As part of my sojourn into the unmapped and undiscovered shores of literary scholarship, I have compiled and composed descriptive summaries of the Woman’s Collection at Texas Woman’s University and the Willa Cather Archive at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln. Although the two collections each hold important artifacts in the quest for Cather, they could not be more different. The collection at Texas Woman’s contains several personal letters of Cather and the diary of her father. It is a traditional collection – protected in a vault and sealed against time and the elements in grey boxes behind walls of red brick and mortar. Access is guarded, but access is granted for those willing to travel and make arrangements with native staff. On the other hand, the University of Nebraska and its consortium of agencies possess by far the most complete and extensive collection of all things Cather, and the Cather Archive has worked tirelessly for more than a decade to digitize and disseminate all that they have to anyone with computer access in all corners of the globe.
Subtly, these two institutions reveal competing theories in the art of archiving. One seeks to collect and preserve, and by preserving, it must also protect. The other wishes primarily to provide access, but by providing unlimited right of entry to a worldwide audience it also risks the watering-down of scholarship and the devaluing of its product. It is a risk they are willing to take, however. Each has its place, thankfully, and each provides its own challenges. What follows is my summation.
The Woman’s Collection
Texas Woman’s University
Denton, Texas
Named after the first female president of the university, the Blagg-Huey Library on the Denton campus of Texas Woman’s University collects and preserves the history of American women through its large and varied special collection. Special attention is given to women from Texas and university alums, however the quality and variety of holdings allow for a wide-range of research opportunities for all scholars. The Woman’s Collection, as it is called, contains a cookbook collection, periodicals, and numerous books by, for, and about women – all easily accessible during regular library hours through open stacks. The library also holds the University Archives and a large collection of rare books and manuscripts. These collections, available with assistance, detail the history of women’s education in the state as well as the accounts of individuals, both regional and national.
According to the university’s website, the collection began in 1932 with the biographies of “great women.” University president Dr. Louis Hubbard wanted the collection “to serve as role models” to students. Possessing more than 40,000 books, nearly 20,000 photographs, more than 2,000 periodical titles, and an extensive collection of international cookbooks, the Woman’s Collection should be considered a leading source for researchers seeking to understand the experience of American women (particularly Texas women) in the last century.
Additionally, the rare book and manuscript collection provides the opportunity for dedicated studies in a wide variety of fields. Contained in the vault and available with assistance are the following:
American Association of University Women – Texas – Photographs, publications, artifacts and oral histories of the Dallas Area Chapter of the AAUW.
Lindsey Blayney Papers – Articles, letters, and newspaper clippings that pertain to the former president of the university and his turbulent tenure.
Mary Williams Campbell Collection – Correspondence, university records, musical scores, programs, news clippings, and photographs of the dance accompanist, composer and educator.
Willa Cather Collection – Personal letters, books, photographs, and clippings of the Pulitzer Prize winning author. Includes the diary of her father.
Clara Miller Dabney Diaries (1857 – 1864) – The Civil War diaries of a teenage girl living in New Orleans, seeking spiritual purity
Mamie Frances King Hansen Papers – Letters and scrapbooks from the Texas native and California resident including her social life and political aspirations in the 1950s.
Claire Myers Owens Collection – Letters, diaries, and other artifacts from the Texas-born novelist and university alum. A large collection, included are correspondences with Nobel-laureate Bertrand Russell, psychologist Carl Jung, and authors Aldous Huxley and Joseph Campbell. Included are insights in to her spiritual journey culminating with her conversion to Buddhism.
Jean Ross Howard Phelan Papers – Includes personal and business correspondence, writings, scrapbooks, and photographs from the aviation pioneer who founded an international organization of women helicopter pilots.
Josephine Jane Rice Papers – Photographs, clippings and artifacts from university alumnus and female gunnery instructor in the U.S. Marine Corps during World War II.
Jeanne Robertson Papers – Personal papers of a member of the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) of World War II, including biographical information, pilot logbooks, photographs, military aviation records.
Southwestern Region American Music Therapy Association Records – Records, newsletters, histories and videos covering the educational and professional activities of therapists using music with special populations.
Hilda Gloria Tagle Collection – Print, video, and audio of files of the first Hispanic female Federal judge appointed in the State of Texas.
Texas Federation of Business and Professional Women Records – Official records of an organization devoted to equal rights.
Texas Federation of Women’s Clubs Collection – Constitution and bylaws, minutes, correspondence, reports, and published material created by the largest women’s volunteer association in Texas. Documents include the founding meeting in 1897 through the 20th century.
