russia and AR's first English teacher, who wrote her that AR's father had died in 1939 and her mother a year later.

August 8, 1946

Dear "Missis":

Thank you for your letter. I have heard nothing from Europe for eight years, and the news you told me was a great shock to me. But I am very grateful that you got in touch with me and let me know.

Later she thought that Nora had also died. She learned in the early 70s that Nora was still alive. She brought Nora and her husband over for a visit - which did not go well.

Ellen

[Cathy]

I never heard her mention her family...it must have been just awful for her worrying about them.

I forgot to include the date on the letter to Vladimir Kondheim (Volodia) from which I quoted in post #578.

It was dated August 6, 1946.

In the part of the letter which I left out, Ayn says:

[The "them" refers to Gimbels. She'd seen an ad in a New York paper listing types of parcels which Gimbels would deliver to Russia.]

Have them send one package to my sister, Nora, and the other one to our cousin, Nina.

I assume she'd already received a letter from Marie Strakhow which she answered two days later.

To Marie Strakhow, a longtime family friend from Russia and AR's first English teacher, who wrote her that AR's father had died in 1939 and her mother a year later.

August 8, 1946

Dear "Missis":

Thank you for your letter. I have heard nothing from Europe for eight years, and the news you told me was a great shock to me. But I am very grateful that you got in touch with me and let me know.

Later she thought that Nora had also died. She learned in the early 70s that Nora was still alive. She brought Nora and her husband over for a visit - which did not go well.

Ellen

Ellen, that's so sad! Do you know what they died from? Do you know if she ever visited their grave? What about Aunt Alice's other sister? She had two. ~Cathy~

[Ellen Stuttle]

Ellen, that's so sad! Do you know what they died from? Do you know if she ever visited their grave? What about Aunt Alice's other sister? She had two. ~Cathy~

I had thought that Ayn's parents died in the Siege of Leningrad, and the other sister, Natasha, too. But the editor's insert in the letter to Marie Strakhow says that Ayn's father died in 1939 and her mother a year later, but the Siege of Leningrad started in '41, so Google tells me. I'll see what I can find later.

Ayn never went back to Russia, or left the U.S. after she came here, except to go to Mexico, from which to reenter married to Frank, and a couple times, maybe more, to Toronto.

Ellen

[Cathy]

Ellen, that's so sad! Do you know what they died from? Do you know if she ever visited their grave? What about Aunt Alice's other sister? She had two. ~Cathy~

I had thought that Ayn's parents died in the Siege of Leningrad, and the other sister, Natasha, too. But the editor's insert in the letter to Marie Strakhow says that Ayn's father died in 1939 and her mother a year later, but the Siege of Leningrad started in '41, so Goggle tells me. I'll see what I can find later.

Ayn never went back to Russia, or left the U.S. after she came here, except to go to Mexico, from which to reenter married to Frank, and a couple times, maybe more, to Toronto.

Ellen

How strange she was...worried so much about her family, but not go visit their graves. Distant with her American family, but close to MiMi, but yet leaving everything to Piekoff. To me, she is one complicated person. I think I'm kind of glad not knowing her as an adult...I have a feeling we would not have gotten along. I have been trying to learn about her philosophies, maybe because I am new at it, it really does confuse me. I watched another movie last night "Ayn Rand in her own words" and was up until two in the morning thinking about her views, and taking notes. I think my big questions is why did she believe this way, I think she may have been somewhat narcissistic. ~Cathy~

[ginny]

Cathy - definitely extremely narcissistic. All part of the I'm for me and only me attitude. By the way, there's no way she could have gone back to Russia. She died before the regime fell. The Communists would probably have grabbed her, even though she was an Amirican citizen. She was aware of the danger.

Feel free to ask any questions. Obj's just love to lecture to a hot potential convert. Fresh meat! Besides, the more you understand Aunt Alice, the better you will probably understand Uncle Frank. You know, I just remembered. They were at one of the lectures one time. I think Frank's mind was already going. Ayn had the usual thunder in her eyes following a thunder and lightning question and answer period. Frank just smiled at passers-by, looking a bit uncomfortable and maybe embarrassed. I suspect as his mind went, so did the memories of good times he had with her.

