A Debutante's Passion-A Coach's Erotica: Love Letters of a Harvard Man and a Boston Elite

By Ronald A. Smith Ronald A. Smith, a well-known sport historian and emeritus professor at Penn State University, has published several books in sport history, including an edited diary belonging to the subject of these love letters. “Big-Time Football at Harvard, 1905: The Diary of Coach Bill Reid” chronicles the most important year in college football, when the crisis in brutality led to the creation of the National Collegiate Athletic Association and the legalization of the forward pass. Bill Reid had another side to his life, however—a passionate one in which he and his girlfriend, fiancé, and wife exchanged intimate love letters for well over a decade. The passionate nature of Bill and Christine’s letters during the late Victorian period and early twentieth century are rare and distinguish them from other collections. Bill and Christine wrote intimate love letters when they first met, through their engagement and a lengthy separation while Christine took an eight-month voyage with