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 |
I had already acquired two of Mr. Wescott's3 interesting maps, but it will be none the less pleasant to have one directly from you on that account. The fact that I ordered the map as soon as I saw it at Whale Cove cottage4 will testify to my appreciation of it. Thank you for your kind thought in sending this on.
Sincerely yours Willa CatherInformation about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let2473.xml
- Letter identifier
- 2473
- Contents
- Document is photocopy of one leaf, handwritten on recto only.
- Person to whom letter was written
- Elizabeth Craven Westcott1
- Date letter was written
- August 26 [1944]
- Explanation of conjectured date
-
The year provided by the archivist, presumably written when the letter was photocopied for inclusion in the collection, is the only extant evidence for the year.
- Place letter was written
- unknown place2
- Location of original letter
- Willa Cather Collected Materials (MS008), University of Nebraska–Lincoln Libraries, Archives & Special Collections, Lincoln, NE
Person Annotations
Westcott, Elizabeth Elwell Craven Wyman (1894-1980). Wife of Allan Westcott. Born in Sitka, AK, to John E. Craven and Emily H. Barnard, Elizabeth Elwell Craven married Robert Wyman in 1914; they had two children, Elizabeth and Edith. Some time after 1929 she married Allan Ferguson Westcott; they had one son, Allan Craven. Elizabeth corresponded with Cather, sending her a map produced by Allan Westcott.
Westcott, Allan Ferguson. (1882-1953). American historian. Born in Alexandria Bay, NY, Allan Westcott attended Brown and Columbia Universities. He taught at the U.S. Naval Academy, writing and editing several histories of naval operations, including: The United States Navy, a History (1943), American Sea Power Since 1775 (1947) and A History of Sea Power (1948). Westcott married Mary C. Townsend. After her 1929 death he married Elizabeth Craven Wyman Walcott; they had one son, Allan Craven. While Cather researched Sapphira and the Slave Girl (1940), she presumably consulted the maps produced by Wescott for one of his books.
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.
