Let me introduce you to some folks I hope you’ll want to get to know better.

This is my grandfather, Sidney Sanderson.

This is the portrait he had taken of himself sometime in the 1950’s or 60’s, which was kind of a funny thing for him to do. According to my Mom, it wasn’t taken for any occasion or for publication. He just went down to a local photography studio and had it taken and printed. An 8”x10” version of this portrait sat framed on a dresser in our guest room when I was growing up, and another framed print showed up in the boxes from my grandparent’s house. Clearly he must have been pleased with the results. I always thought Sidney looked pretty intimidating in that picture. Although it wasn’t quite how he looked when I was growing up, he was much grayer and not quite as sharply dressed by then, I do agree with him that it was a good likeness. Sidney was serious, he was precise, and he was a little intimidating. But I have also always seen a little hint of a smile hidden under the serious demeanor in this photo. And that was totally true of my Grandpa.

The Sidney Sanderson I knew was a retired college professor, who continued to be well read and well traveled into his 90’s. He was independent but very involved in his community. He was careful with money, a meticulous record keeper, and couldn’t let a free envelope go unused.

But my Grandpa was also much more fun than that. My Grandpa taught me how to play blackjack.  (He enjoyed the occasional trip to Atlantic City with the folks from the Senior Center, but always kept one pocket for betting money and one for winnings, and never confused the two.) My Grandpa would let me climb into bed with him and play with his transistor radio in the morning. My Grandpa carried on serious conversations with our cat. My Grandpa always sneezed three times when he was eating Planters Peanuts, and was ok with the fact that we always laughed when it happened.

I spent quite a bit of time with Grandpa growing up. After my Grandma died when I was 4, he came up to Massachusetts more than we drove down to New Jersey. And when we travelled, he was my roommate (and paid my way). He was always with us for all the holidays since my mother was an only child. As a result, I sat at a lot of dinner tables with my Grandpa and I listened to a lot of conversations. It is interesting, though, as I think about all that talk, I realize those conversations were almost always about the present or future. There wasn’t much “good old days” reminiscing. It wasn’t like the past was avoided, it certainly came up, but my Grandfather lived firmly in the present. He talked with my parents about politics, and books, and meetings, and friends, and work. Occasionally  the past did creep in, and sometimes in uncomfortable ways. I remember him embarrassing a younger me with language that I knew wasn’t ok anymore – no Grandpa, you can’t call Japanese people Japs in 1982 – the War ended a long time ago.  I had little context for those comments at age 12, but since no one else I knew spoke like this, it was a strong reminder that my Grandpa was really old,

So the Sidney Sanderson I knew was the 80 and 90 year-old version of a man who had lived a really long life. That’s why my archive is so incredible. The  journals and letters and scrap books provide an amazing opportunity to get to know the 10, 20, 40 year-old versions of this man. And how lucky am I to find that he wrote much like he talked at the kitchen table. I get to listen with fresh ears to how he saw his life as he lived it – the news of the day, the routine of his life, and his opinions on the world around him. I may read through the lens of history and bring a 21^st century sensibility to the letters, but his voice is straight from the 20^th century – although the story starts in the 19^th century.

Sidney Sanderson was born in 1893.

One way to meet new people is to listen more carefully to the people you see every day. ~Robert Brault