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 |
A week ago today I and my family lost the kindest of friends, and you lost
what what very few people ever have at
all, a life-long companion who cherished you and admired you and and found complete happiness in his3 life with you.
You will tell me that this makes it only the harder to bear now. It will make your loneliness greater, I know. 2 But you and I have lived long enough to know that it is possible for human beings to have only a very limited amount of real happiness in this world, and so many people miss it altogether. You had more than most of the people I know. I have known very few marriages as happy as yours. Your devoted care prolonged the Doctor's life for many years, and you made his home so pleasant for him that, as he often told me, he could be happier there than anywhere else 3 in the world. I always loved to meet Doctor on the street because he always looked so happy. His kind, intelligent face glowed with an inner content. I liked to listen to his nice voice when he came to look mother4 over. When I was far away I always felt easy in mind about father5 and mother because Dr. Creighton was there. I knew if anything went wrong he would get there, and get there quick. You remember I kept his telephone number plastered in both bedrooms on sticky labels, so that they could see it without glasses. 4 I wish you and he could have been in New York6 another winter; but I shall always feel grateful to fate that you were both there that one winter.
Sometime, Mary, I want to tell you about a kind thing he did for a young
woman of this town. I promised him never to mention it, and I never did. He
came to our home7 one morning
and said he wanted to see me alone. A patient of his was going to have her
second baby just after she had lost her first, and would
I
please
be
nice
to
her! He asked it just like that! Said she was
5⬩W⬩S⬩C⬩ nervous and felt every little thing, and when I met her
would I please be cordial and jolly her up a little. He said he knew I
didn't mean it, but that sometimes I was
rather brusque with people. I promised, and I certainly never admired the
Doctor so much as when I walked out to his car with him after that
interview. Think of the delicacy of the man, to realize the importance of
such little 7
6 things, and to come directly
to me and ask me to be a little more agreeable! I was complimented that he
felt he could frankly ask me to "mend my manners"! Almost any doctor will
try to help a hurt foot or hand, but how many will try to help hurt
feelings? Not many.
I expect you can guess who the young woman w
was, but since he asked me not to mention his unusual professional call that
morning, I never shall to anyone 6
7 but you, and I had rather only you and
Carrie8 and Irene9 knew about it. Of all my memories of
the Doctor, this is the one I like most. It took
so
many
quali
qualities in a man to make him do that simple
thing! Very few women have as much delicacy as that.
My heart bleeds for you, dear Mary, but how many proud and happy memories you have to comfort you. If I could have tried to plan a happy life for you when we were little girls, I could not have planned anything 8 better than you have had. I never saw a dis-contented look on the Doctor's face. You made him perfectly happy. Only think, he might never have gone to Red Cloud10 at all! His going there meant so much good for my own family and countless others, as well as for you and for him. I shall just try to be thankful to God that he did go there.
So lovingly, dear, Willie From Willa Cather WHALE COVE GRAND MANAN2 NEW BRUNSWICK CANADA Mrs. E. A. Creighton1 Red Cloud10 Nebraska U. S. A.Information about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let1232.xml
- Letter identifier
- 1232
- Contents
- Document is two leaves, handwritten on recto and verso of each leaf. Includes one envelope, handwritten.
- Person to whom letter was written
- Mary Miner Creighton 1
- Date letter was written
- [August 14, 1934]
- Explanation of conjectured date
-
Ernest Creighton died on Tuesday August 7, 1934, and August 14 was the subsequent Tuesday.
- Place letter was written
- Grand Manan, New Brunswick, Canada2
- Location of original letter
- Willa Cather Papers, 1899-1949, in the Clifton Waller Barrett Library (MSS 6494), University of Virginia, Special Collections, Charlottesville, VA
Individual Annotations
541 N. Seward Street (Red Cloud, NE): Built circa 1899, Cather’s parents, Charles F. and Mary Virginia Boak Cather, purchased this home in 1903. Cather stayed here when she returned to Red Cloud to visit her parents, returning for the last time in 1931 following her mother’s death. At that time, Cather's sister Elsie inherited the house, returning to Red Cloud for summer vacations for most of the 1930s. Willa Cather contributed to the maintenance of the property until Elsie sold the house in 1945 to W. H. Maynard. By 1946, it was being used as a local hospital. Willa Cather used the house as the prototype for the second Ferguesson house in her short story “The Best Years.”
Person Annotations
Creighton, Mary S. Miner (1873-1968). Clubwoman; Cather’s
friend from childhood. Born in Iowa, Mary Miner was the second
daughter of James and Julia Miner, neighbors of the Cather family in Red
Cloud, NE. Willa Cather later recalled that when she first moved into town
with her family and enrolled in school in 1885, “Margie Miner was so jolly I
wanted awfully to know her.” They became lifelong friends and
correspondents, and Mary’s sisters Irene and Carrie were equally close to
Cather. Mary Miner wed local physician E. A. Creighton in 1900 and lived the
rest of her life in Red Cloud. She was the prototype for Julia Harling in
My Ántonia (1918).
