CMP Review 2026-04-21

April 21, 2026

Antique writing desk scene with a black fountain pen, ink bottle, and a metal medallion on a chain beside a handwritten page.

The Library of Congress in Washington, DC is not like a normal library. One cannot simply walk in off the street and browse the shelves. Even if one obtains a reader card (which I have), one cannot wander among the stacks of books. One must request specific volumes to be delivered to the reader room. And so I request a small subset of the vast inventory of almost 100 years of Parents’ Review and PNEU Journal issues.

I pick years that I think will be interesting. I don’t always know exactly what I’m looking for. In the quiet of the Jefferson Reading Room I browse the pages. I look at the table of contents, the authors’ names, the article titles.

But then I do know what I’m looking for. I’m looking for things by Charlotte Mason herself that have not appeared anywhere else. Writings by her that will give us just a bit more insight into her thinking and her philosophy.

This past summer I opened the 1917 volume. It wasn’t long before I found what I was looking for. A letter from Charlotte Mason to The Times. And then another. And then another.

Charlotte Mason wrote to The Times because she had something she wanted to say to all of England. Actually I think she wanted to say it to us too. That’s why we’ve transcribed it and recorded it. The first letter is available today. Find a message from Miss Mason that you’ve never heard before here.

@artmiddlekauff