On July 24, 1905, Matilda Dunbar made a 5-cent purchase of cabbage at a Dayton grocery store that was a short walk from the home she shared with her son Paul Laurence Dunbar.
N. T. Bish & Son
Dealers in Staple & Fancy Groceries
Meats, Vegetables, Etc.
1451 W. Third Street
Dayton, O.7-24 1905
Sold to M Dunbar
1 Cabbage 5
Statement from N. T. Bish & Son, July 24, 1905. Paul Laurence Dunbar Papers, Ohio History Connection (Microfilm edition, Roll 2).
There was only one item on her bill that day, but Matilda kept it, along with many more receipts from the fish market, liquor store, news vendor and phone company. These documents provide a glimpse into the life she led with Paul who, at the time, was in poor health and just months away from death. Another bill from the same year indicates a new bed was purchased from a Dayton furniture dealer.
Byrne & Palmer
Dealers in Furniture, Carpets, Stoves, Etc.
1 Iron bed 6.50
Mattress 3.50
Spring 3.50
Total Amount $13.50Name Mr. Paul L. Dunbar
Address 219 N. SummitStatement from Byrne & Palmer, June 7, 1905. Paul Laurence Dunbar Papers, Ohio History Connection (Microfilm edition, Roll 2).
Paul lived with his mother in a two-story house on Summit Street (now known as Paul Laurence Dunbar Street). His bedroom was on the second floor, but toward the end of his life he occupied a bed in the first floor parlor. He was in the bed in late 1905 when Lida Keck Wiggins (a writer from Springfield, Ohio) visited the Dunbar home. Not long afterward, Wiggins wrote Paul's first biography.
His bed had been brought downstairs, so that his mother could be near him as she performed her household duties, and as he lay there among the pillows one could see how weak he was, how wasted and how frail. But, as I entered the room, approached his bed and took his hand, his smile was just as bright and his words were just as brave as they had been in the earlier days of our acquaintance.
The Life and Works of Paul Laurence Dunbar, by Lida Keck Wiggins. J. L. Nichols & Company (Naperville, Illinois), 1907. Pages 126 - 127.
With less than two months to live, Paul wrote a gloomy letter to a friend who was a physician, describing his life spent mostly in bed.
Of course you must have known the reason that I have not answered your letter before this. I confess that I was not in a very cheerful mood and the mood has not yet come, but I must drop you a line to let you know just what a bit of good-for-nothingness I am. My life consists of going to bed at the beginning of the month and staying there, with very brief intervals of half an hour or so, until the beginning of the next month. This repeated over ad libitum and you have my total existence. Of course, there are some friends who come in, and some books that occasionally I get to read, but usually I am studying the pattern of the ceiling until I could make a very clever sketch of it from memory.
Paul Laurence Dunbar to Dr. F., December 15, 1905. "Unpublished Letters of Paul Laurence Dunbar to a Friend." The Crisis (New York, New York). June 1920. Page 74.