[Ellen Stuttle]

In looking up letters from AR to members of Frank's family, I found three which spell out how she felt about requests for money from family members - and more generally.

One of them, a letter to Connie, is long, but I'll type in all three of them.

Heller explains that the issue with Marna's returning to high school involved a misunderstanding, eventually straightened out, with Ayn's having thought that Marna had only a year to finish whereas actually she had a year and a half to go.

---

September 12, 1948

Dear Mimi:

I was sorry to read your request that we loan you money. We are not able to do it--and I had hoped that I could be friends with my nieces without the constant threat of having to assume financial responsibility for them.

I thought I had explained it before, but I will say it again and then I will leave it up to you: If you feel affection for us and want to maintain friendly relations, then it must be on the understanding that there will be no requests for money. I do like you, and on our last meeting in Washington, I had the impression that you were becoming the kind of person of whom I approve--but if you understand my philosophy, as you say you do, you must understand that I do not believe that friendship means an obligation to turn oneself into an object for the use of one's friends.

There is a great deal that I could explain to you about this, but I don't think it is necessary, and you can probably understand it by yourself. So I shall only say that if you want us to remain friends without any financial matters involved, I will be happy to remain your friend. If not, then not. I cannot deal with people on any other terms.

May 22, 1949

Dear Connie:

You are very young, so I don't know if you realize the seriousness of your action in writing to me for money. Since I don't know you at all, I am going to put you to the test.

If you really want to borrow $25 from me, I will take a chance on finding out what kind of person you are. You want to borrow the money until your graduation. I will do better than that. I will make it easier for you to repay the debt, but on condition that you understand and accept it as a strict and serious business deal. Before you borrow it, I want you to think it over very carefully.

Here are my conditions: If I send you the $25, I will give you a year to repay it. I will give you six months after your graduation to get settled in a job. Then, you will start repaying the money in installments: you will send me $5 on January 15, 1950, and $4 on the 15th of every month after that; the last installment will be on June 15, 1950--and that will repay the total.

Are you willing to do it?

Here is what I want you to think over: Once you get a job, there will always be many things you need and on which you might prefer to spend your money, rather than repay a debt. I want you to decide now, in advance, as an honest and responsible person, whether you will be willing and able to repay this money, no matter what happens, as an obligation above and ahead of any other expense.

I want you to understand right now that I will not accept any excuse--except a serious illness. If you become ill, then I will give you an extension of time--but for no other reason. If, when the debt becomes due, you tell me that you can't pay me because you needed a new pair of shoes or a new coat or you gave the money to somebody in the family who needed it more than I do--then I will consider you an embezzler. No, I won't send a policeman after you, but I will write you off as a rotten person and I will never speak or write to you again.

Now I will tell you why I am so serious and severe about this. I despise irresponsible people. I don't want to deal with them or help them in any way. An irresponsible person is a person who makes vague promises, then breaks his word, blames it on circumstances and expects other people to forgive it. A responsible person does not make a promise without thinking of all the consequences and being prepared to meet them.

You want $25 for the purpose of buying a dress; you tell me that you will get a job and be able to repay me. That's fine and I am willing to help you, if that is exactly what you mean. But if what you mean is: give me the money now and I will repay it if I don't change my mind about it--then the deal is off. If I keep my part of the deal, you must keep yours, just exactly as agreed, no matter what happens.

I was very badly disappointed in Mimi and Marna [Docky]. When I first met Mimi, she asked me to give her money for the purpose of taking an art course. I gave her the money, but she did not take the art course. I supported Marna for a year--for the purpose of helping her to finish high school. She did not finish high school. I will take a chance on you, because I do not want to blame you for the actions of your sisters. But I want you to show me that you are a better kind of person.

