Mildred Esther White was born near Adrian, Michigan, February 24, 1894, the oldest of five children of Thomas William and Henrietta (Stanley) White. Her siblings were Everett, Robert, Frances, and Lois. Her parents were both Earlham College alumni, and her father was at the time the superintendent of Raisin Valley Seminary, a Quaker school. In 1897 the family moved to the Richsquare comminity of Friends in Henry County, Indiana, where numerous White relatives lived. Mildred White entered Earlham College in 1913 and graduated in 1918, taking time off to teach in the Richsquare School. After graduating, she spent a year teaching in the Richsquare School. After graduating, she spent a year teaching at Southland Institute, a Quaker school for blacks near Helena, Arkansas. She then took her MA at Haverford College, following with additional coursework in education at teachers College of Columbia University. In 1922, White joined the staff of the Friends Girls School in Ramallah, Palestine, under the American Friends Board of Foreign Missions. She would remain there, with some breaks, until 1954. The bulk of the collection consists of her letters to family members, and their letters to her, while at Ramallah. Mildred White retuned to the United States in 1954, spending the rest of her working life as a staff member for the American Friends Board of Missions in Richmond, Indiana, and as a teacher of homebound students for the Richmond schools. She died in Richmond, March 18, 1988, and was buried in the Richsquare Friends Cemetery.

Note written by