This weekend, I hosted my usual research buddy, Angela, and another Jeanette and Nelson friend, Annette, at my home (and headquarters of The JAM Project) in Virginia. We were doing the usual things one does with one’s MacFriends; we showed Annette the blu-ray releases of Sweethearts and San Francisco, I made Jeanette’s waffles for Sunday morning breakfast, retired nurse Annette read Jeanette’s x-rays and medical files with much interest and medical knowledge I certainly don’t have, and we spent time in my office reading through the endless stacks of folders and papers that make up this collection. Many of these items are personal papers of Jeanette’s, and many are holdings of the defunct JMIFC, and yet another subset of this stuff is correspondence between well-known players of above parties: Clara Rhoades, Tessa Williams, Gene Raymond, Emily Wentz/West, etc.

As so often happens, still, years after this collection made its way to my home, something most compelling surfaced. Annette had busied herself in a folder of papers and notes surrounding the funeral arrangements of Jeanette MacDonald that included lists of people to invite to be honorary pallbearers, lists of people to notify, even Emily’s notation that Gene had let her know that Jeanette had passed.

Annette held up the item in question and said something along the lines of it being a pity that we can’t read this, and I looked to see what she was talking about, immediately recalling having seen it before and putting it on my “get to it someday” list that seems a mile long. In her hand was a multi page (nine pages, actually, small size note pages) letter written in shorthand by longtime secretary, friend and Gal Friday, Emily West. Annette pointed out that the word Nelson was written in longhand in several places, and we discussed how to get it translated for a few minutes, before I hit upon the very 2025 idea of seeing if ChatGPT could read it.

It could, and it did. I worked with this letter and that AI app for several hours, getting line by line translations, putting pages in order, uploading and re-uploading images of each page when it asked me to light it differently, etc, so it could see all the pencil strokes. Here is a photo of the original letter, with key longhand words highlighted.

What follows is a reconstructed version of the letter, as translated by artificial intelligence. (I’m not usually a fan, but hey, in this case it was useful?) While I freely admit some passages sound mechanical and it would be impossible to get it word perfect, what I know without question is that we have, very solidly, after hours of work, the gist of what is being said here.

Thelma Cohen

1616 Avenue L, Brooklyn, New York 11230

I have been thinking for some time about writing to you, and my heart is still heavy remembering the funeral, but I know how much you and the fan club loved her so I will try and tell you as best I can. I wanted you to know what I saw and what Nelson did. He was so broken up—he stood near the casket for a long time without speaking, his eyes full of tears. There were flowers everywhere and many who were there spoke to Nelson, he was quiet and cried softly. Someone near me whispered, “He looks ill.” Truly, I thought he might fall down. His grief was terrible to see. It was dreadful to see him like that. He looked so utterly stricken, he was overcome and said he couldn’t stay. People were crying everywhere. Mrs. Eddy was there too, she remained composed and spoke quietly to someone beside her, while the rest of us could only weep. After a little while, Nelson went back down alone to see her.

She was in Houston for surgery, she was very weak and saw no one. They said she looked bad, and she came to the end before they could do it. She was very brave, holding to her pride even then. There were so many things that hurt her through the years — jealousy, concern, nervous strain — always the same pressures. I don’t want to blame anyone, but it all took a toll. She worried too much about everyone else and tried to keep the peace when others could not. She never thought of herself. Most people don’t know what she endured in silence. She would not let on how bad it was; she tried to keep on for the fans. Through it all, she kept her sweetness and her faith. She was brave, always — even to the end.

That day I prayed for her spirit. Later, after seeing Miss Newell, she said she believed it had been a very beautiful service—so fitting for her. Many others said the same. It was all quiet, sweet, and reverent. I shall never forget it.

I thought the piece in The Shooting Star was very good. You chose such beautiful words, and it brought comfort to me and to the others here. Everyone said it was a fine and respectful job. I only wish everyone could know how much she truly suffered. She always hid it, even from those close to her—she never gave up. I know the fan club has always been loyal and will keep her memory alive. The last issue was so well done, with beautiful pictures — everyone remarked on it. Clara wrote that you were as kind and thoughtful as ever, and we were all grateful for your kindness. There were so many letters and flowers — far too many to answer — but every one was read and appreciated. It all meant a great deal to us. I’ll write you a long letter later, but I wanted to be sure you knew everything. It was so beautiful and so sad at the same time.

