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4. Marriage Regina, like many young women in New York City, had a dating life that was complicated, diverse, and mysterious. She had more than one fiancé, a long distance relationship, a possible affair with a Jewish writer, and a secret lover—the author of a “Dear Reggie” letter who may have been the one she truly loved but her family disapproved of the liaison. Back at 580 St. Nicholas Avenue the trio invited their boyfriends to dinner . Regina knew how to set “the most wonderful table”—a skill she probably learned from her mother who also most likely painted the china that was used for the dinner. Regina spread a beautiful tablecloth, the “proper silver” and candles on the table. Regina knew how to make “the most delicious salads” but not all the courses that followed. According to Ethel Nance, Regina once ordered, “now Ethel you can fry the chicken.” Ethel replied, “fry the chicken, I don’t know how to fry chicken.” Regina said, “I have never fried chicken.” “Here we were in the kitchen,” Ethel recalled, “wondering what we were going to do about the main item on the menu. We got together and somehow or other we did what we thought should be done, but the horrors of that meal. We sat there afraid to try it ourselves and waiting for the guests to take the first bite.”1 In Nigger Heaven, Carl Van Vechten’s fictional Regina and Ethel have the following exchange: Mary suggests that she cook for her date. Olive declares, “Say, Mary, don’t scare the man away. You prepare your first meal for him after you’re married. It will be too late for him to leave you then.”2 The name of Regina’s boyfriend who was invited to the fried chicken dinner is unknown, but during this time she would visit another man in Marriage 49 another state and write letters that could be characterized as love letters to a third man. In 1924, Regina went to Normal, Illinois, on vacation to look after her ill mother. During this time, Regina wrote at least two letters to her friend, Joseph Freeman, suggesting a possible romance. In a handwritten undated letter composed on a Wednesday, Regina wished that Joseph was with her in Normal so that they could walk “under the elms” while the sun was setting and fireflies could light their way.3 In an another undated handwritten letter composed on a Tuesday, Regina wrote, “Hope some evening when I return you will come up when there is not a party, and talk with me about your books, your work, interests, Etc.”4 Regina ended the Wednesday letter by telling Freeman, “I return to Chicago from here and then to Cleveland, Ohio.” She would obviously visit her father in Chicago, but she does not mention her plans for Cleveland. An item in the Chicago Defender’s “The Buckeye State” section, Cleveland Society News (which Joseph most likely did not read), mentioned that a guest of honor, Miss Regina Anderson of New York, was visiting Mr. and Mrs. E. J. Lucas in Salem, Ohio. The item revealed that at a luncheon, “A. St. George Richardson , fiancé of Miss Anderson, of course was also a guest.”5 So Regina was engaged when she was writing letters to Joseph. Richardson would not become her husband. Bermuda-born Arthur St. George Richardson was a bank cashier and former educator—president of Wilberforce Institute in Chatham, Ontario. He was born in 1863 and came to the United States in 1887. He became president of Morris Brown College in Atlanta, Georgia, the following year and presided there until 1898. However, this would make Richardson sixty-one at the time of the engagement when Regina was twenty-three! A biographical sketch of the elder Richardson in the 1915 publication Who’s Who of the Colored Race indicated that he had two sons—one a namesake who was Regina’s fiancé.6 Decades later, Regina’s niece Lorelei speculated that Richardson was the love of her life; her parents disapproved of him because he was so dark, although pictures of his father do not reveal a dark-skinned man but a man with definite African American features. Perhaps her parents also disapproved of the West Indian background of his parents. There is an unusual inclusion of a letter in Regina’s papers from an unknown paramour. Either a second page is missing or the author did not...

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