Barbara Vacker Papers – Material related to Texas and the fight for women’s rights including the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) held in the 1970’s and documents prepared for the White House by Sarah Weddington (Roe v. Wade attorney) during the Carter Administration.
Autrey Nell Wiley Papers – Books, journals, lecture notes, research papers, and the letters of a former Texas Woman’s University English Professor and Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences.
Additionally, the Collection contains the LaVerne Harrell Clark and L.D. Clark Collection, which, for the most part, is not inventoried. Mr. and Mrs. Clark were both authors who recently bequeathed all of their personal papers to the university.
Access to these holdings is limited to regular business hours, Monday through Friday. The library asks for prior notification, usually 24 hours in advance, so that the department can collect requested materials and ensure adequate space for research. The library awards two travel grants of $500 annualy, each in support of significant research in the Woman’s Collection on the TWU campus. The Fellowships are given to visiting scholars promoting the study of women and women’s history. Applicants must submit proposals and resumes to:
Research Fellowship Committee
Texas Woman’s University Library
P.O. Box 425528
Denton, Texas 76204-5528
Scholars unavailable to travel may also request copies of materials. Fees are reasonable (about 20 cents per page), but patience is required. Materials may take up to eight weeks to arrive.
The Willa Cather Archive
University of Nebraska
Lincoln, Nebraska
No arduous journey is required to reach the Mecca of Cather scholarship. It is only a few clicks away. In 1997, five university bodies – Archives and Special Collections, University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, University of
Nebraska–Lincoln Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, The University of Nebraska Press, and the Cather Project at the University of Nebraska – began building what they hoped would be the premier location for research and scholarship for their Pulitzer Prize winning alumnus. The goal was “to create a rich, useful, and widely-accessible site for the study of Willa Cather’s life and writings.” A decade later, not only has The Archive accomplished its task, it has exceeded its own expectations and seeks increasingly ambitious projects.
The Archive has digitized and made available a large number of Cather texts and criticisms while simultaneously creating new “born-digital scholarly content.” The website (cather.unl.edu) contains:
• fully-searchable editions of the Cather novels and short stories in the public domain
• transcripts of her interviews, speeches, and public letters
• the entire collection of Cather Studies
• back issues of Teaching Cather
• recent and archived issues of The Mowers’ Tree newsletter
• galleries of photographs
• Cather biographies
• virtual tours of Cather-related sights
• audio and video files of Cather speeches and interviews
• information about forthcoming seminars and symposiums
The Archive’s impressive plans for the future include:
• digitizing periodicals prior to 1922
• an electronic edition of Janis Stout’s A Calendar of the Letters of Willa Cather
• a searchable annotated bibliography of Cather’s reading
• an expanded, searchable gallery of photographs
• transcripts of Cather’s manuscripts
Also of interest is the forthcoming Mapping a Writer’s World: A Geographic Chronology of Willa Cather’s Life. Envisioned as “a new tool to help understand Cather’s life and writings,” it is an animated map-based chronology hyperlinked to photographs and texts. When complete, scholars will be able to put themselves in Cather’s shoes as she composed some of her most famous and enduring works.
Archive editor Andrew Jewell best summarized the efforts of the Cather Archives in a recent essay saying “with the support of the Cather scholarly community, the Cather Archive can be a tool that offers unprecedented access to important Cather material, and inspire fresh, vigorous research and criticism.” The hope is that access and opportunity will continue the legacy of the profound writer and journalist and open the door to new areas of scholarships.
The Woman’s Collection at Texas Woman’s University and The Cather Archive at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln demonstrate the diversity of genuine scholarly landscapes. The Woman’s Collection holds a wide-variety of pieces, both popular and unique. Great women who were not widely known have pieces of their histories preserved, offering distinctive opportunities for the researcher to unearth rare and mysterious discoveries. The Cather Archive, on the other hand, makes up for its lack of breadth with incredible depth, allowing the scholar to make connections that transcend time and the page. Both collections are equally valuable. Although collections like the Cather Archive seem to be at the breach of the coming wave, it would be a great loss if the approaching tide carried away the bundles of potentiality shelved in grey boxes in the quiet vaults of the university library. In terms of my project, these two collections provide rare opportunities to explore different aspects of the great terrain of Cather’s work.
Works Referenced
The Willa Cather Archive. Ed. Andrew Jewell. Sep. 2008. U of Nebraska-Lincoln. 19 Sep. 2008 <http://cather.unl.edu>.
The Woman’s Collection. Sep. 2008. Texas Woman’s University. 24 Sep. 2008. <http://www.twu.edu/library/wom/wm_index.htm>.
