Garland in His Own Time : A Biographical Chronicle of His Life, Drawn from Recollections, Interviews, and Memoirs by Family, Friends, and Associates 9781609381745, 9781609381622

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Garland in His Own Time

writers in their own time Joel Myerson, series editor

GARLAND in His Own Time

X A Biographical Chronicle of His Life, Drawn from Recollections, Interviews, and Memoirs by Family, Friends, and Associates

X edited by Keith Newlin

University of Iowa Press Iowa City

University of Iowa Press, Iowa City 52242 Copyright © 2013 by the University of Iowa Press www.uiowapress.org Printed in the United States of America No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means without permission in writing from the publisher. All reasonable steps have been taken to contact copyright holders of material used in this book. The publisher would be pleased to make suitable arrangements with any whom it has not been possible to reach. The University of Iowa Press is a member of Green Press Initiative and is committed to preserving natural resources. Printed on acid-free paper isbn-13: 978-1-60938-162-2 isbn-10: 1-60938-162-9 lccn: 2012915018

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Contents

X Introduction

xi

Chronology

xxxi

Franklin Garland, [Garland’s Iowa, Dakota, and Boston Years, 1874–1890]

1

Edwin C. Torrey, [Garland in Dakota in 1883]

9

Horace Traubel, [Discussing Garland with Walt Whitman, 1888–1889]

13

Mary E. Strout, [Garland as a Teacher in 1889]

21

Harriet E. Halliman, et al., [Garland as a Teacher in 1890]

23

Julie Herne, [Garland in Boston, 1889–1890]

25

B. O. Flower, [Garland and The Arena, 1890]

35

Elia Peattie and Robert Burns Peattie, [Garland at the Populist Convention in 1892]

38

William Allen White, [Garland as a Radical in 1892]

41

Edwin Markham, [Journal Comments on Garland in 1893]

42

Eugene Field, [The Battle of the Realists and Romanticists in 1893]

44

Ida E. Tilson, [Garland in West Salem, 1893–1915]

48

Mary Jane Ewing, [Garland as a West Salem Resident, 1893–1915]

52

Mary Jane Ewing, [An Alternate View of Garland in West Salem, 1893–1915]

57

Theodore Roosevelt, [Letters about Garland, 1894]

59

Elbert Hubbard, [Satiric Commentary on Garland, 1895–1899]

63

Eugene Field, From “I State My Views on Taxation” (1896)

66

Charles Fletcher Lummis, [Satiric Commentary on Garland in 1896]

69

Grant Richards, [Garland in London in 1899]

72

Isabel Garland Lord, [Garland’s Marriage, 1899–1906]

74

C. Watt Brandon, From “On the Trail with Hamlin Garland” (1907)

79

William Dean Howells, From “Mr. Garland’s Books” (1912)

87

Fred Lewis Pattee, [Letter about Interviewing Garland in 1915]

91

Ralph Fletcher Seymour, [Garland at the Cliff Dwellers in 1915]

94

Isabel Garland Lord, [Life in the Garland Home, 1916]

96

Theodore Roosevelt, “An Appreciation of Hamlin Garland” (1917)

102

Isabel Garland Lord, [Garland and the Automobile in 1920]

104

Oscar Cargill, [Letter about Garland in New York in 1921]

106

Joseph E. Chamberlin, From “Hamlin Garland — The Hardy of the West” (1926)

108

Eldon Hill, [Journal Comments on Garland in 1929]

117

Sinclair Lewis, From “Text of Sinclair Lewis’s Nobel Prize Address at Stockholm” (1930)

120

Eldon Hill, [Journal Comments on Garland in 1931]

123

Isabel Garland Lord, [Garland in California, 1931–1933]

130

Lee Shippey, [Garland’s Work Habits, 1932]

135

Paul Jordan-Smith, [Letter Commenting on Garland in California in 1933]

137

Isabel Garland Lord, [Garland’s Seventy-third Birthday, 1933]

139

Gladys Hasty Carroll, [Diary Impressions of Garland in 1933]

141

William Ellery Leonard, [Letter about Garland in Wisconsin, 1935]

146

Eldon Hill, [Journal Comments on Garland in 1936]

149

M. Lisle Reese, [The Hamlin Garland Memorial, 1936]

156

Isabel Garland Lord, [Garland and Psychic Investigation, 1937]

159

Floyd Logan, “Hamlin Garland, Active at 77, Enjoys Life in California Home” (1938)

163

W. D. Addison, [Letter about a Visit with Garland in 1938]

169

Isabel Garland Lord, [Garland’s Final Days in 1940]

172

[ viii]

Edgar Lee Masters and Theodore Dreiser, [Letters about the Death of Garland, 1940]

176

Bailey Millard, “Hamlin Garland as I Knew Him” (1940)

178

Lee Meriwether, “My Friend Hamlin Garland” (1940)

181

Irving Bacheller, “A Little Story of a Friendship” (1940)

183

Carroll Sibley, “Hamlin Garland: Delightful Host” (1940)

186

Booth Tarkington, “Hamlin Garland” (1942)

189

Alice Field Garland, [Letter about Garland and His Brother, 1950]

192

Post Wheeler and Hallie Erminie Rives, From Dome of Many-Coloured Glass (1955)

195

August Derleth, [A Literary Tribute, 1960]

197

Witter Bynner, [A Tribute from a McClure’s Apprentice, 1960]

199

Harold S. Latham, [A Tribute from Garland’s Macmillan Editor, 1960]

200

Vilhjalmur Stefansson, [On Garland and His Fans, 1960]

202

Garland Greever, “Hamlin Garland and the University of Southern California” (1960)

204

Kathleen Norris, [On Garland’s Early Praise, 1960]

206

Hermann Hagedorn, “Like the Postman, Fame Rang His Doorbell Twice” (1960)

207

Leland D. Case, [A Tribute from the Editor of the Rotarian, 1960]

210

Constance Garland Doyle, [Garland as a Father, 1960]

212

Van Wyck Brooks, [On Garland’s Later Years, 1960]

214

John Farrar, [A Tribute from the Editor of Bookman, 1960]

217

Harold S. Latham, From My Life in Publishing (1965)

220

Van Wyck Brooks, From An Autobiography (1965)

224

Floyd Logan, From “A Memoir: Hamlin Garland” (1968)

225

Works Cited

233

Permissions

239

Index

243 [ ix ]

Hamlin Garland in 1909. Courtesy of the University of Southern California, on behalf of USC Libraries Special Collections.

Introduction

X

one week before his death on 4 March 1940, Hamlin Garland paused to reflect on his life’s accomplishments in a diary entry he titled “Summing up my life”: A long rainy day alone [in] the house gave me time for reflection and a summing up of my life and its achievements which are becoming more and more pitiful as my own vitality ebbs and I have no further hope of accomplishment. I marvel that so much honor is granted me. As a man dying on his feet I have lost all pride in my books and all expectation of further reward.1

For years his depression had been growing as each day brought evidence of new physical infirmities and reminders that current fiction and literary fashion had edged out interest in his books. To newspaperman Floyd Logan he wrote on 5 February 1934, “Your very frank good letter is on my desk and I feel that I must acknowledge it while its glow is still with me. It reminds me of the first time Howells spoke to me of his waning fame. ‘I have outlived my vogue’ he said and it was a sad moment for me. He had a vogue, I have never enjoyed a boom much less a vogue, but I am in the midst of finding out that I am an old fellow of seventy four and that people are no longer interested in what I say or do or write.”2 In the 1930s Garland may have seemed to his younger contemporaries as “an attractive and lovable but no longer significant has-been,” as Hermann Hagedorn* remarked, but in the heyday of his career Garland had a considerable reputation as a radi[xi]

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cal writer of realistic stories and polemical essays agitating for a literature that accurately represented American life. Born in a squatter’s cabin in the village of West Salem, Wisconsin, on 14 September 1860, Garland was raised in impoverished surroundings as his father struggled to wrest a living from a series of frontier farms. By the time he was ten, young Hamlin had moved four times, eventually settling on a 160-acre farm of unplowed prairie in Mitchell County, Iowa, near the town of Osage, where he would set many of his most effective stories. As the oldest of four children, Hamlin drove a heavy, sod-breaking plow, turning some seventy acres of prairie during his tenth year — hard, brutal labor that would mark him forever. When he was sixteen, he entered the Cedar Valley Seminary in Osage, a combination high school and junior college, returning to the farm for the planting and harvesting seasons. When he graduated in 1881 at age twenty-one, he was determined to leave farm life forever, and in 1884, after a brief stint at homesteading in the Dakota Territory, he made his way to Boston. Like many youths of twenty-four, he didn’t know what he wanted to do with his life. For a time, he dreamed of becoming a great orator, and later, a playwright and actor. After he had drifted into what was effectively an adjunct position as a lecturer at the Boston School of Oratory, he tried his hand at fiction writing and discovered his calling. Garland was an ambitious and industrious youth, and soon he began to flood the newspapers and magazines with reviews, poetry, and essays, even as he wrote to the leading writers of the day to test his judgments as he prepared his lectures. (At this point, fiction was still a vague ambition.) A naturally gregarious man with a gift for friendship, before long he made the acquaintance of many of Boston’s writers and intellectuals. His years on the farm had made him deeply sympathetic to the often-arduous life of the working farmer, and his acquaintance with Boston’s literati underscored the comparative cultural deprivation of the Midwest. He therefore seized upon Henry George’s single tax as a remedy, for he believed that a more equitable system of taxation would lead to economic prosperity and a more rewarding cultural life. He became an enthusiastic and vocal lecturer on the single tax and wrote a number of stories combining George’s economic theories with realistic depictions of farm life. When the best of these stories appeared as Main-Travelled Roads in 1891, reviewers praised his method but were disturbed by the bleak subject. “His pictures and incidents of toil, [ x ii]

Introduction

and grime, and discontent are surely wonderfully touching and suggestive,” observed the reviewer for the Chicago Daily Tribune. “But the seamy side, according to Garland, is about all there is to farm life.” While admitting the stories “are singularly vivid and very true,” America regretted that “the seamy side of the Western farmer’s life is the only one revealed.” While the reviewer wished Garland had described the “thousands of farmers” who “have homes of comfort and even elegance” that better suited the prevailing myth of the western farm as a place of nourishing sustenance, he reluctantly admitted that “for power, truth and pathos it would be difficult to find six stories by another American author which would bear comparison to these.”3 Four years (and eight books) later, the controversy increased with his frank depiction of sexuality in his novel of the New Woman, Rose of Dutcher’s Coolly (1895). When it became clear that his realistic stories would not sell and he tired of controversy, he turned to biography, completing Ulysses S. Grant: His Life and Character in 1898 before setting off for the Klondike gold rush in search of new material and then beginning a string of romances set in the Mountain West. While critics in general (then and now) panned the romances, the public responded enthusiastically, and for the first time Garland enjoyed a measure of financial security. Garland had also discovered that lecturing, particularly about the many writers he had met, increased both his reputation and his purse, and his months became fi lled with lecture dates and work with the many clubs and cultural organizations that increasingly came to occupy his life. By 1910, however, Garland had grown tired of cranking out an average of one novel per year; worse, he had become bored with the romance genre, for at age fifty, the passions of youth seemed increasingly distant. As he told his friend William Dean Howells, who had written to note a decline in Garland’s style with his latest novel, Cavanagh, Forest Ranger, and to urge him to return to the subject matter of Main-Travelled Roads: I’m running low on motives. I don’t care to write love-stories or stories of adventure and I can not revert to the prairie life without falling into the reminiscent sadness of the man of fifty. My own belief is that my work is pretty well done but as I remember the cordial endorsement of men like yourself and [Century editor Richard Watson] Gilder I have no reason to complain. I have had in way of honor (and pay) all

