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 |
200 GUESTS The Shattuck Inn
and Annex3 ALL MODERN
CONVENIENCES AT THE FOOT OF MONADNOCK MOUNTAIN
JAFFREY, N.H.2 AMERICAN PLAN
OPEN ALL THE YEAR October 15 Dear Miss Aaron1;
Please have some of the advertising posters and one of the Nicholas Murray4 photographs5 sent to Mr. Thorpe6 at The Bishop's Lodge7.
Sincerely Willa Cather Ans'd by _____OCT 14 1927
Filed by _____
Information about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let2579.xml
- Letter identifier
- 2579
- Contents
- Document is one leaf, handwritten on recto only.
- Person to whom letter was written
- M. Manley Aaron1
- Date letter was written
- October 15 [1927]
- Place letter was written
- Jaffrey, New Hampshire, United States2
- Location of original letter
- Cather-Knopf Correspondence, The Dobkin Family Collection of Feminism, New York, NY
Individual Annotations
Shattuck Inn (Jaffrey, NH): Hotel built in 1910 in Jaffrey, N,H owned and operated by E. C. Shattuck until his death in February 1933, when operation was taken over by his daughter, Eleanor Shattuck Austermann, and her husband George Austermann. Cather stayed at the Shattuck Inn many times, often with Edith Lewis, finding it a useful place to work. In 1947, Cather wrote of the Shattuck Inn: “I have never found any place where I could work in such peace and happiness as in the little rooms up in the top of the Shattuck Inn” (#1748).
This portrait of Cather by Nicholas Murray was taken c. 1924 and was published a number
of times in ensuing years.
A resort located in the foothills of the Sangre de Cristo range of the Rocky Mountains, just outside of Santa Fe, NM, which was especially popular in the 1920s. Bishop Jean Baptiste Lamy, the prototype for Bishop Jean Marie Latour in Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927), first purchased the property as a retreat in the 1860s. His chapel still stands.
Person Annotations
Aaron, M. Manley. Alfred Knopf’s secretary. As secretary to the president of Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., Willa Cather’s publisher, Manley Aaron was responsible for clerical matters, such as tracking Cather’s address as she traveled or mailing her supplies. However, Alfred Knopf also delegated to Aaron the task of negotiating with magazines for the publication of Cather’s short stories collected in Obscure Destinies (1932), and she took direct responsibility for other matters for Cather and other authors as well.
Muray, Nickolas (1892-1965). Hungarian photographer and fencer.
Born in Hungary to a Jewish family, Miklos Murai emigrated to the
U.S. at age twenty-one and changed his surname to Muray. In 1920 he rented a
studio and began a career in portrait photography. His innovative soft-focus
portrait technique made him immensely popular; he photographed many
luminaries, including Cather, in the 1920s and 1930s. His most famous
portraits are of Frida Kahlo, which he took throughout their ten-year love
affair. During the Depression, Muray shifted to advertisement photography
and became known as one of the preeminent color photographers as a result of
his color photographs published in mass-circulation magazines. Muray was
also a skilled fencer and represented the U.S. at both the 1928 and 1932
Olympics.
Thorpe, James Ruggles (1864-1928). American businessman. Thorpe was born in Red Wing, MN, and began his professional career in real estate with the Thorpe Brothers firm in Minneapolis, MN. Thorpe attended Princeton University, graduating in 1889, and in 1900 moved to Denver, CO, where he became president of Big Horn Collieries. In 1918 he purchased the Bishop’s Lodge near Santa Fe, NM, with the intention of building a resort. Thorpe solicited Cather for a photograph to use as advertising for the resort. He died suddenly while undergoing an operation at the Mayo Clinic.
Place Annotations
