Secrets of the Trunk

There’s an old trunk in our basement that I inherited from my parents. It was built in the 1920’s by Becker’s Leather Goods and measures 3’ X 2’ X 2’ high. It’s reinforced with wooden slats and metal bands and has thick brass pieces to protect each corner. The two clasps and large lock on the front are also made of heavy brass.

Last winter I went downstairs to look for an old photograph in the trunk. When I opened it, a loose paper fell out on the floor. I leaned over to pick it up and noticed for the first time, “A.E. Mathews” stenciled in small letters on the end of the trunk.

I know of no Mathews, A. E. or otherwise, on our family tree, so I wonder who he was – perhaps one Arthur Everett Matthews, a small, thin man who parted his hair in the middle and wore rimless glasses above a thin nose and thick mustache. His family owned a shoe factory in Scranton where it shod most of the residents (“Mathews on your feet puts a spring in your step”).

After surprising his parents by both getting into Princeton and getting out with a diploma, they sent him to Europe for the summer – but not alone. He accompanied his recently widowed Aunt Esther, whose husband, Ed, had been vice president of Mathews Shoes until his heart attack in January, when he’d collapsed while describing a new model shoe, thus making its last his last too.

So Arthur and aunt and trunk crossed the Atlantic on the SS Montpelier from New York in June of 1928. After spending a weekend in London disliking the food, the weather, and the people, they headed to Paris, where they had a joyous time for the next eight weeks. Mostly they were together, but one night, while Aunt Esther was occupied by a French politician, who spoke impeccable English and had a wife on the side, young Arthur sneaked off to the Folies Begere where he met a jolie Folie, who was so overcome by the size of his wallet that she let him stay the night for twice her usual rate. On top of that, she gave him a surprise gift that showed up three weeks later. Luckily, old Doc Oblinger knew a thing or two, and, after a number of penicillin doses (for my “sinuses”, he told his mother), Artie was finally able to go to work and replace his uncle in the family business.

            By the time my parents bought the trunk at the St. James Church rummage sale, Arthur had long since drifted into senility with only vague memories and occasional spasms to remind him of his folie folly.

            After discovering who the trunk’s original owner was, I took a look through its contents. Under three rows of family albums there was a brown envelope with my name on it in my father’s handwriting. Inside I was surprised to find all of my high school and college report cards. Eagerly, I pulled out the ones from high school so I could prove to my teen age children how well I had  – WAIT A MINUTE! What happened to my A’s? Where did all of those B’s come from? Had someone changed them? That thought was too ludicrous to entertain for more than an instant, which meant only one thing…

            The grade inflation so often criticized in recent years hadn’t happened to me during college, but afterwards…and only in my own mind.

            Despondent, I put the report cards in the envelope and went upstairs and threw them in the fire. No sense shattering my children’s image of their brilliant father.

R.I.P., A’s….. R.I.P., A. E. Mathews.