[ x iii]

garland in his own time I deserve — probably. I am dissatisfied only on the artistic side. Why does not our literature tally with the big things we do as a people? I had hopes of doing it once but that was only the foolish egotism of youth.4

Twelve years before, in 1898, as he was preparing to set out for the Klondike and becoming mindful that the dangers of the journey made it possible that he might not return, Garland had dictated to a stenographer the story of his life in the form of a semifictional narrative entitled “The Story of Grant McLane.” When he returned, he mined that narrative for parts of Boy Life on the Prairie (1899), a fictional treatment of his childhood and early adolescence in Iowa, which itself was based on a series of six descriptive sketches chronicling one year of a boy’s life on the Iowa prairie that he had published in 1888. In 1911, he dusted off “The Story of Grant McLane” and began to revise what he had written, hoping that a change to nonfiction would reengage his creative energy. Soon he became absorbed in the past as he relived former triumphs. Unlike his fiction, autobiography did not come easily to Garland, for he was baffled about how to tell his story and escape being charged with egotism. That it was published at all is a testament to his belief in the value of his story and his dogged determination to find a form that would resonate with readers. He was convinced the story itself was worthwhile, for he had led an exceedingly fortunate life: from his inauspicious beginnings, he had attained considerable celebrity, both in the United States and abroad; he had authored twenty-nine books and hundreds of magazine articles; he knew virtually every significant writer of his day; and he was well-known throughout the country as a popular lecturer. After many missteps and much revision, in 1914 Garland completed A Son of the Middle Border, a remarkable autobiography in which he combined the story of his life up to 1893 with the story of U.S. westward expansion. The passage of time added perspective to his youthful observations of the closing of the prairie, as the events themselves were now fi ltered through a nostalgic haze. After serialization in Collier’s, the book was published by Macmillan in 1917 to considerable critical acclaim and large sales. Garland had discovered his forte, autobiography, and he ceased publishing fiction. Almost immediately, he set to work on a sequel, carrying his story up to the death of his father in 1914, this time relying on his daily diary, which he had begun keeping in 1898. When A Daughter of the Middle [ x iv]

Franklin Garland (left) and Hamlin Garland, ca. 1881, at the time of Hamlin’s graduation from the Cedar Valley Seminary in Osage, Iowa. Later, Franklin recalled that “Hamlin was the grandest Brother to me that any man ever had.” Courtesy of the University of Southern California, on behalf of USC Libraries Special Collections.

Hamlin Garland in 1887. Joseph E. Chamberlin remembered that “he was of medium height, of supple figure, with abundant brown hair, and wore a rather long, brown beard, that gave him a sort of apostolic appearance.” Courtesy of the University of Southern California, on behalf of USC Libraries Special Collections.

Maple Shade, the Garland home in West Salem, Wisconsin, 1893. Later, neighbor Mary Jane Ewing recollected that “the distant and quiet personality of Garland touched a chord of distaste in the gregarious community which has not to this day been dispelled.” Courtesy of the University of Southern California, on behalf of USC Libraries Special Collections.

Caricature of Garland in 1893 by Art Young, emphasizing Garland’s early fame as a writer of realistic stories of the prairie farm. The accompanying text notes that “Hamlin Garland, author of ‘Main-traveled Roads,’ passed through Chicago the other day bound from the Pacific coast to the blizzard East. He said he knew a heap more about roads than he did when he started.” From the Chicago Inter-Ocean, 22 January 1893. Image courtesy of the West Salem Historical Society.

Sketch of Garland, at the height of his campaign for realism, by Art Young, 28 May 1894. Garland has written: “Contemplating murder — the murder of a romanticist it may be.” From Art Young, Authors’ Readings (New York: Frederick A. Stokes, 1897).

Caricature of Garland at the height of his reputation. Elbert Hubbard, the editor of the Philistine, satirized Garland ruthlessly. In one issue Hubbard opined, “the reason the Spanish capitulated so quickly at Santiago was because [Major General William Rufus] Shafter had Hamlin Garland read to them thro a megaphone from an unpublished Sex Novel.” From the Philistine, August 1899. Image courtesy of The Newberry Library.

Caricature of Garland in 1907, in the heyday of his Western romances. The accompanying text notes, “It will be noted that he rides a pitching pony without bucking-strap or bridle-rein.” From Life, June 1907, 837.

Isabel and Hamlin Garland on the lecture platform around 1922. Isabel remembered, “Father — stubborn, unreasonable, emotionally mercurial — was at the core all warmth and tenderness.” Courtesy of Victoria Doyle-Jones.

Grey Ledge, Garland’s summer home in Onteora, New York. Eldon Hill commented, “Grey Ledge Cottage, on the top of Onteora Mountain, has a studied rusticity combined with a spacious luxury. Only an artist could have built it. . . . In a literary sense, this is holy ground. Here have been painted some of the most vivid factual portraits of literary and artistic chieftains ever left for the enlightenment of posterity.” Courtesy of the University of Southern California, on behalf of USC Libraries Special Collections.

Hamlin Garland on the lecture platform in 1934. Carroll Sibley noted, “I well recollect that the first time I met him I immediately thought of the resemblance he bore to both Nathaniel Hawthorne and Mark Twain. Certain it is there was a Jovian quality in his physical magnificence, which the quiet authority and restrained strength of his personality helped to make Olympic.” Courtesy of the University of Southern California, on behalf of USC Libraries Special Collections.

Zulime and Hamlin Garland. Lee Meriwether remembered, “I found my old friend mellowed by Time, the picture of Old Age at its best, kindly, courteous, his face framed above by a shock of hair that, while graying, was not yet wholly white.” Courtesy of Victoria Doyle-Jones.

Introduction

Border was published in 1921, he received the Pulitzer Prize for biography. The prize money enabled him to visit England with his family, where he renewed acquaintances with many of the writers he had met during earlier trips abroad in 1899 and 1906, experiences which were increasingly the subjects of his lectures. During that trip he began work on the third installment of his autobiography, this time a semifictional prequel entitled Trail-Makers of the Middle Border (1926), which combined the story of his father’s westward migration with a fictionalized version of his service in the Civil War. The fourth volume, Back-Trailers from the Middle Border, followed in 1928, carrying his story to 1928. Even as he was completing Back-Trailers, George Brett, the president of Macmillan’s U.S. branch, had been urging him to write a volume of literary reminiscences based on his daily diary, designed to capitalize on Garland’s wide range of celebrity acquaintances and timed to appear shortly after the publication of Back-Trailers to appeal to readers who relished gossip about literary figures. At first Garland demurred, for no one knew better than he how extensive those acquaintances were: the sheer magnitude of the job was overwhelming. Then, too, he worried about how to proceed, for his middle-border saga had interwoven his career with his family history, and he was wary of the required repetition. But Harold Latham, who had become his editor at Macmillan, argued that few readers would compare the twin series, and eventually Garland agreed. Roadside Meetings was published in 1930 after serialization in the Bookman. Three other volumes followed — Companions on the Trail (1931), My Friendly Contemporaries (1932), and Afternoon Neighbors (1934) — and Garland completed a fifth volume entitled “Fortunate Exiles.” But even Macmillan’s enthusiasm could not trump lackluster sales and the economic effects of the Depression, and the volume languishes among the Garland papers at the University of Southern California. Garland wrote eight autobiographies in two series, totaling more than 3,800 pages, so one might justifiably wonder what more we can learn from a collection of reminiscences. All autobiographers construct an image of themselves, and Garland is particularly noteworthy in that he constructed a public myth in the middle-border books in which his family stood as an exemplar of prairie settlers and he as a representative midwesterner. In those books he recounted his own successes and failures against the backdrop of [ x x iii]

garland in his own time

a prairie youth who pulled himself up by the bootstraps to achieve international prominence. While Garland was frank in admitting his professional limitations, of necessity he excluded elements of his life that did not fit the myth he was constructing, and like most people, he lacked sufficient distance from events to evaluate his achievements objectively. Absent also was any awareness of the effect of his strong personality upon others. Garland in His Own Time presents candid portraits of Garland at various points in his long career without the omissions, obfuscations, or mythmaking of his autobiographies. For example, in A Daughter of the Middle Border, Garland depicts his courtship of Zulime Taft from the point of view of a man who is mindful of his own limitations and who nevertheless cannot believe that a charming, attractive, and talented artist would want to marry him. “I was perfectly well aware that as a husband I would prove neither lovely nor joyous,” he confessed. “My temper was not habitually cheerful. Like most writers, I was self-absorbed, fi lled with a sense of the importance of my literary designs.”5 Frank though he is in acknowledging his own limitations, Garland only tells part of the story. His daughter Isabel Garland Lord* later recalled: Zulime Taft was not in love with Hamlin Garland when she married him. She had numerous admirers, and Father was frank in explaining the difficulty he had in persuading the lovely, young artist to accept him. Mother said she had admired Hamlin, and liked him, but love as a physical passion had no part in it. “I don’t quite know why I did it,” she said with a half-smile, lying back on her pillows in the darkened room where I sat by her bedside. “Except he was handsome, distinguished, much talked about. And [my brother] Lorado liked him.”

Omitted also from this public myth is any mention of Zulime’s affair in the early years of their marriage, which almost destroyed it. As Isabel concludes, “once I had heard Mother’s confession, many things about my father became clearer to me. He was a proud, self-centered man. It must have turned his world to dust and ashes.” Other qualities of his personality that Garland was either blind to or chose to omit from the public record are his seriousness, impatience with others’ limitations, and sensitivity to criticism, which those who knew him best often described as egotism or humorlessness. Thus Robert Burns Peattie,* who knew him in 1892, recalled that “so dense was his egotism that [ x x iv]

