Interesting and unique collection of letters and photos, all sent to the same recipient in response to an uncle’s request, on behalf of his young niece and nephew, to contribute predictions of the future. Letters, both ALSs and TLSs are signed by Ethel Kennedy, Daniel Patrick Moynahan, Joan Baez, Fulton Sheen, Alec Guinness, George Jesel, Pat O’Brien, Jack Lemmon, Dean Young, Ingmar Bergman, Linus Pauling, Lawrence O’Brien, Mickey Rooney, Howard Baker, John Cheever, Denton Cooley, Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, Julian Bond, Malcolm Forbes, Sir Aflred Ayer, Carlos Baker, Bert Lance, Bess Truman, Ann Miller, Rudy Vallee, Jimmy the Greek, Arthur Hailey, Robert Anderson, Art Buchwald, Nevill Mott, Michael DeBakey, and Cyrus Vance.
A sampling of the letters reads:
Bishop Fulton Sheen writes, “Her future will entirely depend upon how much she lives in her life in accordance with the Will of God and in response to the graces purchased for her soul by the sufferings and death of Christ.”
Alec Guinness writes: “I shall have taken leave of this world by the time you are twenty-one…no advice to give—advice has often seemed to me like a bunch of cast off clothes.”
Joan Baez: “I’m hoping people will do one thing in particular and that is to learn the absolute futility of violence.”
Rudy Vallee writes a short note under his afixed photo statting, “I wish I could offer you some sage counsel but life is moving anc changing so fast and with the constatnt threat of nuclear annihilation, I can only hope that fate will treat you kindly.”
Jimmy ‘The Greek’ Snyder simply states, “Never lose your head—It’s the best part of your body.”
Art Buchwald attempts to predict the industrial future: “I don’t know where you will be reading it—possibly on a space shuttle somewhere between the Moon and the Earth…I am not certain what kinds of jobs will be available in 1997. I suspect many of them will require nothing more than pushing a button, the right button. If you push the wrong button—oh, boy.”
Photos included in the collection include: Buckminster Fuller (photocopied photo), Pat O’Brien, Johnny Carson, Hal Holbrook, Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, Christian Barnard, Arthur Fiedler, Urho Kekkonen, Ann Miller, and James Doolittle. In fine condition. An eclectic collection with some remarklable insight to the future from all walks of life. RRAuction COA.
