21st – We are staying with our friend Fred now at the Mascot Hotel. He has got 2 mighty fine looking girls. We are going to work for the Gate City Sawmill soon.
Maybe those two girls did Jesse’s and John’s laundry as part of the hotel amenities? After ten days of travel and two days working in a logging camp, the Bench boys must have been out of clean clothes, and Sunday church is coming up soon.
Jesse is probably referring to Fred and Annie’s youngest daughter, Mae Ernst Wolf who is 18 years old in 1901. The other girl might be 25 year-old widow Ellen Peaterson who waited tables presumably at the hotel.