Introduction

when [his closest friend Henry Blake] Fuller cruelly satirized him in a story he inquired who Fuller meant.” In the pages of his magazine of satiric commentary, the Philistine, Elbert Hubbard* delighted in pointing out “the spectacle of Ham Garland’s unselfish devotion to the Ego projected by his own literary consciousness.” And even Charles Fletcher Lummis,* who would become a good friend, once remarked, “Hamlin Garland is a worthy young man and a talented writer who has already been laughed at probably more than he deserves. Lacking the sense of humor himself, he naturally provokes the smiles of those who have it, even while they respect his astonishing seriousness.” At the time Garland elicited these comments, he was in the midst of an often-strident campaign on behalf of American realism, in which he flooded the magazines with a number of articles, each more vociferous than the last, deriding the reliance upon Eastern standards and arguing for the ascendancy of the West. When he collected these essays in his literary manifesto Crumbling Idols (1894), critics were quick to pounce. “All that Mr. Garland says of the virtues of originality and truth to nature is but the thousandth repetition of propositions that are dangerously near to platitudes for any well-read person,” claimed the reviewer for the Literary World. Another observed that the essays were “a trifle hysterical,” and the Independent opined that “Mr. Garland’s egotism is not disagreeable; it does not excite a perverse spirit of opposition; we are compelled to accept it in the same spirit that would control us were a big, hearty, wellfed, uneducated Western plowboy to demand recognition as president of Harvard College or professor of Greek at Yale.”6 His articles, and his personality, prompted both satire and parody in the form of caricatures in the magazines, columns of vituperative comment, and lampoons. (See the reminiscences by Eugene Field,* as well as the illustrations included in this volume.)7 Yet this same quality of idealistic vehemence could also prompt admiration. Thus William Dean Howells,* who also was the target of negative press, remembered, “I suppose we were friends in the beginning, and never foes, because he had strong convictions too, and they were flatteringly like mine.” Joseph E. Chamberlin* of the Boston Evening Transcript, the newspaper that published his earliest work, remembered that “he had no ‘bounce’; was no button-holer, but just a sincere, wholesome prairie spirit” who “would not equivocate or compromise or deny anything that he really [ x x v]

garland in his own time

believed in.” And B. O. Flower,* publisher of the Arena and the editor who more than any other gave Garland his start, “cherish[ed] the memory of many happy hours spent with him.” Still others preferred to remember Garland’s generosity to those just starting out in the writing game. “It is impossible to think of Garland without thinking of his kindness, the greatness of heart that was in all of his work and in all of his life,” remembered Booth Tarkington,* referring to Garland’s favorable reader’s report for his first novel, The Gentleman from Indiana (1899), which inaugurated a career that included two Pulitzer Prizes. The prolific novelist Kathleen Norris,* who was married to the brother of Garland’s good friend Frank Norris, remembered Garland’s words of encouragement at the outset of her career: his simple “You have something precious. Dickens had it. Keep on” left her “stunned with ecstasy.” And Gladys Hasty Carroll,* meeting Garland in 1933 during a fi lm adaptation of her novel As the Earth Turns, recalled that his presence was a tonic: “I came away from him with what I hope is a fi xed conviction that life is beautiful and important and that whatever is written about it should be equally so.” Garland’s professional career spanned fifty-five years, a period in which he published forty-seven books and hundreds of magazine articles, but it was also a period that saw much change in the American literary scene. When he published his first story in 1885, realism was then just becoming a dominant genre. He mined the veins of realism until 1916, when he published his last book of fiction, the story collection They of the High Trails; but he also witnessed the rise and ascendency of modernism while he was composing his autobiographies. He did not react well to it. In letters, essays, and conversations he derided modernist subjects as “pornography” and the writing methods as “journalistic.” As a member of the 1921 Pulitzer Prize jury for drama, for example, he lobbied against awarding the prize to Eugene O’Neill’s Anna Christie, explaining in a letter to jury chair William Lyon Phelps that “it seems to me we have had too much pornographic literature this year. The Pulitzer Prize should not add to its vogue. I hate the whole school which is essentially unAmerican. Its writers are — in many cases — for revenue only.”8 His younger contemporaries commented on Garland’s blindness to the innovations of the modernists (as August Derleth* remembered, “I felt that in some ways he seemed to be a Puritan — not prim or prudish, no, [ x x vi]

Introduction

but a trifle puritanical”), even as they profited from his immense store of personal recollection of the writers that had become the subjects of books about American literature. Fred Lewis Pattee,* Oscar Cargill,* and Van Wyck Brooks* are just a few of the critics who based parts of their books on Garland’s recollections and who reminisced about his influence in letters and autobiographies. In his final decade, Garland moved to Hollywood to be near his daughters, and the relocation exacted a toll on his spirits as he felt more and more distant, literally and metaphorically, from the clubs and literary talk of New York that had sustained him. Feeling out of step with contemporary literary culture and preoccupied with his past as he composed his literary reminiscences and attempted in some measure to justify his place in American letters, he also took up a renewed interest in psychic investigation, an enthusiasm of his Boston years. A number of reminiscences concern Garland’s psychic pursuits, ranging from those of Harold Latham,* who believed that Garland “remained a skeptic to the end, but a skeptic with an open mind,” to those of people who patiently listened to Garland relate his investigations and then avoided him, “even though our consciences burned,” as Paul Jordan-Smith* recalled. “Mine still burns, for I know how lonely he was.” Of singular importance to this volume of reminiscences is an earnest fan named Eldon Hill,* who as a twenty-three-year-old graduate student initiated an extensive correspondence with Garland, who became the subject of Hill’s PhD thesis, the first on Garland, which was completed in 1940 at Ohio State University as “A Biographical Study of Hamlin Garland from 1860 to 1895.” For eleven years, beginning in 1929, Hill peppered Garland with letters as he traced the writer’s accomplishments, visited him several times, and made extensive diary notes about his visits; he also wrote to a number of Garland’s contemporaries to verify details of Garland’s achievements. Garland was flattered by Hill’s attention, which came at a time when Garland believed the public had lost interest in him. “It is a source of encouragement,” Garland wrote to Hill on 11 February 1929, “to have one of the younger men, so genuinely interested in my work. I am grateful.” By 1934 Garland was routinely addressing his letters to “My Dear Young Advocate,” and replying carefully and often in detail to Hill’s many questions about phases in Garland’s career. But Garland cautioned Hill against relying too heavily upon him. “Dont send any of your manuscript to me,” [ x x vii]

garland in his own time

he wrote on 15 December 1934. “If I read it, I shall be accused of trying to revise it. I prefer to have you go ahead and say just what comes to your mind.” By then Garland had also noticed Hill’s tendency toward hero worship and his uncritical acceptance of everything he said. “Dont be afraid to run counter to my judgments,” he warned him, “you must do so in order to have the proper balance in your paper. Give your honest reactions no matter how uncomplimentary they may seem to my readers.”9 After Hill completed his dissertation, he embarked upon a full-scale biography of Garland. In 1950 he placed an announcement of his intent in the New York Times and asked to hear from people who had known Garland. He received a good number of replies from people including Fred Lewis Pattee, Carl Van Doren, William Ellery Leonard,* Robert Morse Lovett, Oscar Cargill, and Gladys Hasty Carroll, as well as detailed memoirs from Garland’s brother Franklin* and his wife Alice.* These letters are of singular importance in their revelations of the effects of Garland’s personality upon others, as well as of his eccentricities.10 The texts reprinted in this volume are either from the earliest printed versions of those that were published or from manuscripts for those that were not published. In preparing them for publication, for print sources I have silently corrected obvious typographical errors and have regularized date format but have let stand original spelling, punctuation, capitalization, and inconsistent use of the dash. On occasion I have supplied missing punctuation or names of authors and titles in brackets. For manuscript sources, I have regularized title mechanics (for instance, book titles in italics), terminal punctuation, and placement of dates. To avoid confusion with editorial emendation, I have not transcribed ellipses and have replaced brackets with parentheses where they appear in the manuscript. Complete bibliographic information is given in a note following each text. I have indicated with an asterisk (*) when a text cited in this introduction has been reprinted in this volume. I am grateful to the interlibrary loan staff of Randall Library at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, especially Sophie Williams, who as always was extraordinarily helpful in tracking down sometimes obscure references. I also thank Sue Cody of Randall Library for helping identify genealogical information. I am especially indebted to Samantha Faber, my student assistant, whose nimble fingers quickly and accurately transcribed [ x x viii]

Introduction

many of the source texts; and to Dean David Cordle of the University of North Carolina Wilmington, who provided a semester’s research leave that enabled me to devote my attention to this book. This volume would not have been possible without the aid and consent to publish from a number of archives and publishers, whom I gratefully acknowledge in the list of permissions elsewhere in this volume. Finally, I thank Robin Briggs Newlin, who remains a beacon in the night. Notes 1. 25 February 1940, Hamlin Garland’s Diaries, ed. Donald Pizer (San Marino, CA: Huntington Library Press, 1968), 74. 2. Selected Letters of Hamlin Garland, ed. Keith Newlin and Joseph B. McCullough (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998), 369. 3. “Main-Traveled Roads,” Chicago Daily Tribune, 13 June 1891, 12; “Pictures of Western Farm Life,” America 6 (18 June 1891), 332, 333. 4. 29 March 1910, Selected Letters, 99–100. 5. A Daughter of the Middle Border (New York: Macmillan, 1921), 118. 6. “Crumbling Idols,” Literary World, 2 June 1894, 164, rev. of “Crumbling Idols,” Book Buyer 11 (July 1894): 308; “Mr. Hamlin Garland’s Essays,” Independent, 21 June 1894, 801. 7. For examples of satire and parody, see Henry Blake Fuller, “The Downfall of Abner Joyce,” in Under the Skylights (New York: D. Appleton, 1901), 1–140, which satirizes Garland’s rise from realism to acquiescence in marriage; for an example of parodic treatment of Garland’s theories about American literature, see George Merriam Hyde, “Grumbling Realists and Great Story-Tellers,” Midland Monthly 5 (April 1896): 327–30. 8. 28 April [1922], Selected Letters, 299. 9. Garland to Hill, 11 February 1929, 15 December 1934, Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. 10. While Hill did complete the biography, he was unable to fi nd a publisher for it, and the biography, together with boxes of earlier drafts and notes, languishes among Hill’s papers. Letters from publishers to whom Hill sent the manuscript offer a variety of reasons why they declined the book, ranging from paper shortages to Garland’s fading reputation to lack of a potential market. But the reason for the lack of interest is not hard to fathom, for Hill was unable to overcome his devotion to Garland and see the writer objectively. The manuscript does not ever evaluate Garland critically or even take note of his many weaknesses. Surprisingly, the manuscript also lacks documentation, apparently in an effort to appeal to a more general readership.

[ x x ix ]

Chronology

X 1856

3 august. Marriage of Richard Garland (b. 1830) and Isabelle McClintock (b. 1838)

1859

15 april. Birth of Harriet Garland in West Salem, Wisconsin

1860

14 september. Birth of Hannibal Hamlin Garland (HG), in West Salem, Wisconsin

1863

11 march. Birth of Franklin McClintock Garland in Green’s Coolly, near Onalaska, Wisconsin 24 december. Richard Garland volunteers for 14th Regiment, Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry

1865

9 october. Richard Garland discharged from military service

1869

february. Garland family moves to a farm two miles west of the town of Hesper, in Winneshiek County, Iowa 6 june. Birth of Jessie Viola Garland in Hesper, Iowa

1870

march. Garland family moves to a rented farm six miles west, on edge of Burr Oak Township, Winneshiek County 14 march. Birth of Zulime Mauna Taft august. Garland family moves to a farm in Burr Oak Township, Mitchell County, about fifty miles west-southwest of Burr Oak, Winneshiek farm

1872

september. Garland family moves to a farm six miles west of Osage, Iowa

1875

5 may. Death of Harriet Garland june. Richard Garland takes job with Grange Elevator in Osage

1876

march. Garland family moves to Osage october. HG and Franklin begin attending Cedar Valley Seminary in Osage [xxxi]

garland in his own time 1877

february. Franklin stops attending Seminary 21 march. Garland family returns to farm

1881

may. Garland family begins homesteading near Ordway, Dakota Territory 15 june. Graduates from Cedar Valley Seminary september. Leaves Iowa farm and, after a brief visit to Dakota homestead, travels in the Midwest, taking odd jobs

1882

july. Travels to New England with Franklin october. Teaches school in Grundy County, Illinois

1883

april. Begins homesteading in McPherson County, Dakota Territory

1884

spring. Reads Henry George’s Progress and Poverty october. Sells claim and moves to Boston; at the public library, immerses himself in the study of literature, Charles Darwin, Herbert Spencer, and John Fiske

1885

spring. Attends classes at the Boston School of Oratory march. “Ten Years Dead,” his first published story, appears in Every Other Saturday summer. Begins teaching at the Boston School of Oratory

1887

spring. Meets William Dean Howells july–september. Visits Chicago, Osage, Ordway, Onalaska, Wisconsin; conscience is awakened by hardships of farm life november. Becomes a single-tax lecturer