I will tell you the reasons for the conditions I make: I think that the person who asks and expects other people to give him money, instead of earning it, is the most rotten person on earth. I would like to teach you, if I can, very early in life, the idea of a self-respecting, self-supporting, responsible, capitalistic person. If you borrow money and repay it, it is the best training in responsibility that you can ever have.

I want you to drop--if you have it in your mind--the idea that you are entitled to take money or support from me, just because we happen to be relatives. I want you to understand very clearly, right now, when you are young, that no honest person believes that he is obliged to support his relatives. I don't believe it and will not do it. I cannot like you or want to help you without reason, just because you need the help. That is not a good reason. But you can earn my liking, my interest and my help by showing me that you are a good person.

Now think this over and let me know whether you want to borrow the money on my conditions and whether you give me your word of honor to observe the conditions. If you do, I will send you the money. If you don't understand me, if you think that I am a hard, cruel, rich old woman and you don't approve of my ideas--well, you don't have to approve, but then you must not ask me for help.

I will wait to hear from you, and if I find out that you are my kind of person, then I hope that this will be the beginning of a real friendship between us, which would please me very much.

Your aunt,

June 4, 1949

I must tell you that I was very impressed with the intelligent attitude of your letter. If you really understood, all by yourself, that my long letter to you was a sign of real interest on my part, much more so than if I had sent you a check with some hypocritical gush note, and if you understood that my letter was intended to treat you as an equal--then you have the kind of mind that can achieve anything you choose to achieve in life. Just stick to that kind of thinking and you will be surprised how far it will take you. Don't let anybody discourage you or tell you that intelligence doesn't pay or that success in life has to be achieved through dishonesty or through sheer blind luck. That is not true. Real success is never accidental and real happiness cannot be found except by the honest use of your intelligence.

When you have the time, let me know something about yourself and your future plans. This is not an obligation; you don't have to do it, but if you feel like it, I would like to know more about you. Mimi told me that at one time you wanted to be a writer. Is that still your interest? If so, we have a great interest in common.

I don't know whether you remember me at all, but I remember you as a perfectly adorable kid who sat on my lap and criticized my shoes and haircut. Let me see what you have turned out to be.

Frank and I will come to New York in July for the opening of the movie of The Fountainhead. We don't know our exact plans as yet, but we may be able to drive East instead of coming by train. If we do, we will stop in Cleveland and then will have a chance to meet.

Your aunt,

Ellen

[PDS]

Thank you Ellen. Very interesting. I love the 3rd letter!

[Ellen Stuttle]

Cathy,

What good does it do a person to visit his or her grave? The person isn't there.

I think, btw, it isn't sure if there are graves.

And for Ayn to have gone to Russia..... Not a safe place.

Ellen

[Cathy]

Cathy - definitely extremely narcissistic. All part of the I'm for me and only me attitude. By the way, there's no way she could have gone back to Russia. She died before the regime fell. The Communists would probably have grabbed her, even though she was an Amirican citizen. She was aware of the danger.

Feel free to ask any questions. Obj's just love to lecture to a hot potential convert. Fresh meat! Besides, the more you understand Aunt Alice, the better you will probably understand Uncle Frank. You know, I just remembered. They were at one of the lectures one time. I think Frank's mind was already going. Ayn had the usual thunder in her eyes following a thunder and lightning question and answer period. Frank just smiled at passers-by, looking a bit uncomfortable and maybe embarrassed. I suspect as his mind went, so did the memories of good times he had with her.

Poor Uncle Frank...he was so much like my father...they both were good men, just weak. I don't fully get what she means about man achieving his own happiness without sacrificing his happiness for someone else. But don't we do that all the time? Sometimes it makes me happy to make someone else happy. Plus I am always sacrificing my own happiness for my children. Maybe that's why she didn't have children. Or does she mean she wont sacrifice her happiness for someone else, but she excepted others to sacrifice for her. I am talking about the affair...when Branden started another affair and how she felt betrayed and tried to ruin him. But she expected Uncle Frank to put up with it. What a hypocrite. ~Cathy~

[Cathy]

In looking up letters from AR to members of Frank's family, I found three which spell out how she felt about requests for money from family members - and more generally.

