Before there was Dear Abby, there was Dear Miss Libbey.

Laura Jean Libbey was a novelist and a syndicated advice columnist in the 1910s. Her columns are filled with interesting advice. For instance:

• “People who can be parted by a petty quarrel should never have loved at all.”
• “After all, kissing is mostly a habit—-and a bad one.”
• “If you cannot get the person you most want, it is better to take the person you can get than to live a lonely life.”
• On marrying for money. Commercial marriages, as Miss Libbey called them, were doomed. “Cupid has much to be blamed for,” she wrote severely in a 1911 column, “but there are marriages brought about in which he has no hand.”

Dear Miss Libbey was not a tactful soul and her advice was usually fairly terse. After reading through some letters and her responses, I can’t figure her out. Some of her responses were preposterous. At times her advice might be called spectacularly bad. Sometimes I agreed with her. This post just contains a few examples but I suspect Dear Miss Libbey will make more appearances on Old Spirituals.  I’m interested to hear your thoughts so here are the letters and her advice, without extra commentary.

Dear Miss Libbey: I have been going with a young gentleman. He’s been a good, jolly fellow, kind and loving to me, and I loved him dearly. Then all of a sudden he writes a cruel letter and gives me the cold shoulder. As he has given me presents, I am constantly reminded of him! Is there any way I could win him back? I cried myself sick over his cruel letter. I would give anything to win him back. I’m heartbroken over the affair. Kindly give me your advice on this. DELLA.

There is no way to revive a man’s love after it has cooled. I would advise you to send back all his presents.

“Dear Miss Libbey: Thank you for the many helpful things you have written to those in the same trouble as I am. I am of a trusting disposition and have been told I sometimes read meanings into insignificant words.
A few weeks ago a young man of charming manners took me to drive. He had been attentive to me for some time in an unobtrusive manner. This day he drove me to the cemetery, took me to his family lot, and in a manner which I consider suggestive, asked me how I should like to be there.
I gave an evasive answer, as I did not like to commit myself. Since that time a coldness has seemed to come between us. Would you consider me justified in speaking openly to him of his neglect? My heart is very sore. TROUBLED HEART.

I don’t know what ails the fellow. I think he is a bit queer, to say the least. If you really care for the fellow, it would be better to treat the matter as a joke, though it is a rather grewsome one, to my way of thinking.

Dear Miss Libbey,  I appeal to your kind heart to please tell me what to do.  I am one of many girls in a big department store here. Among the different men that came to my counter was one I had waited upon for quite a while. At first, I took no particular notice of this young gentleman, who was pleasing in manner and a pleasant talker. He gave me to understand, when our acquaintance had ripened into love, that I was the only girl he ever loved. He asked me to become his wife when I could get ready. Delighted over my bright prospects, and loving him dearly, I gave up my position, took the few dollars I had earned and saved, and bought a little wedding outfit. I told all my friends about my “good luck.”  Do pity me, Miss Libbey, when I tell you that he jilted me for no reason. The day I was to have been married dawned; I was in my bridal dress, my friends waiting–but no bridegroom came. Ever since I’ve been pointed at as “jilted.” I lost my position and my heart is as one dead.  Please tell me how to hold my head up and if you think I’ll ever find a good and different man. Adrian.

My Poor Dear Adrian, you have poured out your heart woes to one who sympathizes with you. A lover as fickle and false as the one you unwisely met, is not worth one thought or lingering memory, which must be painful to your sensitive soul. If you are any way placed to go to some restful cottage where you have friends who will take an interest in your welfare, let them help you forget the trouble that is fresh in your grieved mind. No right-minded persons would look down upon you.
Only a heart of stone would feel anything but intense contempt for such human depravity as the man’s masquerading under the name of “lover.”
You had better regard the affair as a weird, uncanny dream and then you will awake, as the blowing rose, and find a true and worthy appreciative admirer in Providence’s good time.

Dear Miss Libbey: Will you please help me out of my trouble? The other night at dinner we had some biscuits which were impossible to eat. Supposing that the help had made them, I bounced one on the floor to show my wife how hard it was. Now, it seems my wife had made the biscuits instead of the help, and she at once became angry. She has hardly spoken to me since and I am heartbroken. I have apologized a dozen times, but it does no good. What can I do to win back her affection? F.

Induce her to make more biscuits. Then eat and praise them.