1888

january. “Boy Life on the Prairie” sketches begin appearing in the American july–september. Second visit to the Midwest july. Isabelle Garland suffers a stroke 26 september. Meets Walt Whitman

1889

may. Meets James A. Herne 4 september. Marriage of Jessie Garland to Albert Knapp in Ordway, South Dakota 7 september. “Under the Lion’s Paw” published in Harper’s Weekly

1890

summer. Meets B. O. Flower july. Under the Wheel published in the Arena [ x x x ii]

Chronology 11 october. Death of Jessie Garland Knapp 30 october. Reads A Member of the Third House at Chickering Hall 1891

18 may. Joins the American Psychical Society (elected to board of directors) 31 may. With Herne, forms the First Independent Theater Association june. Main-Travelled Roads published summer. Meets Stephen Crane; campaigns in Iowa for the Farmers’ Alliance fall. Resigns from the Boston School of Oratory

1892

january. Becomes president of the American Psychical Society march. Jason Edwards published april. A Member of the Third House published june. A Little Norsk published september. A Spoil of Office published after serialization in the Arena november. “The West in Literature,” the first of four essays arguing for a realistic literature that does not look to Eastern standards, is published in the Arena

1893

february. Prairie Folks published summer. Buys a home in West Salem, Wisconsin, variously referred to as “Maple Shade” and the “Homestead,” and moves his parents to it 14 july. Delivers “Local Color in Fiction” at the World’s Columbian Exposition december. Main-Travelled Roads and Prairie Folks reissued by Stone and Kimball 15 december. Moves to New York City and rooms with Franklin

1894

january. Prairie Songs (poetry) published april. Settles in Chicago (474 Elm Street). Meets Henry B. Fuller, who becomes a close friend may. Crumbling Idols published. Central Art Association formed, with HG as president

1895

summer. First extensive tour of Colorado and New Mexico, gathering material on American Indians [ x x x iii]

garland in his own time 15 august. Marriage of Franklin Garland to Stella Esther Burkhart december. Rose of Dutcher’s Coolly published and Prairie Folks reissued, both by Stone and Kimball 1896

january. Accepts commission from McClure’s Magazine to begin a serial biography of Ulysses S. Grant summer. Visits a number of Western Indian reservations

1897

5 february. Death of Stella Garland june. Wayside Courtships published by D. Appleton, which also reissues Jason Edwards, A Spoil of Office, and A Member of the Third House july. Takes a trip through the West with Franklin, living on several Indian reservations. Joins the Players Club (New York)

1898

3 may–22 september. Travels to the Klondike gold fields september. Ulysses S. Grant: His Life and Character published 3 november. Begins courtship of Zulime Taft

1899

11 february. Attends first meeting of the National Institute of Arts and Letters, of which he is a charter member, and drafts its constitution 19 april–24 june. First trip to England may. The Trail of the Goldseekers and revised editions of Rose of Dutcher’s Coolly and Prairie Folks published by Macmillan november. Boy Life on the Prairie and an expanded edition of Main-Travelled Roads published by Macmillan 18 november. Marries Zulime Taft

1900

april–may. Travels with Zulime to Indian reservations october. The Eagle’s Heart published 26 november. Death of Isabelle Garland

1901

april. Her Mountain Lover published 2 june. Death of James A. Herne 26 june. Birth of son (stillborn) fall. Becomes involved in agitation for Indian rights and composition of stories of the American Indian 16 november. Marriage of Richard Garland to Mary Gilfi llan Bolles [ x x x iv]

Chronology 1902

april. The Captain of the Gray Horse Troop published

1903

15 july. Birth of Mary Isabel Garland in West Salem, Wisconsin 8 october. Hesper published december. Invests in Mexican gold mine with Franklin

1904

7 february. Meets Theodore Dreiser 5 may. The Light of the Star published december. The American Academy of Arts and Letters is formed

1905

4 may. The Tyranny of the Dark published

1906

24 may–2 september. Takes second trip to England september. Witch’s Gold published 30 october. Mary Isabel contracts diphtheria 20 december. Moves to 6427 Greenwood Avenue, Chicago

1907

25 january. Elected as a vice-president of the National Institute of Arts and Letters (reelected each year until 1915) 18 april. The Long Trail published 18 june. Birth of Constance Garland in Chicago, Illinois 10 october. Money Magic published 6 november. Forms the Cliff Dwellers, a Chicago literary club modeled after the Players Club

1908

8 october. The Shadow World published

1909

29 january. Miller of Boscobel, HG’s first performed play, is presented in Wisconsin (on 29 and 30 January) and in Chicago (on 3 February) 9 october. The Moccasin Ranch published

1910

3 march. Cavanagh, Forest Ranger published 19 october. Other Main-Travelled Roads published

1911

11 may. Becomes secretary of the Chicago Theater Society 21 october. Victor Ollnee’s Discipline published

1912

8 may. Marriage of Franklin Garland to Alice Field 6 october. The Garland “Homestead” in West Salem, Wisconsin, burns 9 december. Eight-volume Sunset Edition issued by Harper. Helps form the Authors’ League [ x x x v]

garland in his own time 1913

13 november. Organizes a Chicago meeting of the National Institute of Arts and Letters

1914

5 february. The Forester’s Daughter published 28 march. Begins serial of A Son of the Middle Border in Collier’s 21 october. Death of Richard Garland 9 december. Organizes Society of Midland Authors

1915

11 january. Ousted as president of Cliff Dwellers spring. Begins suffering from sciatica

1916

april. They of the High Trails published may. Garland family moves to New York 28 june. Film of Hesper released by Vitagraph Studios, the first of four novels to be adapted into fi lms july. Leases a seventh-floor flat at 71 East 92nd Street 29 july. Buys a summer cottage in Tannersville, New York, “Camp Neshonoc”

1917

8 april–5 may. Goes to Battle Creek Sanitarium for treatment of sciatica august. A Son of the Middle Border published

1918

11 january. Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters march. Begins service as a Pulitzer Prize juror (serves annually until 1924)

1919

6 january. Death of Theodore Roosevelt; begins work for the Roosevelt Memorial Association 6 november. Elected to Century Association

1920

11 may. Death of William Dean Howells 29 april. Elected acting secretary of the American Academy (serves until 21 November 1921) october. Ulysses S. Grant reissued by Macmillan

1921

1 november. A Daughter of the Middle Border published

1922

may. Twelve-volume Border Edition issued by Harper. Receives Pulitzer Prize for Daughter 31 May–22 October. Takes family to England

[ x x x vi]

Chronology november. Begins lectures on Middle Border with Mary Isabel, as well as lectures entitled “Personal Reminiscences of Famous English Authors” 1923

7 june–7 august. Garland family returns to England october. The Book of the American Indian published

1924

3 june–24 august. Spends summer alone in England

1925

10 june–17 july. Spends summer alone in England 30 august. Buys summer home in Onteora, New York, “Grey Ledge” 19 october. Moves to 507 Cathedral Parkway, New York

1926

12 may. Marriage of Mary Isabel Garland to Hardesty Johnson 21 june. Receives honorary degree from the University of Wisconsin october. Trail-Makers of the Middle Border published

1927

28 july. Marriage of Constance Garland to Joseph Wesley Harper

1928

21 january. Prairie Song and Western Story published october. Back-Trailers from the Middle Border published

1929

29 july. Death of Henry B. Fuller 26 september. Birth of John Wesley Harper (grandson)

1930

2 january. Construction begins on house at 2045 De Mille Drive, Hollywood 16 june. Receives honorary degree from Beloit College 16 september. Roadside Meetings published after serialization in the Bookman 31 december. Birth of Constance Garland Harper (granddaughter)

1931

24 june. Receives the Roosevelt Memorial Association Medal for Distinguished Service august. Zulime Garland begins displaying symptoms of Parkinson’s disease september. Companions on the Trail published. Moves permanently to Hollywood

[ x x x vii]

garland in his own time 1932

september. My Friendly Contemporaries published october. Resigns from the board of directors of the American Academy because of residence in California

1933

march. Begins séances with Dora Drane 3 june. Receives honorary degree from Northwestern University 14 september. Seventy-third birthday celebration dinner

1934

june. Separation of Mary Isabel from Hardesty Johnson october. Afternoon Neighbors published

1935

23 november. Receives honorary degree from the University of Southern California

1936

april. Forty Years of Psychic Research published 2 april. An exhibit of Garland’s books, manuscripts, and memorabilia opens at the University of Southern California before going on a four-year tour 30 october. Death of Lorado Taft november. Separation of Constance Garland from Joseph Harper 21 december. Marriage of Mary Isabel and Mindret Lord

1937

22 january. Filmmaker Guy D. Haselton completes a two-reel, sixteen-millimeter biographical fi lm of HG 9 march. Begins séances with psychic Sophia Williams as he explores legitimacy of the Violet Parent buried crosses

1938

10 november. Makes his final address to the American Academy, the Edwin Blashfield Lecture, published as “Literary Fashions Old and New”

1939

15 may. The Mystery of the Buried Crosses published 14 september. Makes a radio broadcast for the Strange as It Seems program, on The Mystery of the Buried Crosses

1940

4 march. Dies of a cerebral hemorrhage

1942

17 december. Death of Zulime Garland

1945

8 may. Death of Franklin Garland

1988

16 november. Death of Constance Garland Doyle 19 november. Death of Mary Isabel Garland Lord

[ x x x viii]

Garland in His Own Time

[Garland’s Iowa, Dakota, and Boston Years, 1874–1890] Fr a nk lin Ga r l a nd

X Hamlin Garland was born in West Salem, Wisconsin, on 14 September 1860. When he was eight years old, the Garland family moved to the first of four Iowa farms, eventually settling on a tract of land near Osage in September 1872. In the fall of 1876, Garland enrolled in the Cedar Valley Seminary in Osage, an institution that provided college-preparatory classes during a time when Osage had no high school. When Garland graduated in 1881, he left to take a tour of the East and find work, returning in 1883 to join his family in the Dakota Territory, where they had established a homestead near Ordway in the James Valley, near present-day Aberdeen, South Dakota. With his brother Franklin (1863–1945) and school friend Charles Babcock, Garland established a homestead in McPherson County before selling his claim for two hundred dollars in 1884. The proceeds enabled him to move to Boston, where he hoped to continue his education. In this letter and its accompanying “side lights,” Franklin provides the only extant account of Garland’s early life apart from Garland’s own narrative in A Son of the Middle Border. As is common with memories of events from years in the past, Franklin confuses chronology at some points in his recounting: when he graduated in June 1881, Garland first skittered about trying to find a job as a teacher and then joined his family for two weeks in the Dakota Territory before leaving for the East. Franklin joined him in July 1882; by April 1883, Garland was homesteading in Dakota before selling his claim and leaving for Boston in October 1884. I have retained Franklin’s idiosyncrasies in spelling and capitalization.

