This collection includes extensive incoming letters and typescripts to school-aged Mary Joe in Cedartown, Georgia, from family and friends in Rome, Georgia, Huntsville, Marion, and Tuskeegee, Alabama, and many other places, concerning domestic and school news and activities. A few of the 1877 letters are from sisters Lucy and Sallie in Cedartown to Mary Joe after her marriage. The collection also contains a small amount of information on: Rebecca Jane Day Whitely, early Columbus, Georgia, settler; Thomas J. H. Pickett, Sumter Counry, Georgia; and Edward, an unidentified Civil War soldier. Some Downer family genealogical information was transferred to the family file in the Georgia Archives Search Room Library.