This collection is made up of correspondence related to Sibyl H. Spaulding of Foxvale, Massachusetts. Early items include a letter from Spaulding's grandmother and letters that Spaulding wrote to her mother, Clara Harrison Spaulding, about her social life in Auburndale, Massachusetts, and Brandon, Vermont, in the mid-1890s.
Spaulding later joined her mother in Foxvale, Massachusetts, where she received newsy letters from cousins and friends in Vermont and Massachusetts. F. W. Bigg ("Fud"), her fiancé and most frequent correspondent, wrote regularly from Brandon, Vermont, in 1897 and 1898. He shared social news, wrote of his love for her, and otherwise discussed his everyday life. In his final letter, written after the couple broke off their engagement, he requested that Spaulding destroy his previous correspondence with her. After 1898 Spaulding received letters from family members and friends in a New England and New York; some discussed religion and a mission based in Foxvale. In 1899, Clara Harrison Spaulding, Sibyl Spaulding's mother, received a group of letters from Thomas E. Grover, an attorney, about a legal dispute and the related financial settlement. A few letters enclose printed programs.
Sibyl H. Spaulding was born in Newton Centre, Massachusetts, on December 30, 1872, the daughter of Stillman C. Spaulding and Clara Harrison. She lived in Newton Centre and in Foxvale, Massachusetts. In the late 1890s, she was engaged to F. W. Bigg ("Fud") of Brandon, Vermont, but they broke off the engagement in the summer of 1898. Spaulding later lived in Bristol and Newton, Massachusetts, and she married Franklin Balch of Topsfield, Massachusetts, on July 11, 1925.
