Edwin Winter (November 5 [1918]) | Willa Cather Archive

#0269: Willa Cather to Edwin Winter, November 5 [1918]

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passage deleted by overwritten added letters	~~overwritten passage~~
passage added above the line	passage with added text above
passage added on the line	passage with added text inline
passage added in the margin	passage with text added in margin
handwritten addition to a typewritten letter	typed passage with added handwritten text
missing or unreadable text	missing text noted with "[illegible]"
uncertain transcriptions	word[?]
notes written by someone other than Willa Cather	Note in another's hand
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text printed on postcards, envelopes, etc.	printed text
text of date and place stamps	stamped text
passage written by Cather on separate enclosure.	written text

NUMBER FIVE BANK STREET³ New York² November 5^th My Dear Mr. Winter¹:

A letter like yours⁴ is one of the best rewards one can have for writing a book. This book⁵ was meant for a small audience of the people whose memories go back to the untamed prairie country, and whose recollections can be awakened by a very simple account, not at all touched up, but as true as I could possibly write it. I am glad and proud to have made you remember so feelingly a country I love.

Very sincerely yours Willa Sibert Cather

Information about this letter:

Source File:: cat.let0269.xml
Letter identifier: 0269
Contents: Document is one leaf, handwritten on recto only.
Person to whom letter was written: Edwin Winter ¹
Date letter was written: November 5 [1918]
Explanation of conjectured date: The year of this letter is established by Edwin Winter's letter of October 18, 1918, to which Cather is responding.
Place letter was written: New York, New York, United States²
Location of original letter: , Colby College, Miller Library, Waterville, ME

Individual Annotations

5 Bank Street (New York City): The apartment Cather shared with Edith Lewis beginning in 1912, located in Greenwich Village in the Manhattan borough of New York City. Subway construction forced Cather and Lewis to relocate in 1927.

On 18 October 1918, Winter wrote Cather praising My Ántonia and referring to his own experiences in "early Union Pacific days" in Nebraska.

Person Annotations

0123

Winter, Edwin W. (1845-1930). American railroad executive. After serving in an Illinois regiment during the Civil War, Winter joined the Union Pacific Railway Company in 1867 and worked for the railroads in varying capacities for the rest of his professional life. He was president of the Northern Pacific Railway Company from 1896 to 1897 and the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company from 1903 to 1911. Winter wrote a complimentary letter to Cather after reading My Ántonia (1918) and visited her in 1919 to tell her how much he enjoyed the book. Willa Cather wrote to her brother Roscoe that she would “rather have the admiration of one man like” Winter “than sell a thousand books” (#2085).

Place Annotations

New York, New York, United States

Work Annotations

My Ántonia (1918) by Willa Cather