Creighton, Ernest A. (1871-1934). Cather family physician. Born in Ontario, Canada, E. A. Creighton graduated from the medical school of Western University in 1899, and came to Red Cloud, NE, soon after, boarding with the Cathers' family friend Mollie Ferris and her brother. He married Mary S. Miner on July 28, 1900, and they built a house close by her parents’ house. Cather wrote that she felt her parents were in good hands with him.
Cather, Mary Virginia Boak (1850-1931) (“Virginia” or
“Jenny”). Cather’s mother. Born in the 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.
Cather, Charles Fectigue (1848-1928). Cather’s father.
Charles Fectigue (possibly Fectique) Cather was born in the Back
Creek Valley of Virginia, north of Winchester. His family were sheep raisers
who were largely, but not entirely, Union supporters during the Civil War.
He married Mary Virginia Seibert Boak, daughter of Confederate supporters,
in 1872. In 1883 he and his family followed his parents, William and
Caroline Cather, and brother George to Webster County in Nebraska, where
various cousins and uncles had also settled. Initially he ran a ranch in the
county but soon moved his family into the town of Red Cloud, where he had an
insurance and real estate business. Four of his children, Willa, Roscoe,
Charles, and Jessica, were born in Virginia, while three, James, Elsie, and
John, were born in Nebraska. Cather’s relationship with her father was very
warm: she made regular visits to her parents in Red Cloud and especially
enjoyed her father’s letters expressing appreciation of her novels. A week
after she concluded a visit to her ailing father in Red Cloud, he died of
heart disease. He served as the prototype for Hillary Templeton in “Old Mrs.
Harris” (1932).
Sherwood, Carrie Miner (1869-1971). Sherwood, Carrie Belle
Miner (1869-1972) Civic leader; Cather's friend. Born in Waukon,
IA, to James L. Miner and Julia Erickson Miner, Carrie Miner was the eldest
of their children. The family moved to Red Cloud, NE, in 1878, where the
Miner Brothers store became the largest in town. Cather remembered meeting
Carrie there. In 1884, Carrie, her mother, and siblings were confirmed in
the Catholic church. In 1888, she studied music at St. Mary’s Academy at
Notre Dame, IN. She married bank clerk Walter Sherwood in late 1889; they
had two sons. The Sherwoods travelled often in the West, and visited Europe
in 1930. They built a new house at 3rd and Seward streets in Red Cloud in
1908; Cather sometimes sent materials for Carrie to keep in its spacious
attics. Carrie Miner Sherwood led local Red Cross work during the two World
Wars, served on the Red Cloud school board and park commission, and was
active in the League of Women Voters and in the Ladies Guild of Grace
Episcopal Church. Cather corresponded with Carrie Miner Sherwood throughout
her life and dedicated My Ántonia to Carrie, model
for Frances Harling in the novel, and her sister Irene. Carrie was one of
Mildred Bennett’s chief sources for The World of Willa
Cather (1951), and was instrumental in setting up what is now the
Willa Cather Foundation in Red Cloud.
Weisz, Irene Miner (1881-1971). Musician; Cather’s lifelong
friend. Born in Red Cloud, NE, the youngest child of James L.
Miner and Julia Erickson Miner, Irene Miner was educated in Red Cloud,
graduating in 1898 and played with the Cather children as part of the play
town of Sandy Point and in amateur theatricals. She studied piano with local
teachers, such as Mrs. P.E.B. Sill, then went to the Chicago College of
Music from 1899 to 1901. She met clerk Charles Weisz, later president of the
A.F. Shaw insurance company, there; they married in late 1915, settling in
Chicago. She visited Red Cloud frequently, but also travelled in the
American West and then to Europe in 1921 and around the world in 1934.
Cather corresponded with Irene Miner Weisz for many years and sometimes
stayed with her in Chicago when travelling to and from the West. My Ántonia is dedicated to Irene, model for Nina
Harling in the novel, and to her sister Carrie Miner Sherwood.
Place Annotations
Grand Manan, New Brunswick, CanadaCather and Edith
Lewis frequently vacationed on Grand Manan Island during the summer and
early fall for about twenty years, beginning in 1922. For the first few
years, they stayed at the Inn at Whale Cove, a collection of cottages with a
main house operated by Sarah Jacobus. Cather and Lewis rented Orchardside
Cottage from Jacobus until they had their own cottage built. In 1926, Lewis
acquired land on Grand Manan, and construction was completed in 1928. Cather
and Lewis returned to this cottage almost every summer until
1940.