july 19 1940 My Dear Mr. Hill: — I am sorry I cant give you any information about the Girl Alice,1 as I never met her, and Hamlin was not much of a hand to talk about matters of that kind. [1]

garland in his own time

I was born March 11th, 1863, in Greens Coulee, some ten miles from Hamlins birth place in West Salem. Mother was born some place in Ohio April 16th, 1848. While Hamlin was attending the Seminary, I was at home doing the chores and keeping up the Farm work on the assumption that I was to have my chance when he had finished, but my chance never came. Conditions got so bad Father could not spare me or the money, then he sold the Farm and we moved to Dakota. A wildly beautifull land the first two or three years we lived there. When I first roamed those prairies Buffalo Carcases dotted the plain like hay-cocks in a hay meadow. The ground was so smoothe you could drive anywhere with a Horse and buggy, regardless of roads, and the most invigorating Air. Wish I could live it over again. I am also enclosing a few little side lights, that may possibly be of interest to you, if not to the reading public. Any way I hope they may be of some use. Most Cordially Yours, Franklin Garland Notes of the Early Life of Hamlin Garland During the years from 14 to 17 of Hamlins life, we both belonged to a Baseball team composed of farm boys, Hamlin was our Star Pitcher and was a good one. He threw the curves, and had one particularly effective sinker that had the big boys swinging wildly and missing. He was so effective that we beat the County seat team more often than they did us. I played short in the line-up, but was pretty light to be much of service. Also during these years, this was while he was attending the Cedar Valley Seminary, he was reading Shakespeare, and other High-brow works, which he would tell me about during his week end visits at home. The Sword fights in Shakespeare made a great hit with both of us so we fashioned Broad Swords out of some tough Elm timber we had, then we engaged some very lively fights, though probably [not] very expert. But we had loads of fun at it. We both rode Horses like wild Indians, bare-back mostly, until I won a saddle at a County fair, then we took turns using the Saddle while the other one used a blanket with a Circingle.2 We indulged in some wonderful races [2]

Franklin Garland

over the Prairies. We did a lot of the Cowboy stuff, swinging down to pick wild flowers with our mounts on the dead run, throwing our hats ahead to be picked up also with the horses on the dead run. Then lean down, unbuckle the saddle, throw it to the ground, unbuckle the Bridle, throw that aside then ride without anything to guide the Pony but the swaying of the Body or the touch of the hands on the side of the neck, things which we had taught the Horses with many hours of patient endeavor, then return, pick up the Saddle and Bridle just to fi ll up the time. When I was 18, Hamlin had graduated from the Seminary. Father sold our Iowa Farm, and moved us to Dakota Territory in the upper Jim Valley, where he established a general store in which I was installed as a Clerk. Hamlin had gone out on his own, part of the time he taught School, and part of the time he worked as Carpenters helper, and the way that boy could lay shingles was something to see. He would fi ll his Mouth with shingle nails, lay a row of Shingles[,] then with a one two tap of the hammer he would keep a continuous stream of nails from his mouth to the shingles til the row was all nailed down. He was always fast at any work that he undertook. One sunday when he was visiting us at the Home on the Homestead which Father had fi led on, he had been writing on something, and came out to sit on the Door step beside me to read it to me, — during his early writings, he always tried it out on me “as the Dog.” He said I was of ordinary intelligence and if it went with me, the general public would like it, well anyway while listening to his reading I was watching a big black cloud forming in the southwest, and being experienced in such matters I knew what was coming. One could see for many miles across those Dakota plains, and by the time he had finished the story, the storm, a young Cyclone no less, had reached to within a couple of miles of our place hitting a wheat field, and what it did to that wheat was something spectacular to be hold. I had been watching it carefully, and was sure it was passing to the South of us, but close enough so that we would get part of it, and as he finished I called his attention to it and we went inside, closed all the doors and windows, and we weathered it with little damage to our place. On our way to town next morning we saw a neighbors House had been picked up bodily and set down again on its Roof, apparently without very little damage. A cute little way with Cyclones. The following Spring he came back and together we took a camp outfit [ 3]

garland in his own time

and drove some twenty odd miles out in to McPherson County where we fi led Timber Claims, 3 built a little board store building, installed a little stock of goods to supply the neighboring settlers, with a living room at the back. We took in an old schoolmate, Charles Babcock, to live with us. I ran the store and did the Cooking for the outfit while Hamlin and Charles did the necessary improvements on our claims. The point of this incident, is that during his leisure hours, Hamlin, continuing his literary studies, covered the walls of our living quarters with Charts of English literature, from a way back up to then. He had it in periods, classes, epochs, cycles and what have you. As I look back upon it now it seems like great performance. It was preparing for his Teaching Job at the Boston School of Oratory in Boston. In the Fall of 1883 we sold our Claims after proving up on them, and Hamlin went back to his teaching and I started for Valparaiso Indiana to attend the Northern Indiana Normal School. We met by pre-arrangement at Madison Wisconsin, and promoted a little Amusement Company composed of Hamlin as Lecturer and Myself as Manager, ticket seller, door keeper and all around flunky. I think we lasted about three nights out in the Country districts. Then he went to his School and I continued on to Valparaiso. It was when our several terms were over, that we got together again in Chicago for our celebrated trip to New England, Bunker Hill, the White Mountains, Fathers birth place, Etc, which He has written about.4 Roxbury and Jamaica Plain Episodes Early in October 1886 I received a letter from Hamlin saying he had found a job for me in Roxbury with a distant Cousin of ours who owned a large Clothing Store. I was, at the time enjoying life, pitching grain to or with a big Steam Threshing outfit near Ordway, Brown County South Dakota. And on Saturday night, I stuck my fork in the ground announced to all and sundry, especially my employers, that I was leaving them, also the land of the Dakota’s for good. That night I packed my Paper Mache Bag and my Tin Trunk, and the next day, Bidding my folks Good Bye, I climbed aboard the Train bound for Boston, where I arrived some four or five days later, so green that the Cows nibbled at me as I walked across the Common. [4]

Franklin Garland

Hamlin met me and took me out to introduce me to Mr. Lawrence, of the Clothing store, and to my prospective Land Lady, Mrs. Hutchinson, a charming elderly Lady, where [I] lived during my two years in Boston. On Monday morning, I took up my duties as Clerk in said Clothing store. And as they say in the Studio’s in hollywood, “get this, it’s good.” My only experience in Clerking had been in My Uncle Dick’s store in Onalaska Wis, for a few months the winter I was 17, and then in Fathers “wamberger grocery and dry goods emporium” in Ordway So. Dakota. My cousin ran his business on the Jew Plan, and his head salesman took me in hand and gave me all the instructions I was to get in the art of selling Jew fashion. He said “Suppose a man comes in and wants a pair of Five dollar pants, you try to sell him at Five dollars, if he wont pay that try Four Fifty, and failing that, make it Four, then Three Fifty, and if he still holds, Turn him over to the head Salesman.” I think that gives you the picture — Oh yes I was to receive Six dollars per for these most valuable services, of course I was a High-class Wash-out. Mr. Lawrence kept me on for a couple of months, then he very Kindly secured a book-keeping place for me with the shawmut ave. Street Car Company, where I was more at home as I had graduated from the Valparaiso Commercial College, with very good grade. Meantime Hamlin and I were together as much as we could be, going to the Beaches in the summer, and to Theatres and Symphony Concerts, and during the Grand Opera season Each Saturday Night would find us each with his two bits clasped tightly in his right fist, waiting at the Gallery door for it to open when we made the mad rush up two or three hundred steps to the top gallery where we would sit and drink in That Glorious Music. In order to get good seats we had to be in line by Six thirty, but with our limited Capital that was our only chance. But it was pretty wonderful for two green country boobs. Then again when booth and barrett, came to the old Boston Theatre, we did the same thing over again to see the Marvelous acting of Edwin Booth and his Company. Way up in the top of the Gallery, but we could see and hear perfectly up there, in fact I found we could hear the Music better up there than we could on the first floor at a later time. Hamlin lived with Dr. Cross and family in Jamaica Plain, for many years, they were grand people, and treated him as a son.5 And were most cordial to me whenever I visited Hamlin there. Jamaica Plain is a beautiful Suburb, [5]

garland in his own time

and in Winter we used to go Skating on Jamaica Pond a beautiful little lake only a short distance from the Cross home. And one day we were Idling about doing some fancy figures, when I saw a chap across the pond doing stunts backward, suddenly throw up his arms and disappear in an Air-hole in the Ice. I recalled seeing a ladder some 15 or 20 feet long lying near another hole not far away, and we made for that; I grabbed it by the large end and pushed it across the Pond to the Boy in the water. He had had presence of mind to come up and lay his arms out over the Ice, and not wear himself out threshing about; Hamlin took the front end of the ladder, and laying on his stomach, got close enough to the boy to push the top rung of the ladder to him and get him to grab it and hold tight while we pulled him out. A couple of his friends took him one on each side, he was pretty badly chilled by that time, and escorted him home. A young man standing by, came up to us and tried to persuade us to apply for a Rescue Medal, but we were not interested, or possibly too green. A few months after I entered the Street Car office that Company Consolidated with the larger Company, which controlled most of the lines in the City, and Our office was closed. I was again unemployed. Then began a strenuous time for the “Greenhorn” from Dakota, hunting another job. I walked the streets, answered all the Ads in the Papers, annoyed office managers, Merchants etc, and what have you for six solid weeks, to land office work in the osgood furniture store on Washington St. This was a branch store and in several months he closed this place, moving the stock to his main Emporium, and again, yours Truly, as old John L. Sullivan used to say, was on his uppers again. And after another session of six or eight weeks, I was fortunate enough to secure the position of Book-keeper for the Firm of sweetland and burdon, on Milk Street, Wholesale Silverware dealers. Mr. Sweetland was the one who had the experience, Mr. Burdon had the money, and I had the office experience. And believe me it was some experience. I remained with this firm for two years, until I left them to go on the Stage. Mr. Burdon fired me twice during the two years, and hired me back again at an increase in salary each time. While working for them I went to a Dramatic teacher, to prepare for a career on the Stage. When I finished my studies with Edith Stanhope, my instructor, she got me an Engagement as leading man with the flavia cole Company, playing the “Kerosene Circuit” through New England, [ 6]

Franklin Garland

week stands, carrying Thirteen plays, comprising Wild westerns, to Lady of Lyons, and we opened in Narragansett Pier, just ten days after signing my contract. I had to keep up my Books till the Firm could get another Bookkeeper, Study my parts, rehearse every day, and hunt up costumes for the Thirteen plays, and maybe little wille the actor man, wasn’t busy. We played six of these plays the opening week, finishing up on satyrday night with Lady of Lyons. I never was so tired in my life as I was that night, and some people think acting is fun. Hamlin saw my first performance of Claude Melnotte in The Lady of Lyons, and said I “Narrowly missed playing it well.” Meantime Hamlin had met The Hearns, and during the summer vacation he introduced me to Old James A., who signed me up for the part of an old Sea Captain in his play of Hearts of Oak, which I played with him during the season 1889–90. No it wasn’t Hearts of Oak, it was Drifting Apart, the most heart breaking play I ever saw. And the hearns were great actors. Hearn was a great Director, and Playwright.6 I worked around with other Companies for a couple of years then came back to Hearn in 1893 in Shore Acres, and stayed with him the same part for Five years. Another little episode may interest you of an entirely different nature. Hamlin as you Doubtless know, was an enormous reader, and during one of his visits to us in Ordway, he wandered into the office of a young Lawyer who had an office next to our store, looking for something to read, he had read everything we had, even to the labels on the Soap boxes. He asked Mr. Farnham what he had, and the only thing he could raise, that Hamlin had not read, was a copy of Henry George’s Progress and Poverty, the Primer of the Single Tax Theory.7 He asked Farnham if he had read it. He said he had. H. brought it back to the Store. Seated himself in my little Cubby-hole office and started reading. He finished it in two or three hours, then he called me in and said I must read it, which I did, and we were both won to the proposition. After I joined him in Boston and its environs, we joined the Movement there, becoming tremendously interested in it. One night, after the Speaking, [the] Platform manager announced that there would be no meeting the following week, unless they could find a Speaker; I nudged Hamlin and urged him to offer his services, which he did and was joyfully received. He gave a splendid address the following week, and many others thereafter. [7]