One of them, a letter to Connie, is long, but I'll type in all three of them.

Heller explains that the issue with Marna's returning to high school involved a misunderstanding, eventually straightened out, with Ayn's having thought that Marna had only a year to finish whereas actually she had a year and a half to go.

---

September 12, 1948

Dear Mimi:

I was sorry to read your request that we loan you money. We are not able to do it--and I had hoped that I could be friends with my nieces without the constant threat of having to assume financial responsibility for them.

I thought I had explained it before, but I will say it again and then I will leave it up to you: If you feel affection for us and want to maintain friendly relations, then it must be on the understanding that there will be no requests for money. I do like you, and on our last meeting in Washington, I had the impression that you were becoming the kind of person of whom I approve--but if you understand my philosophy, as you say you do, you must understand that I do not believe that friendship means an obligation to turn oneself into an object for the use of one's friends.

There is a great deal that I could explain to you about this, but I don't think it is necessary, and you can probably understand it by yourself. So I shall only say that if you want us to remain friends without any financial matters involved, I will be happy to remain your friend. If not, then not. I cannot deal with people on any other terms.

May 22, 1949

Dear Connie:

You are very young, so I don't know if you realize the seriousness of your action in writing to me for money. Since I don't know you at all, I am going to put you to the test.

If you really want to borrow $25 from me, I will take a chance on finding out what kind of person you are. You want to borrow the money until your graduation. I will do better than that. I will make it easier for you to repay the debt, but on condition that you understand and accept it as a strict and serious business deal. Before you borrow it, I want you to think it over very carefully.

Here are my conditions: If I send you the $25, I will give you a year to repay it. I will give you six months after your graduation to get settled in a job. Then, you will start repaying the money in installments: you will send me $5 on January 15, 1950, and $4 on the 15th of every month after that; the last installment will be on June 15, 1950--and that will repay the total.

Are you willing to do it?

Here is what I want you to think over: Once you get a job, there will always be many things you need and on which you might prefer to spend your money, rather than repay a debt. I want you to decide now, in advance, as an honest and responsible person, whether you will be willing and able to repay this money, no matter what happens, as an obligation above and ahead of any other expense.

I want you to understand right now that I will not accept any excuse--except a serious illness. If you become ill, then I will give you an extension of time--but for no other reason. If, when the debt becomes due, you tell me that you can't pay me because you needed a new pair of shoes or a new coat or you gave the money to somebody in the family who needed it more than I do--then I will consider you an embezzler. No, I won't send a policeman after you, but I will write you off as a rotten person and I will never speak or write to you again.

Now I will tell you why I am so serious and severe about this. I despise irresponsible people. I don't want to deal with them or help them in any way. An irresponsible person is a person who makes vague promises, then breaks his word, blames it on circumstances and expects other people to forgive it. A responsible person does not make a promise without thinking of all the consequences and being prepared to meet them.

You want $25 for the purpose of buying a dress; you tell me that you will get a job and be able to repay me. That's fine and I am willing to help you, if that is exactly what you mean. But if what you mean is: give me the money now and I will repay it if I don't change my mind about it--then the deal is off. If I keep my part of the deal, you must keep yours, just exactly as agreed, no matter what happens.

I was very badly disappointed in Mimi and Marna [Docky]. When I first met Mimi, she asked me to give her money for the purpose of taking an art course. I gave her the money, but she did not take the art course. I supported Marna for a year--for the purpose of helping her to finish high school. She did not finish high school. I will take a chance on you, because I do not want to blame you for the actions of your sisters. But I want you to show me that you are a better kind of person.

I will tell you the reasons for the conditions I make: I think that the person who asks and expects other people to give him money, instead of earning it, is the most rotten person on earth. I would like to teach you, if I can, very early in life, the idea of a self-respecting, self-supporting, responsible, capitalistic person. If you borrow money and repay it, it is the best training in responsibility that you can ever have.

