Over the last 75 years, the friendship between Masonic Village at Elizabethtown resident Nancy Wenrich and her childhood pen pal, Iola Snow (shown above, l-r), has grown and evolved along with the method of communications they use to remain close despite the hundreds of miles that separate them.
They don’t remember exactly what year they started writing, but they do know they chose one another from a list of pen pals offered through their church’s newsletters because they both had birthdays in October. Iola had 13 pen pals at one point, but when her father complained about the cost of stamps ($0.03 at the time), she reduced her pals to just Nancy.
“It intrigued me that I could write to someone across the country,” Iola said. “Nancy’s letters were the most interesting.”
At the time, Nancy lived in Pennsylvania and Iola in Iowa. They started their early letters by asking each other how they were doing and other pleasantries, until they were eventually sending multiple letters at once, numbering the envelopes so they knew the order in which to read them.
“We literally grew up learning about each other through writing,” Nancy said. “When a letter from Iola arrived, everything else stopped.”
While unfortunately, they don’t have many of the original letters they exchanged, Nancy and Iola don’t need them to recall the highlights of their relationship.
“She lived in the city, and I lived in the country,” Iola said. “We asked about each other’s lives. The letters became our diaries. We knew more about each other than anyone else.”
Nancy grew concerned when she didn’t hear from Iola for more than a year. She later learned Iola’s father had been killed in an accident on their family farm, and her family had moved to Missouri.
They continued writing through junior and senior high school. In the early years, telephone calls were not an option since long distance calls were too costly. Their handwritten letters evolved into typed letters and then tape recordings, followed by email. Now, they mostly correspond by telephone.
Iola married a man named Alden; Nancy a man named Allen. They finally met in person over Labor Day weekend in 1961, a few weeks after Nancy’s wedding. Alden actually met Nancy first when he came a week early to the wedding (he had the wrong date).
Allen and Alden hit it off immediately, and Nancy and Iola have been inseparable ever since. Iola and Alden even named Nancy and Allen as godparents of their only son, Jason.
Once they met in person, they learned they had even more in common, like that neither one sleeps with a pillow.
“We’re so much alike,” Iola said, “and our husbands, too. We really get along. The Wenrich family would welcome us to Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner.”
Nancy, Robbie and Iola
Now 87, Nancy moved to Masonic Village in 2008. Iola, now 86, lives 25 miles south of Atlanta, having also lived in Virginia, Missouri and California. For about 15 years, Nancy would fly down to Atlanta once a year, and she and Iola would drive to Florida “Thelma and Louise style,” according to Nancy, to visit another friend of Nancy’s, Robbie Hoffman, who was living in Florida at the time. Robbie, now also a resident of Masonic Village, met Nancy more than 50 years ago through work, and they were co-workers until retirement.
Robbie quickly became close with Iola, too. Robbie would sit on the curb outside her home in Florida waiting for them to arrive.
“The distance doesn’t matter,” Robbie said. “When we get together, it’s like we were never apart.”
The three recently gathered to celebrate Robbie’s 80th birthday at Masonic Village. They also toured Amish country and enjoyed a July 4th picnic.
“Our friendship has meant so much,” Nancy said. “Iola is just a special person in my life. There are so many stories I have from the 63 years of actually knowing her. A lot has happened. We’ve grown up together, lost both our husbands and so much more.”
“She’s more like a sister than a pen pal,” Iola said.
