A collection of letters written by the family and friends of J. Evan Merrell while he was a missionary serving in Chicago, Illinois in the late 1940s. The letters reveal the lives of his family members living in the agricultural hamlets of Malta, Idaho and Duncan, Arizona. Writers complain of starting a letter but not finishing it the same day or even the same week. Evan's sisters in Idaho describe attending church suppers, drilling wells and joining others in the community on rabbit drives. Family members in Arizona report on how the crops are doing, whether the Gila River is flooding that year and how the local high school basketball team is doing. The young children described in the letters are now grandparents and great grandparents themselves. Their parents have left us the gift of rich, first-person insights about themselves and the world they created.