Guide to Reading Letter Transcriptions
Some of these features are only visible when "plain text" is off.
| 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 |
MEDICAL DIRECTOR
CHARLES W. THOMPSON, M. D.
ASSOCIATE MEDICAL DIRECTOR
J. A. COLLIE, M. D.
RESIDENT PHYSICIAN
ETHEL FANSON, M. D.
PATHOLOGIST LAS ENCINAS
SANITARIUM4
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA2 BOARD OF DIRECTORS
GEORGE DOCK, M. D., PRES.
W. JARVIS BARLOW, M. D.
F. C. E. MATTISON, M. D.
STEPHEN SMITH, M. D.
F. H. MACPHERSON May 10th Dear Virginia1;
Grandmother5 wants me to write you a
note on "Mothers' Day". You are a dear girl to write her so often, and I
enjoy your letters as much as she does. You can not know how much letters
mean to her—how she watches the path in the shrubbery for the post–boy's
white coat, and how she smiles STEPHEN SMITH, M. D.
MEDICAL
DIRECTOR
CHARLES W. THOMPSON, M. D.
ASSOCIATE MEDICAL
DIRECTOR
J. A. COLLIE, M. D.
RESIDENT PHYSICIAN
ETHEL
FANSON, M. D.
PATHOLOGIST
LAS ENCINAS
SANITARIUM
PASADENA,
CALIFORNIA
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
GEORGE DOCK, M. D.,
PRES.
W. JARVIS BARLOW, M. D.
F. C. E. MATTISON, M.
D.
STEPHEN SMITH, M. D.
F. H. MACPHERSON when he hoe holds up a letter. When I'm here I always
resolve to write every day hereafter—but I never am able to keep that
resolution. You do better than any of the grandchildren, you and Helen Louise6 she counts on. I'm very
grateful to you both for writing to her so often.
So glad you like the blue scarf, dear.
RETURN IN [missing]DAYS TOLAS ENCINAS
PASADENA, CALIF.2 Miss Virginia Cather1 Baldwin House Northampton3 Mass. PASADENA,CALIF. E. PASADENA STA.2 MAY 11 1931 730 AM Air Mail
Information about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let2321.xml
- Letter identifier
- 2321
- Contents
- Document is two leaves, handwritten on recto of each leaf only. Includes one envelope, handwritten.
- Person to whom letter was written
- Virginia Cather1
- Date letter was written
- May 10 [1931]
- Place letter was written
- Pasadena, California, United States2
- Location of original letter
- Roscoe and Meta Cather Collection (MS316), University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Archives & Special Collections, Lincoln, NE
Individual Annotations
Las Encinas Sanitarium (Pasadena, CA): Established in 1904 by Dr. James H. McBride, the Southern California Sanitarium for Nervous Disorders was renamed Las Encinas Hospital for Nervous Disorders in 1917, and finally to Las Encinas Sanitarium in 1928. Willa Cather’s mother, Mary Virginia Boak Cather, spent the last three years of her life here, where Cather visited her in 1929, 1930, and 1931.
Person Annotations
Brockway, Virginia Cather (1912-1984) (“West Virginia”). Cather's
niece. Born in Lander, WY, to Roscoe Cather and Meta Schaper
Cather, Virginia graduated from Natrona County High School in Casper, WY, in
1929. She received an A.B. in English from Smith College in Northampton, MA,
in 1933, the same year Willa Cather received an honorary doctorate there. In
1934, she enrolled in the University of Chicago School of Social Services
and was, for a time, a social worker. She married John Hadley Brockway, a
Navy officer, in 1936. They moved frequently until his retirement from the
Navy. She had one child, son George. In letters, Willa Cather sometimes
calls her "West Virginia" to distinguish her from her cousin Mary Virginia
Auld because Virginia Cather's birthplace in Wyoming was farther west than
Mary Virginia's in Nebraska.
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.
Southwick, Helen Louise Cather (1918-2004). Cather’s niece.
Helen was born in Red Cloud, NE, to Willa Cather’s brother James and
his wife Ethel. Willa was a doting aunt on her visits to Red Cloud. In 1931,
Helen moved with her family to Long Beach, CA, where she graduated high
school and attended Long Beach City College. In 1939, Helen returned to Red
Cloud to help care for her maternal grandmother and then enrolled in the
University of Nebraska in Lincoln, where she met her future husband, Philip
Southwick. After graduating in 1941, she briefly returned to California to
work in the personnel department of Douglas Aircraft company, but married
Southwick in Lincoln in 1942, and then moved with him to Champaign, IL. When
Philip’s employment took them to Plainfield, NJ, she frequently spent time
with her aunt in New York City. In 1946, the Southwicks moved to Pittsburgh,
PA, where their son James was born. In later years Helen worked as a school
librarian and was active in the Cather Foundation in Red Cloud, NE. She was
a beneficiary of Cather’s literary estate, and when Edith Lewis died in 1972
she bequeathed Cather books and manuscripts to Helen and her brother Charles
Cather. Helen donated her share of these materials and Willa Cather’s
letters to her to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
Place Annotations
