As First Lady and after she and her husband returned to Northampton, Grace Coolidge had franking privileges. This meant she did not have to affix postage to her correspondence. She signed her name instead. Mrs. Coolidge was a prolific letter writer and many examples of her franked envelopes have survived her.
This envelope may have contained the “Round Robin” letters she sent from 1915 until the end of her life. The “Robins” were a group of Pi Beta Phi members who traveled to the 1915 Pi Beta Phi Convention in Berkeley, California. All but two of the Robins were members of the Massachusetts Alpha Chapter of Pi Beta Phi at Boston University. The two, Mrs. Coolidge and one of her college friends, were members of the Vermont Beta Chapter at the University of Vermont.
This envelope was addressed to Anna Robinson Nickerson, a friend she had met at the 1901 Syracuse Convention when they were Pi Beta Phi chapter delegates. The friendship lasted their entire lives. Mrs. Nickerson served as Pi Beta Phi’s Grand Vice President. She married David D. Nickerson in 1905, the same year as the Coolidges married in the parlor of the Goodhue home in Burlington. Mr. Nickerson was in publishing and worked for several companies in Boston, including Estes & Lauriat Co., and Dana Estes Co. before entering business for himself. The address on the envelope was that of the Nickerson’s summer home on the water in Quincy.
The postmark date is November 1937. The address, 112 Washington Avenue in Northampton, was that of Mrs. Coolidge’s good friend Florence Adams, with whom she lived while her home Road Forks was being built around the corner on Ward Road. After leaving the White House in 1929, the President and First Lady returned to the rented duplex on Massasoit Street. They needed a home with more privacy to keep away the gawkers. In May 1930, they purchased the Beeches, a secluded home on six acres. The President died in the home on January 5, 1933, two days after Mrs. Coolidge’s 54th birthday.
First Ladies were not provided Secret Service protection in those days, and Road Forks was built with this in mind. The living quarters were on the second floor. The first floor was reserved for parking, storage and a vault. There was a guest room, maid’s room and a sleeping porch on the third floor. The home was surrounded by trees. Mrs. Coolidge passed away in the home on July 8, 1957, four days after what would have been her husband’s 85th birthday and two hours from the 33rd anniversary of her son Calvin Jr’s death in 1924.
Grace Coolidge in her official First Lady portrait