P.S. I’ll send you one soon, and thank you for being so understanding.

[There is a page included of notes about Clara Rhoades who had mentioned a town called Unity Village, which is the home to Unity Church (now Unity World Headquarters), which is a New Thought-type Christian church very similar to the Church of Religious Science that Jeanette attended. The notes mention that this is about a fifty mile drive from Clara’s home in Topeka, and mentions a chapel service. Extrapolating a bit here, it sounds to me as though Clara was interested in memorializing/honoring Jeanette at a religious service, perhaps seeing if club members who couldn’t get to LA could get there? This is the only piece of the letter that seems to be more “notes” and less prose, and, no matter how I try to fit it in with the rest of the narrative, I can’t seem to piece it in, but I did want to mention it here for complete context.]

Wow.

So many emotions, reading this. We’ve been grappling with it all weekend. First and foremost, this is exactly as others have described Nelson around the time of her death, and his grief, even in this sort of robotic-sounding shorthand translation, is gut-wrenching to read about anew. The man was shattered. He would follow her in death not quite twenty-six months later, at the conclusion of a palpable decline.

As compellingly heartbreaking as that is to revisit, though, there’s something totally WILD about this letter. Emily. Brick house. Secret-keeper. Knows where all the bodies are buried in this story. Would staunchly oppose anything that smelled like this relationship a decade later, once the ripple effect of Sharon Rich and Diane Goodrich worked its way into the circle of folks in the know and folks who suspected. Would join in on the Gene-Clara-Tessa of it all to try to expunge, purge, scrub from the record and literally white-out any and every reference to what really happened between these two souls. EMILY!!! Reaching out to Thelma Cohen, president of the Nelson Eddy Music Club, with these seriously loaded descriptions of Nelson’s emotion and grief, because she knew Thelma would want to know? She clearly was not clueing her in so that she could put this in print, she was speaking to her on a personal level — and telling the truth.

Over the years, Emily would try to give a witty response to this issue, saying things like, “If Jeanette had an affair with Nelson Eddy, they must have been doing it on another planet.” — A flip response, but not an exclusive and resounding no. Was it because it genuinely bothered her to lie, after a lifetime spent witnessing the ramifications of this relationship up close and personal, so she chose her words carefully? Sorta sounds that way.

And, no, this doesn’t say in so many words that Jeanette was having an affair with Nelson Eddy. But what it does do is draw a very vivid picture of a man broken by his loss. What it does do is not mention Jeanette’s husband Gene at all. What it does do is make a point to say that Mrs. Eddy remained composed and was not crying. What it does do is say that Nelson had to leave the group at her casket because he was overcome, but that he returned to be with her privately.

Emily knew exactly what the hell was going on, and she knew others did too. This would even lend itself to the absolutely outlandish notion that she cared about Nelson’s pain, and that seeing it made a real impact on her. The fact that she shared her eyewitness account of Nelson at the funeral has, however, actually blown my mind, and the further one gets into this story, the harder that is to do…! What on earth did she have left to say that made her promise a “longer letter”? This letter is pretty long! Lastly, why is she thanking Thelma for being so understanding? Simply because Thelma put a touching tribute to Jeanette in The Shooting Star? Is that all? What else have they discussed of this nature that lent itself to this kind of dialogue between Jeanette’s trusted secretary and the president of a Nelson fan club? This, if nothing else, is a clear sign that this sort of thing was being discussed at the highest level of these clubs (which has been known for years) — and that Clara, as a latecomer to the scene (people like Marie Waddy Gerdes had known the score for years and Clara only stepped up as club president in 1962) seems to have been left out of such talk. That made it very easy to weaponize Clara against people who were, in fact, telling the truth, because she had never been privy to it to begin with. Don’t think for a second that Gene didn’t know that, too, which is why he made such a ridiculous alliance with her and Tessa and put them on salary, using them as his attack dogs and cleanup crew for the rest of their lives.

My thanks to Annette for bringing this letter to the forefront and off the “get to it someday” list!! And Angela, who sits here on her last night of this trip listening to me read this aloud before publishing, and who has been throwing this back and forth with me all weekend.