Guide to Reading Letter Transcriptions
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| Textual Feature | Appearance |
|---|---|
| passage deleted with a strikethrough mark | |
| passage deleted by overwritten added letters | |
| 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 |
| printed letterhead text | printed text |
| 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 |
35 FIFTH AVENUE
New York October 20, 1931. My dear Mr. Austermann1:
I had hoped and planned to be at Shattuck Inn5 about the first of October, but I am afraid now that I shall not be with you at all this year. My mother6 died on the thirty-first of August, and this changed all my plans for the Fall and Winter. I write you to explain my absence because I hope you will always consider me a regular Autumn guest at the Inn.
If any of my friends should be with you, will you be kind enough to tell them why I am not coming to you this year. I you could drop me a line telling me whether Eleanor7 and the twins8 are well and what you know of Mrs. Faxon9's whereabouts, I would be very grateful. I shall be here2 for about a month before starting West again.
With best wishes always, Willa Cather Mr. George Austerman1, Shattuck Inn, Jaffrey,3 New Hampshire. MADISON SQ. STA. N.Y 62 OCT 21 1931 8 30 PMInformation about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let1078.xml
- Letter identifier
- 1078
- Contents
- Document is one leaf, typewritten on recto and verso. Includes one typewritten envelope.
- Person to whom letter was written
- George Austermann 1
- Date letter was written
- October 20, 1931
- Place letter was written
- New York, New York, United States2
- Location of original letter
- Willa Cather Papers, 1899-1949, in the Clifton Waller Barrett Library (#6494-6494-i), University of Virginia, Special Collections, Charlottesville, VA
Individual Annotations
Grosvenor Hotel (New York City): When Cather and Edith Lewis lost their 5 Bank Street apartment in 1927, they moved into the Grosvenor Hotel, where they continued to live until 1932. The hotel was located at 35 Fifth Avenue in the Manhattan borough of New York City.
Shattuck Inn (Jaffrey, NH): Hotel built in 1910 in Jaffrey, N,H owned and operated by E. C. Shattuck until his death in February 1933, when operation was taken over by his daughter, Eleanor Shattuck Austermann, and her husband George Austermann. Cather stayed at the Shattuck Inn many times, often with Edith Lewis, finding it a useful place to work. In 1947, Cather wrote of the Shattuck Inn: “I have never found any place where I could work in such peace and happiness as in the little rooms up in the top of the Shattuck Inn” (#1748).
Person Annotations
Austermann, George (1899-1982). Hotelkeeper, the Shattuck
Inn. George Austermann, born in Missouri, married Eleanor
Shattuck in 1927; they had four sons, one of whom died in 1933. That same
year, after his wife’s father died, they took over the management of her
family’s hotel, the Shattuck Inn, in Jaffrey, NH, where Cather had been a
regular summer or fall guest since 1917.
Cather, Mary Virginia Boak (1850-1931) (“Virginia” or
“Jenny”). Cather’s mother. Born in Virginia to William Lee Boak
and Rachel Seibert Boak, Virginia was educated in Baltimore, MD, and was a
schoolteacher until her marriage to Charles Fectigue Cather in 1872. Her
husband’s family were primarily Union supporters during the Civil War while
her family supported the Confederacy (three brothers served in the
Confederate Army although their mother opposed slavery). After her marriage
she tried to help unite the divided family. Four of her children, Willa,
Roscoe, Charles Douglas, and Jessica Virginia, were born in Virginia, while
three, James Donald, Elsie Margaret, and John Esten, were born in Nebraska
after the family moved there in 1883. Despite occasional differences, Cather
remained in affectionate contact with her mother, who remained in Red Cloud,
NE, where the family settled in 1884. After her husband’s death in 1928
Virginia Cather suffered a stroke while visiting her children and their
families in California. She spent nearly three years in a sanitarium in
Pasadena, CA, unable to speak. Willa Cather visited her there several times
but was unable to travel quickly enough from Grand Manan to Red Cloud for
her funeral and interment after she died in Pasadena in 1931. Virginia
Cather was the prototype for Victoria Templeton in “Old Mrs. Harris” (1932),
which Willa Cather completed shortly before her mother’s death.
Austermann, Eleanor C. Shattuck (1903-1994). Hotelkeeper,
the Shattuck Inn. Eleanor Shattuck was born in New Hampshire,
the eldest of Edmund and Helen E. Shattuck’s three children. She married
George Austermann in 1927; they had four sons, one of whom died in 1933.
That same year, her father died and she and her husband took over management
of the Shattuck Inn, her family’s hotel in Jaffrey, NH, where Cather had
been a regular summer or fall guest since 1917.
Austermann, Edmund Frederick (1929-1933). George and Eleanor Austermann's son. Born in Peterborough, NH, Edmund Austermann and his twin brother George Austermann were the first-born children of George and Eleanor Austermann. He died from encephalitis at the age of four.
1811Austermann, George S. (1929- ). George and Eleanor Austermann's son. Born in Peterborough, NH, George Austermann and his twin brother Edmund Austermann were the first-born children of George and Eleanor Austermann. He grew up in Jaffrey, NH, and as an adult, he moved to Massachusetts and worked for the Polaroid Corporation.
Faxon, Mrs. In the 1930s a Mrs. Faxon was a guest at the Shattuck Inn, but no further information is known about this person.
Place Annotations