I want you to drop--if you have it in your mind--the idea that you are entitled to take money or support from me, just because we happen to be relatives. I want you to understand very clearly, right now, when you are young, that no honest person believes that he is obliged to support his relatives. I don't believe it and will not do it. I cannot like you or want to help you without reason, just because you need the help. That is not a good reason. But you can earn my liking, my interest and my help by showing me that you are a good person.

Now think this over and let me know whether you want to borrow the money on my conditions and whether you give me your word of honor to observe the conditions. If you do, I will send you the money. If you don't understand me, if you think that I am a hard, cruel, rich old woman and you don't approve of my ideas--well, you don't have to approve, but then you must not ask me for help.

I will wait to hear from you, and if I find out that you are my kind of person, then I hope that this will be the beginning of a real friendship between us, which would please me very much.

Your aunt,

June 4, 1949

I must tell you that I was very impressed with the intelligent attitude of your letter. If you really understood, all by yourself, that my long letter to you was a sign of real interest on my part, much more so than if I had sent you a check with some hypocritical gush note, and if you understood that my letter was intended to treat you as an equal--then you have the kind of mind that can achieve anything you choose to achieve in life. Just stick to that kind of thinking and you will be surprised how far it will take you. Don't let anybody discourage you or tell you that intelligence doesn't pay or that success in life has to be achieved through dishonesty or through sheer blind luck. That is not true. Real success is never accidental and real happiness cannot be found except by the honest use of your intelligence.

When you have the time, let me know something about yourself and your future plans. This is not an obligation; you don't have to do it, but if you feel like it, I would like to know more about you. Mimi told me that at one time you wanted to be a writer. Is that still your interest? If so, we have a great interest in common.

I don't know whether you remember me at all, but I remember you as a perfectly adorable kid who sat on my lap and criticized my shoes and haircut. Let me see what you have turned out to be.

Frank and I will come to New York in July for the opening of the movie of The Fountainhead. We don't know our exact plans as yet, but we may be able to drive East instead of coming by train. If we do, we will stop in Cleveland and then will have a chance to meet.

Your aunt,

Ellen

Ellen...WOW, I know now me and "Ayn" would not have gotten along! Did Uncle Frank have any say so in his family affairs? What she put Connie through over $25 is ridiculous, especially for someone with that much money. Did she repay back her mother when she sent her to America? Did she repay back her Chicago relatives for putting her up...hell, she couldn't even give them a coat she had promised. I hope Connie told her what she could have done with her money! Didn't "Ayn" think Aunt Agnes raised her children right...she was a great mother. "Ayn" had a lot of good breaks in life to get her to where she was. As far as Marna and school, it was "Ayn" that got the time wrong. I'm sure Marna paid hell for that to. Shes lucky I wasn't born yet. ~Cathy~ The letter to Mimi about assuming financial responsibility for her nieces...wasn't it after that letter she sent Mimi money for Christmas dinner? What was her deal...don't ask to borrow money when you need it without hearing a big lecture, but she will give it freely when she wanted to...which I'm sure wasn't often. Or maybe she felt guilty. she shouldn't have said we are unable to. she should have said "I" don't want to because we all know she was able, just not willing.

[Ellen Stuttle]

About Ayn's parents' deaths, here's the passage in Heller's bio. I'll include the description of Ayn's giving refuge for some time to Marie von Strachow.

I'll add a couple extra paragraph breaks for easier reading.

The death date for Anna, Ayn's mother, is given as a year later than was said in the Letters book.

[...] in the middle 1940s [she] provided sanctuary to at least two European refugees fleeing postwar Soviet occupation of Central Europe. The first was a woman who, Ashby recalled, developed a paranoid fixation on him and eventually was evicted. The second was Marie von Strachow, Rand's long-lost former English tutor from St. Petersburg. Von Strachow had been a close friend of Rand's mother and, in 1925, had helped to prepare the young émigré for life in the United States. She seems to have fled Russia before the onset of the Stalin Terror. In early 1946, she managed to locate Rand through the American delegation to the Intergovernmental Committee on Refuges in Austria, where she was living as a displaced person.

