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 |
NORTHEAST HARBOR
MAINE September 5, 1945 My dear Roscoe1,
I am sending you a letter from young ?
Joe Pavlickh5, [illegible] who has bought the Osborn6 farm. I do not think I ever got a
fan letter that pleased me so much as this funny honest scrawl from the son
of old Joe Pavlickh7. You will remember him and his
father well. You will also remember the time when old Joe and his son bought
their first buggy, and young Joe
drove over to our house8 to take
me buggy riding. I had seen a good deal of him in Father's9 office and always tried to be
friendly toward the poor clumsy lad. But, you know, in Red Cloud10, in those days, taking a young
girl buggy riding was a very definite gesture. On this occasion I ran up and
hid in the attic and left poor Mother11
to deal with Joe. She always had great tact and presence in handling the
common people so I expect she gave a pretty good alibi. You must send me
back Joe's letter as I want to keep it for the nice things he says about
Father. I am sure he means that with all his hard–working,
honest nature.
I won't have any very definite address for a couple weeks -- it depends on weather and various things -- but I will bein New York12 before the first of October and I will telegraph you as soon as I get there. So keep Joe's funny letter and sent it to me when you know I am again at 570 Park Avenue13.
Lovingly Willie From W. S. Cather ASTICOU INN NORTHEAST HARBOR2 MAINE Mr. R. C. Cather1 Colusa3 California [illegible]Information about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let2238.xml
- Letter identifier
- 2238
- Contents
- Document is one leaf, typewritten on recto only. Includes one envelope, handwritten.
- Person to whom letter was written
- Roscoe Cather1
- Date letter was written
- September 5, 1945
- Place letter was written
- Northeast Harbor, Maine, United States2
- Location of original letter
- Roscoe and Meta Cather Collection (MS316), University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Archives & Special Collections, Lincoln, NE
Individual Annotations
Asticou Inn (Northeast Harbor, ME): Originally built in 1883 by A. C. Savage, the Asticou Inn was destroyed by a fire in 1899, but rebuilt by 1901. When the war and health considerations made travel to Grand Manan impossible, Willa Cather and Edith Lewis stayed at the Asticou in the 1940s, occupying a small cottage on the grounds of the inn.
241 N. Cedar Street (Red Cloud, NE): Built circa 1879, the Charles F. Cather family rented this home beginning in 1884. Willa Cather’s room was in the attic and her original wallpaper remains to this day. Charles and Mary Virginia Cather lived in this house until they purchased the 541 N. Seward Street house in 1903, although Willa Cather moved out in 1896. Cather used this home as a prototype most clearly in "Old Mrs. Harris," although she memorably describes her attic bedroom and wallpaper in The Song of the Lark (1915).
570 Park Avenue (New York City): The apartment Cather shared with Edith Lewis from December 11, 1932, until her death, located in the Manhattan borough of New York City, near Central Park. They had apartment 7D. Lewis continued to live there until her own death.
Person Annotations
Cather, Roscoe (1877-1945) (“Ross”). Cather’s brother.
Roscoe was born in Virginia, the second child and oldest son of
Charles and Virginia Cather. After graduating from Red Cloud (NE) High
School in 1895, he taught country school for two years, attended the
University of Nebraska in Lincoln for one year (1897-1898), taught high
school in Carlton, NE, and Oxford, NE, and finally became superintendent of
schools in Fullerton, NE. There he met fellow teacher Meta Schaper, whom he
married in 1907. They relocated to Lander, WY, in 1909, where he opened an
abstract office and where their three children, Virginia and twins Margaret
and Elizabeth, were born. In 1921, they moved to Casper, WY, where Roscoe
became president of the Wyoming Trust Company, and in 1937 to Colusa, CA,
where Roscoe and his brother Douglass had acquired a controlling interest in
the First Savings Bank of Colusa. Roscoe served as president of the bank
until his death. Willa visited Roscoe and his family in Wyoming several
times and shared important travel experiences with them, including a 1926
trip to New Mexico with Roscoe, Meta, and their children and a 1941 San
Francisco vacation with Roscoe and Meta. She also relied on him to handle
family-related business as well as personal financial matters, and he was
one of her chief correspondents throughout her life. Roscoe served as a
prototype for one of the twin brothers in the Templeton family in “Old Mrs.
Harris” (1932).
Pavlicek, Joseph, Jr. (1872-after 1945) (“Joe”). Webster County farmer. Born in Bohemia, Joe Pavlicek came to the U.S. in 1880 with his parents, Joseph and Antony Pavlicek (also spelled Pavlick in some records). They settled in southern Batin township in Webster County, NE, where other emigrants from Bohemia had settled, including some whose names or characters would later figure in Cather’s My Ántonia (1918). Joe married in 1896; he and his wife Mary had twin sons. Cather knew Joe as a young man, later recalling that he had come to take her buggy riding when she was a teenager. In the 1920s Cather’s father invested some of her money in farm loans, including one or more to Joseph Pavlicek; she later sold him a farm she refers to as “the Osborne place.”
Osborn, John Richard (1864-1941). Webster County farmer. Born in Grandview, IA, to C.D. and Pheba Ann Osborn, John Osborn moved with his family to Webster County, NE by 1880. He and his wife Emma had two sons and one daughter and farmed in Webster County. In 1920 they were living in Garfield Precinct and in 1930 in Red Cloud.
Pavlicek, Joseph A. (1846-1923) (“Joe”). Bohemian-American farmer. Born in Bohemia, Joseph Pavlicek (sometimes spelled Pavlick) married in 1870; he and his wife, Antony Pavlicek, had nine children, five of whom survived to adulthood. The family came to the U.S. in 1880, settling in Webster County, NE, where their youngest son was born. By 1900 Joseph Pavlicek had a 320 acre farm in Batin Precinct; he had purchased some of the land in the 1890s from Willa Cather’s father, Charles F. Cather. Two of Joseph’s sons, Frank Pavlicek and Joseph Pavlicek, Jr., had farms nearby.
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).
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.
Place Annotations
