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Pen friendship lasts 80 years

Posted on July 31, 2008, 1:01pm

When Boneham Cottage Homes resident Grace MacKenzie heard a woman talking on the “wireless” about a pen friend she had kept for 60 years, her mind drifted into her past.

About 80 years have passed since Grace struck up a pen-friendship with a young man named Tom Brandon.

Grace MacKenzieGrace, 94, said there was not much entertainment for a young lady growing up in Rocky Camp, although she enjoyed gardening, dancing and stamp collecting.

When she saw an advertisement for a pen friend in The South Eastern Times from a young man who also liked stamp collecting, she answered his note.

“We talked about all sorts of things — our families, work and social life,” she said.

“Tom was a farmer who lived in Wilmington, 300km north of Adelaide.

“He’d tell me what the weather was like. One year the drought was so bad they never even got the crops in.”

Tom also told Grace he played the piano accordion at local dances and was a lay preacher at his Methodist church.

She said her parents encouraged the friendship, as the young peoples’ social scene was limited around these parts and it was something she enjoyed.

“It was a new experience because in those days we just stayed around home, sometimes helping out around the neighbourhood, but living a relatively sheltered life,” she said.

“Having a pen friend was a way to broaden my understanding and knowledge of other people and things.”

They met several times and were invited to each others’ weddings, keeping their friendship alive through adulthood.

Although she kept the letters for many years, Grace said they were “long gone to Planet Ark”.

Grace said other relationships had developed when she introduced Tom — who had turned his attention from stamp collecting to acquiring bird eggs — to her friends here, Allan and Jessie Ey who had the same hobby.

Tom, 96, now resides in Booleroo Centre at Mount View Homes near Wilmington and although their correspondence is limited to a Christmas card these days, their friendship has stayed strong.

ELLIE TURNER

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