On November 10, 1904, someone in Los Angeles sent train tickets to Paul Laurence Dunbar and invited him to California. The handwritten letter is incomplete, and no signature exists.
After keeping you for so long in a state of uncertainty, I at last have the pleasure of enclosing you those passes we promised some time ago hoping you will make immediate use of them. I have striven to make them double but could not. I will explain the tardiness when I see you. You will observe one is from Chicago to Albuquerque and one from Albuquerque to Los Angeles and limited until December 31st, 1904, giving you sufficient time to make whatever preparation you will care to make before leaving the land of long and dreary winter. I know you are not the leastwise unused to traveling but I want you to be careful and if at any time you feel too thoroughly exhausted, you have but to ask for a stopover from the conductor and can rest for a day or so. Make yourself known to the Gentleman Porter you are traveling with and he will
Unknown to Paul Laurence Dunbar, November 10, 1904. Paul Laurence Dunbar Papers, Ohio History Connection (Microfilm edition, Roll 1).
Paul was 32, suffering from tuberculosis, and living in Dayton with his mother Matilda. For the sake of his health, Paul had previously traveled to the Catskill Mountains in New York, the Rocky Mountains in Colorado, and Jacksonville, Florida, but apparently never went to California. However, while on a speaking tour of Kansas and Missouri in 1903, Paul mentioned California in letters to Matilda and his estranged wife Alice.
Life is so gray and so brief dear
And it is so hard to live.
Why should we neighbor with grief, dear?
Better to love and forgive.
En route to California your long loved, long wanted lamb.
1214 E. 12th St. Kansas City, Mo.Paul Laurence Dunbar to Alice Moore Dunbar, February 2, 1903. Paul Laurence Dunbar Papers, Ohio History Connection (Microfilm edition, Roll 8).
I am not doing nearly so much reading but I am loafing and having a good quiet time. If I still think it worthwhile to go to California, I shall not be able to start before March and I shall stop in Denver anyway. It is very snowy here today but the weather has been delightful. I go out driving every day and am feeling pretty good for an invalid.
Paul Laurence Dunbar to Matilda Dunbar, February 16, 1903. Paul Laurence Dunbar Papers, Ohio History Connection (Microfilm edition, Roll 2).
Shortly before receiving the train tickets to California, Paul wrote about his health to a friend who was a physician.
I have indeed been very ill and am glad to be here at home where good nursing and good air ought to do me good, but I fear that I am not going to be allowed a chance to stay, as the doctors are crying California, California, even as before they cried Colorado.
Paul Laurence Dunbar to Dr. F., October 21, 1904. "Unpublished Letters of Paul Laurence Dunbar to a Friend." The Crisis (New York, New York). June 1920. Page 74 and 76.
Paul's friend Sallie Brown in New York City once sent Christmas gifts to Matilda, and asked her to forward Paul's present to California.
Dear Mrs. Dunbar, I suppose by now Paul has gone to California. If so, will you please send him this little case for clipping? With note and card.
My Dear Boy, Just a little remembrance at this Yuletide. I know you have so many clippings, but that case will not begin to hold all of the nice things that people delight to say about your work and self. As you did not send me word when you expected to leave for Cal, or where you would be located I did not know where to write you. I am sending this note to your mother so that she can forward.
Sarah "Sallie" Brown to Matilda and Paul Laurence Dunbar, no date. Paul Laurence Dunbar Papers, Ohio History Connection (Microfilm edition, Roll 1).