She wrote to tell her former pupil of the elder Rosenbaums' deaths. Zinovy had succumbed to heart disease in 1939, she reported. Anna had perished from cancer during the siege of Leningrad, in November 1941. Rand later learned that her sister Natasha and her childhood friend and cousin Nina Guzarchik also had died, Natasha during a Nazi air raid and Nina on a ship in the Caspian Sea that was bombed. A year or two later, she discovered that Nina's sister Vera was alive and had made her way from Berlin, where Rand had last seen her in 1926, to Paris to take a medical position at the Pasteur Institute. Vera had married and given birth to a daughter, Lisette, then moved to Lyon. Rand sent Vera's family packages of food and clothing. No one knew what had happened to Rand's lively and much beloved youngest sister, Nora.

Rand's reaction to the shock of her parents' death was muted, but she declared herself anxious to bring her mother's former friend to safety in the United States. [Heller gives no source for the description of Rand's reaction as "muted."] Evidently, as a person carrying a Russian passport, von Strachow was in danger of being extradited to the Russian zone in Austria and from there to the Soviet Union. It took two and a half years of legal maneuvering for Rand to gain permission for "Missis," as she called her former teacher, to travel to the United States, but in late 1948 von Strachow arrived in California and moved into the Neutra house.

She lived there for six or nine months, June Kurisu [who did some secretarial work for Rand] recalled, until the women's political disagreements created friction. Although Missis tried to be agreeable and avoid arguments, she "wasn't a quiet lady," Kurisu said appreciatively. "She would speak up at the dinner table. She would say just what she thought." This made for an intolerable strain on Rand as she was working on a difficult and important section of Atlas Shrugged [the Reardens' wedding-anniversary party scene]. Eventually, the writer arranged for von Strachow to live elsewhere in California and saw the woman no more.

Ellen

[Ellen Stuttle]

[...] someone with that much money.

How much money was that? The letter was from 1949.

Ellen

[Cathy]

About Ayn's parents' deaths, here's the passage in Heller's bio. I'll include the description of Ayn's giving refuge for some time to Marie von Strachow.

I'll add a couple extra paragraph breaks for easier reading.

The death date for Anna, Ayn's mother, is given as a year later than was said in the Letters book.

[...] in the middle 1940s [she] provided sanctuary to at least two European refugees fleeing postwar Soviet occupation of Central Europe. The first was a woman who, Ashby recalled, developed a paranoid fixation on him and eventually was evicted. The second was Marie von Strachow, Rand's long-lost former English tutor from St. Petersburg. Von Strachow had been a close friend of Rand's mother and, in 1925, had helped to prepare the young émigré for life in the United States. She seems to have fled Russia before the onset of the Stalin Terror. In early 1946, she managed to locate Rand through the American delegation to the Intergovernmental Committee on Refuges in Austria, where she was living as a displaced person.

She wrote to tell her former pupil of the elder Rosenbaums' deaths. Zinovy had succumbed to heart disease in 1939, she reported. Anna had perished from cancer during the siege of Leningrad, in November 1941. Rand later learned that her sister Natasha and her childhood friend and cousin Nina Guzarchik also had died, Natasha during a Nazi air raid and Nina on a ship in the Caspian Sea that was bombed. A year or two later, she discovered that Nina's sister Vera was alive and had made her way from Berlin, where Rand had last seen her in 1926, to Paris to take a medical position at the Pasteur Institute. Vera had married and given birth to a daughter, Lisette, then moved to Lyon. Rand sent Vera's family packages of food and clothing. No one knew what had happened to Rand's lively and much beloved youngest sister, Nora.