garland in his own time

He converted Hearn to the plan, and he made many talks as we toured the Various Cities on our travels, from Coast to coast. During all these years, and in fact all my life, Hamlin was the grandest Brother to me that any man ever had. He was my Sponsor, backer and financier. One of the most exemplary men I ever knew, matched only by Henry George. Notes 1. Franklin refers to his brother’s love interest as recounted in A Son of the Middle Border (241–43), the girl who so affected him that her avatar appeared in “A Branch Road” (as Agnes). 2. Franklin refers to a surcingle, a wide leather strap fastened around the horse’s girth. 3. A timber claim differed from the standard homestead claim in that settlers were granted an additional 160 acres if they agreed to plant at least ten acres in trees — with the idea being to encourage establishing forests on the prairie. 4. Garland had taken a job as a teacher in a county school in Grundy County, Illinois, before taking a position at the Morris Normal and Scientific School in Morris, Illinois, in the fall of 1882. Garland describes the Eastern trip in Son, 267–300. 5. Dr. Hiram Cross (1833–1912) was a practitioner of homeopathy and rented his attic room at 21 Seaverns Avenue in Jamaica Plain to Garland for several years. In 1888 Cross accompanied Garland on a visit to his parents in South Dakota and was instrumental in treating his mother’s stroke, an event Garland recounts in Son, 399–402. 6. Franklin refers to the playwright James A. Herne (1839–1901) and his wife, the actress Katharine Corcoran Herne (1856–1943). Franklin misremembers his role: he played the minor character of the Old Fisherman in Hearts of Oak before taking the role of Josiah Blake in Shore Acres, Herne’s most successful play. 7. The most significant influence of Garland’s early career, Progress and Poverty (1879) argues that competition for natural resources inevitably leads to the rising price of land (the “unearned increment”). Landowners accumulate wealth through speculation as they accumulate parcels of land, while renters are burdened with taxes on their improvements to the land. To break the paradox of progress and poverty, George (1839–1897) proposed a “single tax” whereby land would be taxed according to the average value of the land around it and not in proportion to improvements; the result would make land speculation unattractive and thus land would be available to those who worked it rather than to those who accumulated it. From 1887 to 1895, Garland was an active proponent of the single tax in his writing and lectures. Franklin Garland to Eldon Hill, 19 July 1940, Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

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[Garland in Dakota in 1883] Edw in C. Tor r ey

X Like Garland, Edwin C. Torrey (1860–?) was a Wisconsin native who settled in the Dakota Territory in 1883, taking a job on a newspaper in Ordway. He helped launch the Aberdeen Daily News in 1886 before leaving for a position at the Minneapolis Journal, where he wrote features about the Dakotas. In this reminiscence, Torrey takes issue with Garland’s characterization of his parents’ toil as reflected in the dedication and epigraph to Main-Travelled Roads, pointing out that Richard Garland was in fact comparatively well-off financially.

hamlin garland’s latest book, “A Son of the Middle Border,” brings to mind his first volume, “Main Traveled Roads,” published in 1891. Some of the inspiration for the two books, as well as for the third called “Prairie Folks,” was gathered in the ’80s when his parents resided at Ordway in Dakota territory and when he himself “held down” a claim west of the village in McPherson county. Populism was running wild over the prairies when Mr. Garland broke into literature, and felt impelled to come out from the east to preach the doctrine from the stump. For that reason and for others that will appear, the dedication lines that accompanied “Main Traveled Roads” were resented in certain quarters. These lines read as follows: To my father and mother, whose half century pilgrimage on the main traveled road of life has brought them only toil and deprivation, this book of stories is dedicated by a son to whom every day brings a deepening sense of his parents’ silent heroism.

Elsewhere, speaking of the main traveled road in the west, he said: Mainly it is long and wearyful and has a dull little town at one end and a home of toil at the other.

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It was essentially a difference in viewpoints that prompted criticism in and around Ordway. Mr. Garland, in his Boston quarters, placed a low valuation upon his parents’ surroundings. This was quite natural. But the village critics from their viewpoint maintained, and with a show of reason, that the impression sought to be carried in the dedication was at variance with the facts. They contended that the words, “toil and deprivation,” were misapplied, and that the author was lending himself to the movement then represented by populism to incite class against class. Most of the settlers, contrasting their own situation with that of Mr. Garland’s parents, felt that the author was not convincing. Values in a community are relative, and an inventory of the Garland possessions would show that family was “better fi xed” than most of the others — that the older Garland, in addition to owning several farms, was at the head of a mercantile business in Ordway and a branch store in the county of McPherson. Even later, when Ordway was put out of business by mutations of a permanent development, Mr. Garland bought a home in a neighboring town and devoted his time to superintending the cultivation of his farms. The settlers were sincere in the belief that there was something radically wrong when such a career as that of Mr. Garland’s honored and successful parents was written down as bringing “only toil and deprivation.” In those first years after the Garlands had moved to Ordway from Iowa, Hamlin did not seem to “hit it up” with the people any better than he did with the agriculture of the middle border. He had a brother Frank, a few years his junior, who belonged to all the societies fostered by the young people, who attended all the church parties and all the dances, and always took a leading role in “Above the Clouds” and other amateur theatricals. Frank was popular; the people were certain he had “no false notions.” Hamlin, on the other hand, could have lived in the community fifty years, and no one would ever have thought of calling him “Ham” — to his face. There were, of course, misunderstandings on both sides. Frank went from the amateur stage, as it was known at Ordway, Columbia, and other villages in the region, to the professional, and for several years was with James and Katharine Herne in their sterling plays, “Shore Acres,” “Drifting Apart,” and “Margaret Fleming.” He was in the cast of “Shore Acres” when it delighted many thousands in a long run at the Boston Museum. Nowhere was his career more closely followed than in the little village he had left behind. Everybody was interested in him and his [ 10]

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success. As for Father and Mother Garland, they were wholesome, hearty folks, respected and liked by everybody. Mrs. Garland was celebrated for her kindness of heart and keen sense of humor. John Burroughs, in a communication concerning Mr. Garland’s book, “A Son of the Middle Border,” brought out vividly the difference in the angle with which men sometimes view like experiences. The poet naturalist said: In looking back over my life on a farm in central New York, I have mainly pleasant memories. Of course, it may be that an incurable romantic strain in my blood leads me to minimize the hardship and loneliness — just as Garland’s feverish desire to get away to do other things led him to overemphasize the dirt and drudgery. I can’t quite agree with him on that point.

To this, Mr. Garland rejoined: I admit that farm life has ameliorated. In my old township in Iowa there is, I am told, an automobile to every fourteen inhabitants. Even in Brown county, South Dakota, the fl ivver is as common as the top buggy and will soon displace it altogether. With wheat at $2.50 a bushel and corn at $2 a hundred weight, farm life, even in western Kansas, is a very different industry from what it was in years of which I wrote. With no desire to overemphasize the mud and murk and early rising of farm life, I have tried to proportion the facts as I experienced them. Most writers in approaching farm life feel it necessary to abandon the temper of the realist and they become sentimentalists, just as Burroughs cautiously admits that he has done. Almost invariably they write of it from the outside, from the standpoint of the summer visitor, whereas my book was written from the point of view of the working farmer. As one of the fellows binding grain on a Marsh harvester, holding the handles of a stubble plow in a drizzling rain, or husking corn in the falling snow with feet loaded with mud, I naturally saw agriculture from a different angle. My notion of plowing, seeding, and tending cattle was naturally not that of the village lawyer or merchant riding by in his surrey. Take this matter of morning chores. I was one of those who rose early. I didn’t talk about it, I rose. I didn’t enjoy hustling out to the barn at 5 o’clock to curry horses by lantern light, and I don’t intend to lie about it now. The farmyard seen under the cold gray light of a November dawn is not especially attractive to a boy. There is a mighty chasm between the “hand” who rises at 5 o’clock and the boss who comes along to breakfast a couple of hours later. To a growing boy those morning hours were of priceless value for slumber — but we seldom had

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garland in his own time the joy of lying abed till 7 o’clock. Father was a soldier and as inexorable as the commandant of a reservation garrison.

I distinctly remember one cold winter morning in Ordway, in that bleak and formative period, when the “commandant” failed to get his forces up at anything like 7 o’clock. I had occasion to make a few purchases at the Garland store. It was storming outside, and it was stormy inside. Mr. Garland senior stood behind the counter. The “hands,” Hamlin and Frank, were fast asleep in their rooms connected with the store, and the “boss,” who never minced matters, even when his own flesh and blood were concerned, promptly relieved his feelings to the first customer who appeared in the offing, intimating with a fluent flow of speech that the seven sleepers of old had nothing at all on those precious boys of his. It was a dramatic moment for the customer, a sort of forbidden peep behind the scenes, the memory of which still lingers. From Edwin C. Torrey, “Garland’s Dedicatory Lines,” in Early Days in Dakota (Minneapolis: Farnham Printing and Stationery Co., 1925), 80–84.

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[Discussing Garland with Walt Whitman, 1888–1889] Hor ace Tr au bel

X Horace L. Traubel (1858–1919) had known Whitman since 1873, when the poet moved to Camden. Beginning in 1888, Traubel made almost daily visits to Whitman, summarizing the meetings and recording Whitman’s conversations in compressed form in a small notebook. Then later each day he expanded the notes while his memory was fresh. He compiled his daily chronicle in With Walt Whitman in Camden, with the first volume appearing in 1906. Two more volumes were published before Traubel died, and the last of six subsequent volumes appeared in 1996. Garland first wrote to Whitman on 24 November 1886, when he learned that Whitman had suffered another stroke. At the time, he was preparing lectures on American literature for the Boston School of Oratory. He had read Leaves of Grass in the Boston Public Library, where it was “double starred” to restrict its circulation “to serious students of literature” (Roadside Meetings, 127), for Whitman’s poetry — in particular, its supposedly indecorous and obscene passages — was then the subject of fierce debate in the press. In his letter, in an effort to cheer the ailing poet, Garland described his practice of reading the poems aloud to his students to demonstrate “(what you of course know) that there is no veil — no impediment — between your mind and your audience, when your writings are voiced. The formlessness is only seeming not real” (Garland, Selected Letters, 19). Later, on 26 September 1888, on his way back to Boston from a visit to his parents in Ordway, Garland stopped to meet Whitman, and he later described his visit in an article for the New York Herald (“Whitman at Seventy: How the Good Gray Poet Looks,” 30 June 1889, 7).

[18 august 1888] i said to w.: “Garland’s practice of reading you aloud is one that Ingersoll, too, has told me he followed.”1 “How so? What did the Colonel say?” “That all great literature lent itself to the lips — that you were never so impressive as when rightly read aloud.” “Did he say that? How [13]

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interesting that is. Is that all he said?” “No — not all. He said that he often argued with people about you — that argument most times did not have much effect. He said that when he found his arguments were making no impression he resorted to your book and read from it: that the argument of the book, given in that way, was many times conclusive.” W. exclaimed: “How fine! And that is probably what Garland meant, too. I shouldn’t wonder but it’s all true. That is a striking theory of the Colonel’s: All great utterance in literature lends itself to the lips! I shall never forget that — it is very startling, incisive: it’s not difficult to remember anything expressed with such piercing directness.” He paused for a spell. Then went on: “Now — wasn’t that a dandy letter from Garland? This was his first salutation — this was what he said when he first came along: a first confession: not an obsequious obeisance made to the ground but just a manly equal shake of the hand — like that, no more. Did you notice, too, that he speaks of himself as a borderman? — a child of the western prairies? That appeals to me — hits me hardest where I enjoy being hit. That country out there is my own country though I have mainly had to view it from afar. I always seem to expect the men and women of the West to take me in in — what shall I say? — oh! take me in in one gulp! Where the East might gag over me the West should swallow me with a free throat. That letter of Garland’s was two years ago — already two years ago. He ought to do something with the West — get it into great books.” “The East is like hope and the West is like more hope!” I said. W. shook his finger off the bed at me. “That’s very clever — very true — Horace. Be careful — be careful: they will get you into the papers — quote you — pass you around: then your troubles will begin.” [26 September 1888] W. spoke of a visit today from “Professor Hamlin Garland of Boston.” “He came in — the doctor said for two minutes (only two minutes) but he stayed half an hour at least — seemed to be so interested he would have stayed longer.” W. laughed. “Mr. Musgrove2 was on nettles — the man so overstayed his leave.” “What is he professor of?” Smiled and replied: “That would be hard to tell — literature or something kin to it — I don’t know. I think Kennedy3 knows him — I don’t know but has written about him to me. I have heard from him — know him in a way, too — but on the personal side we have naturally not seen each other. Garland has lectured on Walt Whitman. I asked him if the people didn’t protest against it: he said, no, no, they cried for more! And now it occurs to me I had intended to ask him to send me a good report of his [14]

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talks, lectures — if one is given anywhere. I have always been curious to see what he says — once started to write him but did not know where to address my letter. I am more than favorably impressed with Garland. He has a good voice — is almost Emersonee — has belly — some would say, guts. The English say of a man, ‘he has guts, guts’ — and that means something very good, not very bad. Garland has guts — the good kind: has voice, power, manliness — has chest-tones in his talk which attract me: I am very sensitive to certain things like those in a man. Garland seemed to be enthusiastic about Leaves of Grass.” [10 November 1888] He had laid aside a Garland letter for me. “You will find it significant enough to go into good company: you have the good company: put it with Rossetti, Rhys, the rest.”4 . . . I asked: “What is your theory about Garland’s tactics in introducing the prose first?” He said: “I have no theory: Garland seems to be very firm in that notion: he always speaks of it: is determined to test it out: I have doubts of it myself: I think on the whole, usually, it’s best to let the people take the plunge at once. Of course Garland will say he has the evidence of his own eyes and that that is enough — is conclusive: I don’t say it’s not — for Garland: but for me? Well, while what Garland says seems profoundly probable in special cases, I am not convinced of the rule: I like best the idea of trusting the people at once to the full programme — not being afraid that they can’t stand the dose. I of course respond heartily to Garland’s beautiful brotherliness: that takes right hold of me — that is wholly convincing.” [17 November 1888] W. had received a copy of the Boston Transcript to-day containing Garland’s column review.5 Garland wrote, too, enclosing the slip. W. gave the note and slip to me. “I laid them aside here thinking you would like them.” . . . Here reverted to The Transcript piece. “It contains some most shocking typographical errors — slips of phrase.” “But you make nothing of them, do you?” I asked. “No: I am willing to excuse them. I like the piece: think you will like it: it has spirit, movement: inspires me as a horseman determined to push on — to tolerate no stop: on and on, whatever happens. It is written by an admirer: that can be seen: Garland is surely an admirer.” . . . W. said: “Garland’s letter is quite busy — it addresses itself to a lot of people and things. The Transcript piece has as a trifle a certain air almost of apology: but for that feature I like it. We are forcing the enemy to listen to us: not hurrah for us but listen to us: that so far is about our only accomplished asset.” [ 15 ]

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[21 November 1888] Garland discussed. Did Morse know him in Boston?6 “I think not: he is a new man — has just lately come up: has his career yet to make.” He wondered whether Garland’s friendliness was a “permanency.” Then pulled himself in. “Perhaps it is not just to ask that: but with Garland it may be considered more or less of an experiment: it was a sudden move.” I pleaded: “We can’t say for sure: some people wake up suddenly, others by degrees: but the day is a fact to both of them.” He smiled: “That is profoundly true — is to be considered.” He described Garland as “still young, enthusiastic, bright — I may say, too, demonstrative.” But genuinely so? “Oh! without a doubt: I never met a more earnest man: yes, he is genuine.” He then reflected: “It is best to be cautious: it is utterly impossible to lay down a rule for everybody: there are no formulas that have not the most remarkable exceptions — remarkable exceptions indeed: there is no formula but demands to be broken — is broken.” [24 November 1888] W. had turned to the table: took up a letter. He handed the letter to me. “It is from Bucke,”7 he said. “I had it to-day: he thinks very highly of Garland’s article.” Didn’t we all like it? “Yes, that is true: we all like it.” This is what Bucke writes: If I had Hamlin Garland’s address I think I would write him a few lines to say how much I admire his calm and pleasant sentences in The Transcript. I do not know when I have read anything that pleased me more — not, I think, since I read O’Connor’s letter in the N. Y. Tribune on the Osgood-Stevens affair.8 We are coming to the front at last — and should come. I have no fear, no doubt. It is only a question of waiting a few years till men have time to take it in. Another quarter or half century will see Leaves of Grass acknowledged to be what it really is — the Bible of America.

[1 January 1889] No letter from Garland yet saying what he thinks of the big book.9 W. said: “I have had a note acknowledging — that is all. Garland is a very active man — a man determined to have his hand on things: you have never seen him?” Described Garland — depicted his “earnestness.” “Garland is one of the fellows determined to be in the fight: in manner he is extremely quiet: has a low voice — speech toned down, way down. He does not give you the impression of a belligerent man at all, yet in his writing he is very aggressive.” G. expressed “polish, some little” — “then some little the college bred man,” but was “genuine — full of conviction”: “this [ 16]

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espousal of the single tax is a very good representative illustration of his mental daring — likewise his Whitmanic endorsement and adhesion.” I said: “A man can’t be an upholder of W. W. and be altogether a man of peace.” W. laughingly: “Not? Not? I suppose not.” Then: “No one knows better than I do the difficulties that beset such a course.” I said: “You seem to have hopes of Garland.” “I do: yes: why shouldn’t I? He seems started all right: is dead set for real things: is disposed to turn himself to the production of real results. Will he keep on or get discouraged by and by? So many of the fellows do go all right for awhile then suddenly stop — are arrested — develop no further — or go back, retreat: so many of them: the brilliant men particularly: those who have no faith — who have only cleverness: the smart fellows, the gaudy glittering showy men and women whose main idea in writing is to surprise, startle, transfi x, the reader, instead of fi ltering into people gradually, subtly, by the mere force, vehemence, of an exalted faith. Garland looks like a man who is bound to last — to go on from very good to very much better: but you never can tell: there are so many dangers — so many ways for the innocent to be betrayed: in the clutter, clatter, crack of metropolitan ambitions, jealousies, bribes, so many ways for a man, unless he is a giant, unless he is possessed of brutal strength and independence — so many ways for him to go to the devil. I look for Garland to save himself from this fate.” [7 March 1889] I showed W. a poem by Garland in The Standard called A Word for the East Sea.10 He put on his glasses, glanced briefly over the poem and passed the paper back to me. “I see: Hamlin is deft — is a college man: has a hand in everything.” Then he asked me: “Have you ever met him?” I had not. “Oh! then you should try to arrange to do so: he has been here twice” — stopped — “well — once, anyway.” Did he feel amiably disposed towards Garland’s work? “Yes: why not? He is versatile — can turn his hand to almost anything: yes, can accommodate himself to the inevitable even when it comes in unwelcome forms.” I queried: “Do as Rome does?” W.: “No — not just in that sense: I mean, turn himself from theme to theme, from poetry to prose — making himself at home anywhere. He is a well-dressed man: has a manner which my word ‘deft’ describes: a manner which in the odious sense of that word would be oily, slippery: but there’s none of that poison in Garland: he is very frank, outspoken — has the courage of his convictions: is never afraid to avow, assert himself — stand his [ 17 ]

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ground.” W. said Garland “is much better mettle than his polished exterior would indicate.” W. said further anent Garland: “‘He’s a professor — teaches elocution: he lectures about the country on literature — something — for a living.” [6 June 1889] I received Garland’s speech today, and with it a short note which, among other things, he wished W.’s attention called to certain passages.11 I read all to W., that public piece as well as this private one. I tried to go over it in the waning light there at the window — but it would not do. W. then hastily took a match from his pocket and struck it, I igniting the gas. He drew his curtain down. “Now,” he said, “now we can have Hamlin’s deliverance!” Listened intently, face bent towards the ground, hands clasped, hat on — easy, fine, well. He called it “all aflush with applause” but was still “glad” it had come. But “it seems genuinely written — Hamlin meant it — every word of it.” And he said again, what he has said so often, and what he said to Browning yesterday: “I must have been unusually well the day of the dinner, else how could I have stood it, to be so lorded over it by everybody?” But his gratefulness for Garland’s friendship did not end off in such a strain as that. “I know it is very warm — but in itself, it is fine — a good bit of literature, taking it that way — and a-throb, too — it has pulse: an all-important point.” It seemed to him “quite an accession” to the matter of our pamphlet. [8 July 1889] A long letter from Garland to me today about W. W.’s condition.12 Although not reading him the letter there were a couple of points I referred to W. I told W. that in soliciting contributions to the nurse fund I had never put it on the ground of poverty but of necessity that a nurse should be kept and of the grace it would do W.’s friends in these last days to make it their own voluntary offering. W. said at once — “That was right — I approve that myself.” To Garland’s statement — “If I could state publicly that he was poor, that he did need money for running expenses (as I think does) — and that his relatives and neighbors cannot or do not help him — then I could do something for him.” W. quickly replied — “Horace — write to Garland — tell him it would not please me to have him make any statement in the public prints. Tell him I don’t want him to discuss my Philadelphia and Camden friends.” And as to Garland’s question, what had become of the cottage money, etc., W. was equally quick to retort — “That was all fi xed — understood — fully settled — long and long ago — it is a closed [ 18 ]

