Teheran. Persia June 22nd, 1917

My Dear Mrs Platt;

It is with a feeling of almost helplessness that I begin to write a letter for you. Mrs Beede & Miss Holmes first & I hope I will be able to write things that you can spread the letter among other of your friends. You see busy people always have a great deal to tell & never time to tell it in.

The one important thing first is I am enclosing a program of the commencement given last Monday morning. In spite of the great troubles & disagreements [“the” scribbled out] a wonderfully beautiful commencement-such as has never before been seen in this country. There are six classes in the school & each year the Board of Education gives a diploma to those who pass their examination. There were 17 of them. The largest number of any school & the only one in which no girl was refused a diploma. The exercises were held in [page 2, right side of image 17] a garden adjoining the one in which the school has been the last year & the verandeh [sic] which extended across the house at one end of the garden served as a stage, it had been beautifully decorated with festoons of English ivy & six white pillars were sparsely covered with ivy & a very large rope of it lying flat on the front edge. The picture of the King surrounded by a large heavy wreath of it hung in the center. Miss K. put the decorations into my hands while she took care of the lovely program. you would be amazed to know how little the Persians know about what we call decorations. Their only idea is to hang up rugs on the walls, also to see how difficult it is to teach there. I assembled the girls of last year & some of this years graduates to help me make long ropes of ivy such as we used to do long ago when we decorated the country church for Christmas, then some of the young men helped put them in place [illegible] years ago we used ivy for the same purpose & now all the schools do it. We had a tent covering a space seating 300 people, many important people were in the audience (all women) [page 3, left side of image 17]

A number of girls stood at the side entrance gate singing a Persian song while the little bits of girls headed by Miss K. & another tall girl came in each carrying a large Persian flag. They went down to the middle of the garden, came up the center. The baby class first, then the 2nd. They carried a large rope of ivy & when they reached the centre of the steps I met them on one side, Mrs Draeger on the other, & took their 4 ropes & hung them in festoons in front of the stage. The 2nd class was followed by the 3rd class, each girl carrying a flag & each class including the 6th. The 3rd class flags were small, the 4th larger [illegible] when you see the one we hope to send you, you will be able to imagine how pretty they looked when they reached the stage[.] The teachers collected the flags & put them on the ivy pillars. until now the girls did not even know the colors of the flag. Miss K had a man write a poem in Persian to the flag which was sung by the whole school. all the graduates were dressed in white while all the rest of the school had on simple muslin dresses [illegible] in color & all [page 4, left side of image 16] in some way displaying the Persian colors, green, red & white. at the end of the program one of the princesses who occupied one of the front seats called Miss K. down from the platform & took a beautiful gold ring with her own initials from her finger & put it on hers. She also wrote a little speech which was read by one of the teachers thanking the Americans in a very nice manner.

Everybody everywhere is praising Miss K. for her work & the head of another school has already been here to know how to make the flags. each one was made by hand by the little girl who carried it & she even drew the “Lion & the Sun” herself. Some of the sewing is very good & some very bad.

The name of the girl whom Dr Moody gave you is [space left blank]. it is never possible to get the exact day of birth of any one, & very seldom does a person know their own age. Some of them say they were born the year Nazir Ed din Shah was killed but cannot tell even if it was winter or summer. [page 5, right side of image 19] Last year we asked a man how old his son was & he said he was born the year his horse died. The horse was 14 yrs old & died the year before he bought another one. In the Mohammedan calendar the month is lunar & a certain day of a certain month comes 10 days earlier each year. They also observe the twice [illegible] sun enters a zodical sign. I am also enclosing a small bit of Persian writing which you may like to see[.] it is an invitation from Tajeh Sultanet to visit her. She is one of the daughters of Nazir Ed Din Shah, the King who so cruelly oppressed the Bahais, but is herself now a beautiful Bahai. in one of the tablets Abdul Baha sent her he told her she would “become like the mother of Christ.” every time I see her she renews her promise to write you a letter but Persian like puts it off. she gave me two pieces of crocheted lace to be sent to you to be sold & the money given to the Mashrak El Azcar. you will wonder what it is for but it is intended to be put on the two opposite sides of a pillow. We enjoy all the magazines you [page 6, left side of image 18] send more than I can tell you and pass them around to other people to read.

We seem to be well started in summer[.] The sun is very hot, but our house is very comfortable & the spring just over was indeed a lovely one except for the lack of rain, following a winter which was a long spring with no snow & very little rain the scarcity of water is felt very much but it would pay any one to have seen our garden, we had a great abundance of roses & the loveliest of Marechal Neil roses with quantities of La France, for about 6 weeks we will have great heat, after that the weather will be very nice, we hope to be able to get up into the mountains for most of the time.

Miss K. is just now busy trying to repair some of her clothes but tells me to say she will soon write Miss Holmes a long letter & thank her for the pkge of [“]star of the west “ which came safely.

We are looking hourly for news of [page 7, right side of image 18] the arrival of Mirza Assadullah who was with Abdul Baha in America.

We know you are right in regard to Mrs Caldwell, she does not admit the possibility of a human being being a manifestation of God. The missionaries do not like her intimacy with us & instructed her not to invite us there at the same time with them. We are very glad but we do not spend much time with social affairs anyway, with the exception of Mrs Caldwell & two or three other ladies the class of people here among the foreigners are not the kind we like anyway - Mrs Draeger we see often & like her very much. she is very interested in you & one other American friends & we read her your letters.

Probably before this letter reaches you you will be in the mountains [page 8, left side of image 19] & perhaps have come back because some of our letters have been 4 months in coming from America here.

Give my best Bahai love to everybody &

Believe me, Yours sincerely, Sarah A. Clock.

18 Ave. Alladollah Teheran Persia.