Archives Digital Exhibits
Helen Carroll Gannon's 1920s Mirror Letter
On an unidentified date in the late 1920s - some time "before our busy springtime recitals" - Averett music teacher Helen Carroll Gannon (above left) created one of the most inherently delightful items to be found anywhere in the Archives and Special Collections of Averett University. In attempting to cheer the spirits of her flu-stricken fellow, Ruth Barnhill (above right), she decided to write a 'get well' letter backwards.
Quietly acknowledging the peculiarity of what she had created - and indicating that this was a unique bit of correspondence, not a common game the two would play - Gannon included instructions on the envelope: "If you cannot read this, hold it before a mirror."
A rare bit of personal correspondence hiding among our professional records, the letter provides a fleeting and unique glimpse into faculty lives nearly a century ago. The fond friendship in the letter is clear in the use of nicknames ("Bjarne" instead or 'Ruth' or 'Ms. Barnhill'), the casual reference to an acquaintance named Buck, a closing poetic phrase of companionship ("your 'old-maid' partner in 'chords and dischords'"), and a signature which is only initials ("H.C.G."). Beyond those details, the very action itself indicates a playful and affectionate relationship between the two far in excess of anything we might surmise from yearbooks or other extant information.
Gannon and Barnhill were piano teachers together at Averett College from at least spring 1927 to spring 1929. Barnhill was here only briefly; 1927-1929 may cover nearly her entire career at Averett. No information has been retained as to why she left or where she went. Gannon - who would go on to write the college Song "Averett Spirit" - was with the school quite a bit longer: 1916-1936. After her marriage to Hugh J. Keeling in 1936, she left Averett to start a new life with her husband. Tragically, she died only three years later in 1939. She is buried in Mountain View Cemetery in Danville.
Read the full text of the mirror letter in this inverted image:
