A Guide to the Handy Writers' Colony Collection in the Sangamon State University Library Archives by Thomas J. Wood and Meredith Keating A Guide to the Handy Writers' Colony Collection A Guide to the Handy Writers' Colony Collection in the Sangamon State University Library Archives Thomas J. Wood and Meredith Keating Sangamon State University 1989 Copyright 1989 by Illinois Issues and University Library, Sangamon State University, Springfield, Illinois. All rights reserved. Reproduction or translation of any part of this work beyond that permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act without the permission of the copyright owner is unlawful. Requests for permission or further information should be addressed to the Pub- lisher, Illinois Issues, Sangamon State University. Printed in the United States of America. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Wood, Thomas J., 1957- James Jones in Illinois: a guide to the Handy Writers' Colony Collection in the Sangamon State University Library Archives / by Thomas J. Wood, and Meredith Keating. x, 57 p. 242 cm. 28. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 0-938943-02-2 : $17.95 1. Jones, James, 1921-1977-Manuscripts-Catalogs. 2. Jones, James, 1921-1977- Homes and haunts-Illinois-Marshall. 3. Handy, Lowney Turner-Manuscripts- Catalogs. 4. Handy Writers' Colony-Archives-Catalogs. 5. Marshall (111.)- History-Sources-Catalogs. 6. Manuscripts, American-Illinois-Springfield- Catalogs. 7. Sangamon State University. Library Archives-Catalogs. I. Keating, Meredith, 1954- . 11. Sangamon State University. Library Archives. 111. Title. Z6616.J627W66 1989 [PS3560.049] 016.813'54-dc20 89-61725 CIP Cover: Mealtime at the Handy Colony in Marshall, Illinois, summer 1950. Seated, clockwise from left: Willard Lindsay, Bert Bliss, James Jones, unknown, Don Sackrider, Mary Ann Jones. Standing: Eddie Shearer and Robert Smith. Illinois Issues Sangamon State University Springfield, IL 62794-9243 TABLE OF CONTENTS v pages Acknowledgments .....................................vii Preface. by John Bowers ..............................ix Photograph Section ............................after xii Introduction .......................................xiii Series Description ................................ xxix Handy Colony Chronology ............................xxxi Student List ......................................xxxix Box Directory ......................................xlv Abbreviations Used ...................................1v Acquisition and Access Note ........................lvii Series I: Business Records .... (Boxes 1-2) ............1 Series 11: Correspondence Jones-Handy ...............(Boxes 3-4) ............ 2 James Jones ...............(Box 5) ...............34 Handy (A-Z)............... (Boxes 6-9) ...........42 General (A-Z)............. (Box 10) .............126 Cross-listing ..................................128 Series 111: Manuscripts Writers A-D ...............(Boxes 11-17) ........145 Lowney Handy .............. (Boxes 18-19) ........148 James Jones ...............(Boxes 20-34) ........150 Edward Kurtz ..............(Boxes 35-36) ........156 Jere Peacock ..............(Boxes 37-44) ........156 Writers F-Z ...............(Boxes 45-58) ........161 Cross-listing ..................................176 Series IV: Personal Papers Harry Handy ...............(Box 59) .............179 Harry & Lowney Handy ...... (Box 60) .............179 Lowney Handy .............. (Boxes 61-63) ........180 James Jones .............. :( Box 64) .............182 Persons A-Z ...............(Box 65) .............183 Cross-listing ..................................184 vi Series V: Articles and Clippings .......................... (Boxes 66-67) ........185 Cross-listing ..................................196 Series VI: Photographs and Negatives Life photographs .......... (Box 68) .............201 1938-51 ...................(Box 69) .............201 1951-53 ...................(Box 70) .............202 1953-62 ...................(Box 71) .............203 Cross-listing ..................................204 Series VII: Robinson Township Library Collection ..........................(Box 72) .............205 (Includes Vivian Turner McClellan, One in the Middle) Oversize ....................... (Boxes 73-74) ........216 Miscellaneous ..................(Boxes 75-76) ........218 Oversize Duplicates ............ (Box 77) ............. 220 Bibliography ........................................221 Appendix: "James Jones: From Reveille to Taps/A Television Documentary:" interviews. production videotapes from J . Michael Lennon Papers .......................... 229 Index ............................................... 233 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS James Jones in Illinois: A Guide to the Handy Writers' Colony Collection provides a thorough inventory and finding aid for an extensive and important literary collection housed in the Sangamon State University Library Archives. Archivist Thomas J. Wood and stu- dent assistant Meredith Keating have added to this inventory a care- fully documented introduction tracing the history of the Handy Writ- ers' Colony, a chronology of the lives and works of James Jones and other colony writers, a list of Colony students, a section of his- toric photographs, and a selective bibliography of works by and about writers associated with the Colony. The preface is by John Bowers, a former colony member and author of the memoir, The Colony. The body of the guide provides an item-by-item inventory of the correspondence of James Jones and Lowney Handy, and a folder listing of manuscripts, personal papers, photographs, and publications included in the collection. An index is included to provide quick access to the contents of the guide. Acknowledgment of those who made this guide possible must begin with Margaret Turner, the wife of the late Harold Turner, brother of Lowney Handy. Margaret Turner preserved the Handy Colony Collection and donated it to Sangamon State University. Without her trust and generosity, and that of the Turner family generally, the collection would not have been established. The arrangements for the gift of the collection to SSU were made by J. Michael Lennon and Jeffrey Van Davis during the taping of interviews for the television documentary "James Jones: From Reveille to Taps." Lennon, professor of English at SSU, is curator of the collection. Special thanks are due to Lennon and Davis for bringing the collection to Sangamon State Uni- versity and making it available for scholarly use. The compilers of the guide also gratefully acknowledge the assistance of the following individuals who were responsible for the initial assembling of the collection: Steve Dykema, David Antoine, Ray Schroeder, William Furry, and Frank MacShane; also former uni- versity archives staff members Nancy Hunt, Elsebeth Buckley, and Annette Hunsaker. Marilyn Huff, Brian Alley, John Bowers, Larry Dale, Norman Hinton, and Greg Randle deserve special gratitude for their assistance in the production and publication of the guide. PREFACE by John Bowers To see the catalogue of letters to and from Lowney Handy, to read once again the titles of colony manuscripts, to hear the roll- call of colony writers and would-be writers and hangers-on of one kind or another, brings back in a most bittersweet way being at the Handy Colony in 1952-53 and calls to mind being affected by it for the rest of one's life. Lowney Handy was unlike anyone else I've ever met--before or since. Even now it is nearly impossible to compare her to anyone else, but two aspects of her character need to be pointed out in order to begin to understand her. She was self-educated and she was fiercely maternalistic. Now James Jones was more or less self- educated too, but he kept to more traditional paths than Lowney Handy. Lowney was so distinct, so self-willed, so everlastingly at center-stage and unusual that when one who was there thinks back, one thinks first of Lowney Handy. She blots out the landscape around. Jim would swig a brew with you, get maudlin over kids, corn- pete with you in arm-wrestling and pool, and seemed no better or worse than any other man who had just written a classic best-seller and was raking in thousands upon thousands and rave reviews. Lowney was different--very different. And so when I now begin this preface to the Handy Writers' Col- ony Collection, my thoughts go first to her, not Jim. I see her now. She had an outwardly sunny disposition (on first meeting). Her white-toothed smile, her large moist dancing eyes, her wild breathy tumble of words, could stop you dead in your tracks. You were bowled over by her enthusiasm and sheer animal energy. Yet once you stayed around her for awhile you saw the other side. Beneath the glow was a much darker persona. She seethed with hurt and anger and deep dissatisfaction. And here is where her self- education came into play. She found answers to her troubles from eclectic sources--from Far Eastern religious tracts, Tom Uzzell's Narrative Techniques, a smattering of modern fiction, the Bible, old wives tales, folk art, family lore, and God knows what else. She churned up her sources and came out with her own peculiar philosophy about life and art. Life and art combined with her. We neophyte writers at the colony (and selected veterans there) copied word for word the prose of those masters in her favor (Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Dos Passos, and Tess Schlessinger) and we ate cottage cheese every day and were encouraged to hook ourselves up to enemas, something that