Hazel Nevis writes her son Arnold from Santa Barbara, where her husband is being treated at the Sansum Clinic for diabetes.
Arnold is working in Whitehorse, California, in a lumber camp to earn some extra money for his studies at Harvard Medical School. He has long expressed a desire to become a medical missionary (presumably in the Presbyterian Church, the family religion on Hazel's side), but in this letter there is a hint that he might be rethinking his plans. Hazel and Arnold shared a strong religious bent (along with Arnold's sisters/Hazel's daughters Dolly and Laura). Older brother Leonard was far less religious, perhaps even an atheist or at best an agnostic. Hazel's husband Bill grew up Roman Catholic but married outside that church when he wed Protestant Hazel, so he was denied mass at Catholic services through much of his life. Near the end of his life, Hazel converted to Catholicism so that Bill could have mass said at his funeral. She did not mind the conversion, and in fact enjoyed the religious conversations with the priests during that process; and as a grandmother she no longer minded signing the document in which she promises to raise her children in the Catholic faith.
(Hazel's pagination is off for the last three pages.)
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