11-year-old Emily Dickinson's roll-folded locked letter to her brother, USA (May 1, 1842)

Modeled after Emily Dickinson's holograph letter to W. Austin Dickinson, Amherst, MA, May 1, 1842. Houghton Library, Harvard University, b MS 1118.4 (54). Two edited letter editions, Johnson and Ward (1958) and Miller and Mitchell (2024), refer to this letter as 2, JW2, and MM2, respectively. Model located in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Libraries (MIT), Unlocking History Research Group archive, MC0760. We feature Emily Dickinson's desk in this video; the surface of her desk - where she wrote and locked many letters- we used to demonstrate her letterlocking techniques. Harvard University's Houghton Library displays Emily Dickinson's desk and other personal effects on the second floor of the Library.
When 11-year-old Emily Dickinson used letterlocking to send the letter she wrote to her brother, Austin, she chose a distinctive style we refer to as an independently roll-folded bifolium, or "rectangle inside" folding sequence. We see other well-known writers use similar variations, including Phillis Wheatley (See our video entitled, "Phillis Wheatley's rolled, tuck, and seal letter to Obour Tanner, England (1774)") and Jane Austen (See our video entitled, "Corrected folding sequence: Jane Austen's roll-folded locked letter to Cassandra, England, (1799)").
Emily's 37 lines of densely written text fill a page and a half of carefully formed cursive. She provided news from home, including updates on family members, friends, and animals.
To lock the letter, Emily roll-folded the first leaf of the bifolium twice from the fore-edge towards the center fold. She then folded both leaves of the bifolium together, folding the top and bottom edges toward each other onto a central panel, creating a gatefold. She then tri-panel folded the letter, creating two multi-layered flaps on either side of a central panel. One flap expanded to form a pocket, and the other was inserted into the pocket. She wet and placed two starch wafers between the top layer of the pocket and the closure panel. She impressed a seal-stamp with a distinctive checkered pattern designed to be used with wafers to secure the packet shut.
Leslie Morris explains, "This early letter of Emily to her brother is lively, full of descriptive detail, and captures the energy and joy she brought to her writing. The stereotype of the poet as a recluse shut away from the world is belied by her letters, both as a child and as an adult."
Produced and directed by Jana Dambrogio. Demonstrated by Jana Dambrogio and Leslie Morris. Thanks to Leslie Morris, Jennifer Pellecchia, the Houghton Library staff at Harvard University, Jenn Bervin, Deborah Mayer, Linda J. Evans, and Elissa at Squill's Finest Sealing Wafers. Funded by the Seaver Institute and Jana Dambrogio in support of our project, "Unlocking History."
Citation information: Authors: Jana Dambrogio, Leslie Morris, Jennifer Pellecchia, and the Unlocking History Research Group. Title: "11-year-old Emily Dickinson's roll-folded locked letter to her brother, USA (May 1, 1842)." Letterlocking Instructional Videos. Unlocking History number 6260/Letterlocking Unique Video number: 303. Date filmed: April 9, 2024. Duration: 3:19. Date posted: May 1, 2024. Video URL: [Insert URL]. Date accessed: [Date].
Copyright 2024. Jana Dambrogio and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). All rights reserved. The following copyrighted material is made available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) License: creativecommons.org/licenses/.... Contact the MIT Technology Licensing Office for any other licensing inquiries.
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[@metehancandr3204]

An 11 year old came up with that? What a bright little girl!!!!