During the 1909-1910 season, the Choir undertook a concert tour to Buffalo and Cleveland. The over 200 choristers later expressed their great appreciation – in the most flowery terms – for the care and attention to detail taken by the Choir President Mr. G. H. Parkes (who was also a tenor in the Choir) on this tour. This presentation letter, illuminated by Edith Emily Shaw, was presented in February 1910.

Here’s one of the paragraphs from the letter:

“To make the journey to Buffalo and Cleveland a success musically it was necessary for the chorus to be relieved from the countless worries usually inseparable from the luxury of travel. It was necessary for some one to assume two hundred burdens. Some one had to care for the choristers, to transport them, to house them, to feed them and to deliver them in the halls of Buffalo and Cleveland, fresh in complexion, capable in mind, cheerful in spirit. This self-sacrificing task you carried out with consummate efficiency. Such tenderness as a mother would bestow upon her babe you lavished upon booming Bassses…”

And for trekkies, please note that the letter concludes with the words “live long and prosper.”

See the full letter (in all its glory) below.

#TMC125 #LoveLetter