Florence Wolfson Howitt

A delightful biography/autobiography of the young Florence Wolfson (Howitt), resident of 1930s New York, as discovered in her found diary which spanned 5 years from her 14th to 19th birthday.

Journalist Lilly Koppel discovered the little red diary in a trunk which lay among many that had been put in a dumpster when the block owners where she lived were planning to re-purpose the basement storage space, and the tenants who no longer resided there's trunks were evicted.

Several years after finding the diary, and writing an article about it, Koppel hires a private detective to establish whether Florence is alive. At 92 she is alive and well, and Koppel takes the diary to be reunited with its author. Regular meetings ensue, and are recorded, and Florence fleshes out those brief daily entries of her teenage years. A young cultured woman comes alive to her aged self, and she agrees to the book being published.

Florence died aged 96 in 2012.

Thanks to Shelley for putting this on my radar.… (more)

I have always loved and been drawn to journals, diaries and memoirs. The romance and charm of even how Lily found this diary was delightful. But yes, the time capsule it opened up was fascinating. If it had been me, I would have arranged to have the entire steamer trunk (maybe ALL of them, out there on that sidewalk, waiting for the dumpster), brought home with me, and I would have spent months going through each and every item, savouring every moment of treasure. But maybe that's just me!

Florence was the very definition of a brainy, artsy free spirit while, at the same time, rebelling and chafing against family and the constraints of the day, the same as every teenage girl across time, I am sure. That she could sail across the ocean alone and traipse around an increasingly tempestuous and dangerous Europe in 1934, and stay safe, even in her innocence, was remarkable to me. For sure, those were different times.

But what fascinated me almost as much as the diary itself, was the end, the last chapter, which brought us to the present, where Lily engages the help of a private investigator to help her locate Florence. And the meeting of the two, the kindred spirits, and the instantaneous bond they developed - I expected nothing less. I also enjoyed the final section, *About the Author*, an interview with Lily herself. I wish she had written more and hope she does. I read her second book, The Astronauts Wives several years ago, before I ever heard of this one. But I enjoyed The Red Leather Diary so much more.… (more)