Frankie held an autograph album filled with signatures from all over Kansas and the United States. Autograph albums were used to keep friends and families signatures near and dear when life takes its next step. Frankie’s book was filled with inscriptions like the following: “Don’t forget that pleasant six months we spent in the home of ours and may success find you during your school days and all through your future life. Your friend, Mary V. Murray.” 

Many of the autograph albums are filled with pop culture references, poems, and/or loving motifs from the 19th century such as: “The tissues of the life to be, We weave with colors all our own, And in the field of destiny, We reap as we have sown. Your friend, Minnie Asher Colestock.” 

This album in particular shows how those friendships and family members maintained relationships from far distances. Traveling within the 1880s was not easy. This album shows the dedication between friends that the autograph albums preserved over hundreds of years, the love and kinship humans have held for one another throughout all of history. This also gives us a glimpse into a young woman’s life, as inscription talks about a musical club Frankie and one of her schoolmates created: “When we practiced together, And braved the weather, To meet at the ‘Mozart,’ And bear our part! In that merry musical club of ours. Your friend and schoolmate, Alice Ropes.” 

These books reveal that the maintainer of the autograph album cultivates clubs and societies. The encouragement for Frankie to grow up and find success in her life was sown with each signature within her book.

Here's a look at some pages inside her autograph book: