Grace Davis Vanamee (October 26, 1940)

#1500: Sarah J. Bloom on behalf of Willa Cather to Grace Davis Vanamee, October 26, 1940

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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
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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

October 26, 1940. Dear Mrs. Vanamee¹:

Am I right in informing Miss Cather that the hour of the annual meeting³ of the Academy on November 14 is 11 o'clock in the morning? So many letters were awaiting her on her return from Canada⁴ a few days ago that though I am certain of the date, I am not certain⁵ of the hour.

Very truly yours, Sarah J. Bloom⁶ Secretary

Information about this letter:

Source File:: cat.let1500.xml
Letter identifier: 1500
Contents: Document is one leaf, typewritten on recto only.
Person to whom letter was written: Grace Davis Vanamee ¹
Date letter was written: October 26, 1940
Place letter was written: New York, New York, United States²
Location of original letter: Cather, Willa (1873-1947), Member Archives, American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York, NY

Individual Annotations

In #1498, Cather wrote Walter Damrosch that she planned to attend the annual meeting of the American Academy of Arts and Letters as part of a plan to rescind an amendment concerning membership.

Vanamee confirmed the information on 28 October 1940.

Person Annotations

1690

Vanamee, Grace Delle Davis (1876-1946). Assistant to the president of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Born in North Adams, MA, daughter of George and Electra Magoon Davis, Grace Davis attended the Emerson College of Oratory in Boston from 1899 to 1900. She published occasional verse, taught, and lectured in schools until her marriage to lawyer William Vanamee in 1909. After his death, she joined the staff of the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1915, becoming assistant to the president from 1921 to 1941; she corresponded with Cather and many other writers on Academy business. In the 1920s Grace Vanamee was active in Republican politics in New York, once running on a ticket headed by Fiorello LaGuardia. She retired to Florida, where she died.

0102

Bloom, Sarah J. (1889-1961). Cather's personal secretary. Born in New York in 1889 to Russian immigrants Solomon and Bertha Bloom, Sarah J. Bloom worked for Cather from some time in the 1920s until Cather's death and continued to work for Edith Lewis on matters pertaining to Cather's literary estate thereafter. Bloom typed Cather's literary manuscripts and managed Cather's correspondence, typing dictated letters and sometimes responding for Cather when she was traveling. Bloom’s work for Cather supplemented full-time office employment in New York City (for many years she worked for the New York State Public Service Commission). She thus came to Cather and Lewis's apartment on weekends to take dictation, pick up and deliver typescripts, and deliver typed letters for signature. She died in New York city in 1961.

Place Annotations

New York, New York, United States

Canada