Rand's reaction to the shock of her parents' death was muted, but she declared herself anxious to bring her mother's former friend to safety in the United States. [Heller gives no source for the description of Rand's reaction as "muted."] Evidently, as a person carrying a Russian passport, von Strachow was in danger of being extradited to the Russian zone in Austria and from there to the Soviet Union. It took two and a half years of legal maneuvering for Rand to gain permission for "Missis," as she called her former teacher, to travel to the United States, but in late 1948 von Strachow arrived in California and moved into the Neutra house.

She lived there for six or nine months, June Kurisu [who did some secretarial work for Rand] recalled, until the women's political disagreements created friction. Although Missis tried to be agreeable and avoid arguments, she "wasn't a quiet lady," Kurisu said appreciatively. "She would speak up at the dinner table. She would say just what she thought." This made for an intolerable strain on Rand as she was working on a difficult and important section of Atlas Shrugged [the Reardens' wedding-anniversary party scene]. Eventually, the writer arranged for von Strachow to live elsewhere in California and saw the woman no more.

Ellen

It looks like she was pretty generous to her people. It looks like she didn't keep friends...Barbra and Uncle Frank must have been saints. Am I missing something? ~Cathy~

[Cathy]

[...] someone with that much money.

How much money was that? The letter was from 1949.

Ellen

Your right...I didn't realize that...Ill give her a break...this time ~Cathy~

[Cathy]

Cathy,

What good does it do a person to visit his or her grave? The person isn't there.

I think, btw, it isn't sure if there are graves.

And for Ayn to have gone to Russia..... Not a safe place.

Ellen

I see...maybe I'm being to hard on her. ~Cathy~

[ginny]

Cathy, sorry you are angry at Ayn. Actually, when I read the letters, I was in a state of shock just how generous she could be. I hadn't expected that. The $25.00 bit is ridiculous, but that was her. Taking money from her relatives then lecturing the poor girl about how to live her life was typial Ayn. There's a funny (to me) scene in Atlas Shrugged when the hero and heroine need a car. One of their millionaire friends offers them a rental car for 25 cents in gold/. The heroine is appalled. You're going to charge 25 cents? Then she gets a little lecture about nothing being free.

I could be wrong, but her Russian background might play into this. When you live in poverty after losing all, the way Ayn did,every dollar becomes something precious. My mother lived through the war in Germany. When we got here, she would squeeze a buffalo nicket until it howled. Giving away anything didn't happen. Ayn might have some of that same mindset. So, sending $25.00 might have been a big deal. But, at least she did.

To tell the truth, she could be nicer than I ever gave her credit for. Thanks for the letters, Ellen.

[Cathy]

Cathy, sorry you are angry at Ayn. Actually, when I read the letters, I was in a state of shock just how generous she could be. I hadn't expected that. The $25.00 bit is ridiculous, but that was her. Taking money from her relatives then lecturing the poor girl about how to live her life was typial Ayn. There's a funny (to me) scene in Atlas Shrugged when the hero and heroine need a car. One of their millionaire friends offers them a rental car for 25 cents in gold/. The heroine is appalled. You're going to charge 25 cents? Then she gets a little lecture about nothing being free.

I could be wrong, but her Russian background might play into this. When you live in poverty after losing all, the way Ayn did,every dollar becomes something precious. My mother lived through the war in Germany. When we got here, she would squeeze a buffalo nicket until it howled. Giving away anything didn't happen. Ayn might have some of that same mindset. So, sending $25.00 might have been a big deal. But, at least she did.

To tell the truth, she could be nicer than I ever gave her credit for. Thanks for the letters, Ellen.

Ginny, I just thought about poor Aunt Agnes...Connie would have been eighteen. Her dad had died and seventeen months after her mother's marriage to her step father, he died. I didn't realize in 46 that Aunt Alice didn't have money. I just didn't think it was her place to give Connie a great big lecture on responsibility. If I was Aunt Agnes, I would have told my daughter to never asked that woman again for one red cent. BTW, she did loan her the money? Did Connie pay it back on time? Did Uncle Frank ever write to the family? ~Cathy~