sunset sky, glorious behind a black screen of naked trees; memories of hepaticas and snowdrops in early spring, of anemones and crow-foot violets; of a mist of new pale leaves on the elms and red buds on the maples; of lushness of green June, and waxen lilies on summer streams, a greenness and wetness unlike my land at home, unlike my California with its wide skies and open miles, its great mountains, its grays and tans, its far blues and wistful purples. It is blessed I am to know two homes.
Time in its passing brought me to college, not to the one which I had been destined from birth, Mt. Holyoke, but to Wellesley. The former had not then transformed itself from a female seminary into a woman’s college, so, since the value of a degree for women had become increasingly apparent, it was deemed wise for the girl going three thousand miles to school to go to the institution of the higher rank. Neither Berkeley nor Stanford University, though near home, had been considered. The State University was of necessity non-religious and hence somewhat suspect of the orthodox, and Stanford was new and untried—and besides—didn’t it derive its support from race horses and a winery? Moreover, New England parentage and tradition sent the children “home,” if possible, for their education.
With Mt. Holyoke eliminated, the choice lay between Smith and Wellesley, and fell upon the latter for the following reasons:
In the first place, Wellesley was reputed to be modeled on the beloved school of Mary Lyon, and to