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book — it is a question not again to be reopened.” On the point of Garland’s description of the hot and festering street and all that, W. only smiled, and without a word, pointed to the fine northern skies, and the trees swaying almost boisterously in the wind. It seemed like enough comment. By and by he said: “Hamlin does not understand.” Then we let the matter drop. Notes 1. The famed orator Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899), about whom Whitman remarked, “He is a type of our best — our rarest. Electrical, I was going to say, beyond anyone, perhaps, ever was: charged, surcharged. Not a founder of new philosophies — not of that build. But a towering magnetic presence, fi lling the air about with light, warmth, inspiration” (With Walt Whitman in Camden 8:102). 2. W. A. Musgrove, Whitman’s nurse. 3. William Sloane Kennedy (1850–1929), a Whitman admirer, published Reminiscences of Walt Whitman (1896) and A Companion Volume to Leaves of Grass (1926), among other works. In his letter of 19 April 1888, Garland had noted, “Mr. Kennedy I know writes to you in a depressed mood many times, saying he fi nds ‘a solid line of enemies’ (I think those were his words). This is not true of my experience.” Garland then went on to describe his efforts to promote Whitman and his astonishment “at fi nding so many friends and sympathizers in your work and cause” (Selected Letters, 27). 4. On 16 November 1888 Garland had written: “I talked last night to my Waltham class (of forty ladies) about your work and read to them. I wish you could have seen how deeply attentive they were and how moved by ‘Out of the Cradle’ ‘To Think of Time’ ‘Sparkles from the Wheel’ and others. Many of them will now read your works carefully and understandingly. I told them to come at you through ‘Specimen Days.’ I always advise my pupils so. After reading your prose they are better prepared to sympathize with your poetic views” (Selected Letters, 36). 5. In “Whitman’s ‘November Boughs’” (Boston Evening Transcript, 16 November 1888, 6), Garland defended Whitman’s poetry against detractors who objected to the poet’s unconventional form and content. In his letter of 16 November 1888 Garland had noted, “It is not intended to be a study or an elaborate review simply a good word which will allay if possible some of the antagonism which still exists toward your work” (Selected Letters, 37). 6. Sidney H. Morse (1832–1903) sculpted a bust of Whitman in 1887. 7. Richard Maurice Bucke (1837–1902), a physician specializing in psychiatry, was the author of Walt Whitman (1883) and Walt Whitman: Man and Poet (1897) and became literary executor of Whitman’s estate. 8. William Douglas O’Connor (1832–1889) was a longtime Whitman supporter who published, among other works, The Good Gray Poet: A Vindication (1866), a pamphlet that criticized Whitman detractors, lauded admirers, and was responsible for promulgating the phrase “Good Gray Poet.” In 1882 O’Connor responded to Osgood and Company’s

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garland in his own time withdrawal of its contract to publish Leaves of Grass, which had been prompted by threats of prosecution for obscenity, in several letters published in the New York Tribune. See Jerome Loving, Walt Whitman: The Song of Himself (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), 413–20. 9. Complete Poems and Prose of Walt Whitman (self-published, 1888–1889). 10. The correct title is “A Wind from the East Sea,” Standard, 9 March 1889, 11. 11. Garland attended Whitman’s seventieth birthday celebration at Morgan’s Hall in Camden on 31 May and gave a brief address on Whitman’s “Optimism and Altruism — Hope for the Future and Sympathy Toward Men.” He sent Whitman a typescript entitled “Whitman at Seventy,” which Whitman revised before Garland published it in the New York Herald, 30 June 1889, 7. See Selected Letters, 48–49. 12. In his letter to Traubel, Garland had volunteered to help raise money to support Whitman and noted, “My own impression is that Whitman is very poor. That he lacks the necessities of life. I dont mean meat and potatoes but a clean and wholesome room in a clean and wholesome street. . . . It is only the natural pride and endurance of a great soul that keeps Whitman silent” (Selected Letters, 50). Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, 9 vols., (1906–1996). Vol. 2 (entries for 18 August 1888, 162–63; 26 September 1888, 383–84); vol. 3 (entries for 10 November 1888, 67–68; 17 November 1888, 113–14; 21 November 1888, 147; 24 November 1888, 166–67; 1 January 1889, 437–38); vol. 4, ed. Sculley Bradley (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1953: entry for 7 March 1889, 299); vol. 5, ed. Gertrude Traubel (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1964: entries for 6 June 1889, 267–68; 8 July 1889, 355).

[ 2 0]

[Garland as a Teacher in 1889] M a ry E . Strou t

X Early in his career, Garland delivered a series of lectures at Chautauquas, which offered lectures and other cultural entertainment to the public. The following letter describes the effect of one of Garland’s lectures on American literature at the Hedding Academia Summer School, in East Epping, New Hampshire, from 2 to 24 August 1889, at which he also read some of his fiction, according to The Chautauquan 10.1 (October 1889): 119.

january 1, 1939 Mr. Eldon C. Hill Dear Sir: It interests me that you are writing for your thesis on so interesting a subject as the life and doings of Hamlin Garland. This morning I have been rummaging around in the attic hoping to find an old notebook to send to you. I have not been able to find it. So can only tell you that Mr. Garland was for a brief term my teacher, with others in a class of perhaps six, in a Chautauqua course in Hedding Campground, Epping, New Hampshire. The course was in American Literature and every session was delightful for he brought Poe, Hawthorne and other great writers near; his chief emphasis, I remember, for advice to would-be writers was on the telling of one’s own surroundings and experiences. This must have been in the late 80’s. A few years ago I wrote asking Mr. Garland to autograph his latest book for me as I wanted to send it to my son Richard who is a writer on the Christian Science Monitor in Washington, D.C. Mr. Garland then wrote me from New York and spoke, I recall, of a friend whom he greatly admired and enjoyed living then in D.C. This friend was Mark Sullivan.1 When your book is published I shall certainly get a copy. By the way — Mr. Garland was at the time of his term in Epping in his late [21]

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twenties — a fine gentlemanly person with soft brown beard and hair, and charming voice. With best wishes for your success, I am Sincerely yours, Mary E. Strout Note 1. Mark Sullivan (1874–1952) was the editor of Collier’s and published the serial version of A Son of the Middle Border. Mary E. Strout to Eldon Hill, 1 January 1939, Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

[22]

[Garland as a Teacher in 1890] H a r r iet E . H a lli m a n, et a l.

X From 1885 to 1891, Garland taught at the Boston School of Oratory, where he eventually would be in charge of its literature program. In his lectures, he applied evolutionary theory to the development of literature, represented in such topics as “COLONIAL AGE. — Factors. Race, Surroundings. Epoch” and “MODERN AGE. — Effects of Civil War. Growth of cosmopolitanism. Heterogeneity of elements” (Catalogue of the Boston School of Oratory [Boston: Beacon Press, 1893], 30). At the time, Garland’s approach was in the vanguard of viewing literature as a progressive development toward more sophisticated expression — a schema underlying many literature textbooks today. The following is a round-robin letter of appreciation from some of his students.

the course of lectures given during the summer of 1890 by Hamlin Garland, at the Boston School of Oratory, has proved of so much benefit to us who were present that we are moved to express our appreciation. Just now the realistic movement in American fiction is so close upon us as to fail of a candid estimate by the public. Under such circumstances, the vigor and independence of an enthusiastic sympathizer with the movement do much to awaken a taste for what is good in the literature of our country and our time. We take pleasure, therefore, in expressing our thanks to Mr. Garland for his generous, faithful, and inspiring presentation of the claims of American literature — especially the literature of the present age. Our field for wholesome reading has been widened by his evidence that we need not seek truth in the records of the past alone, but in the sheets that leave the printing-press here and to-day. Boston, Aug. 6, 1890. Harriet E. Halliman, Norriston, Penna. Katharine M. Wery, Greensburg, Penna. Ellen E. Thompson, Plainville, Mass. [23]

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Louise Rebecca Browne, Canandaigua, New York Carolyn Gary, Boston Louise Jowell Manning, Minneapolis, Minn. Elizabeth McRae, New Albany, Ind. Myrtie E. Furman, Philadelphia, Pa. A. M. Cunningham, Halifax, Nova Scotia W. T. Dempsey, Lansing, Iowa Edward P. Perry, St. Louis, Mo. D. L. Maulsby, Barre, Vermont Students’ Round-Robin Letter of Appreciation of Garland’s Lectures at Boston School of Oratory, 1890, Item 711a, Hamlin Garland Papers, Collection no. 0200, Special Collections, USC Libraries, University of Southern California.

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[Garland in Boston, 1889–1890] Julie Her ne

X Early in January 1889, Garland saw James A. Herne and his wife Katharine in a performance of Herne’s temperance play Drifting Apart. He wrote a lengthy letter to Herne praising the quality of the acting and the play’s use of local color (see Selected Letters, 38–42), and when the two met in May 1889, they formed one of Garland’s closest friendships. Garland soon became an enthusiastic champion of Herne’s plays and worked tirelessly to promote them. His discussions with Herne about Ibsen, realism, and the future of American theater helped prompt Herne to write Margaret Fleming, an Ibsenesque problem play about the double standard in marital fidelity, and to form America’s first noncommercial theater to produce it. Soon Garland was also writing plays (most notably Under the Wheel, 1890), as well as collaborating with both James and Katharine in drafts of others. Julie Herne (1881– 1955), the eldest of the five Herne children, became an actress, a playwright (1903–1918), and a screenwriter (1920–1925). The other Herne children were Chrystal (1883–1950), Dorothy (1885–1921), Alma (who died in infancy), and John (1894–1966). Julie Herne’s reminiscence of Garland is from the unpublished manuscript of a critical biography of her father; the manuscript was later rewritten, with most of the personal reminiscences replaced by more scholarly analysis, and published as Herbert J. Edwards and Julie A. Herne, James A. Herne: The Rise of Realism in the American Drama (Orono: University of Maine Press, 1964).

Hamlin Garland One lovely Sunday morning early in the summer of 1889 Katharine told the children there would be a very special guest for dinner, a certain Professor Garland. The family eagerly awaited his coming, with no premonition of the thunderbolt that was to burst upon their home. Hamlin Garland swept into that quiet household like a cyclone from his own prairies. He was about thirty years old, strong and broad-shouldered, and though of medium height, he seemed to fi ll Herne’s study. Although [25]

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he has told us that his early hardships seriously affected his health, he radiated vigor and vitality. He was very handsome, with his pale face, dark beard, finely cut features and deep-set, flashing eyes. He had a pleasant voice, a strong Western accent and an infectious chuckle. The clasp of his big hand was warm and friendly. He wore a dark bluish-purple suit of some rough material, with a tie of the same color that seemed to the little girls the last word in elegance, although he wrote later that his clothes in those days were worn and shabby. He threw himself in the armchair beside Herne’s desk, and began talking — magnificently — while the family listened spell-bound as the words poured out, vivid, polished, perfectly phrased. Only once he paused, when Dorothy, the youngest child, demurely dressed in pale gray, toddled into the room, and was introduced. He took her hand gravely, as if she were a grown-up person. “A sedate little lady,” he said, and it became his name for her. From that moment she was his favorite. The effect upon the Hernes of this unusual young man was one of instantaneous liking. Five minutes after they met the three of them were talking together as if they had known one another all their lives. Before that first visit was over — and it lasted long into the night, — they all knew pretty well where they stood on most important questions, and found that they were in general agreement about the drama, literature, religion and politics. Thus began a friendship, remarkable not only for its warmth and endurance (it lasted between the Herne and Garland families for fifty years), but for its stimulating effect upon the Hernes. In his autobiographical books, A Son of the Middle Border, and Roadside Meetings, Garland has written with feeling, truth and humor of the Hernes, who opened to him the glamorous world of the theatre. He had never met any people like them, he said, and on their part, they found this product of the great West, this combination of farm-boy, scholar, teacher, writer, poet and radical, equally strange and fascinating. Early in their acquaintance they invented a name for him, “the Dean,” partly in fun, partly in affection, and the name stuck. “The Dean” he remained to the end of the chapter. There was about Garland a directness and forthrightness that amounted almost to brusqueness. He had no small-talk and abhorred trivialities. When the conversation did not interest him, he would get up and walk away. He was very much in earnest, with the deadly, terrible earnestness of a youth who had been face to face with nature at her cruelest, and who had [ 2 6]

Julie Herne

asked, and had been offered no quarter by life. His humor was grim and ironic rather than genial. The hardships of his boyhood, spent chiefly on the desolate prairies of Dakota and Iowa, the years behind the plough, the struggle for an education, the loneliness, poverty, cold and hunger of his first years in Boston, had left their mark on him in a certain harshness of manner, a somewhat defiant attitude towards life. At the same time he had an almost feminine tenderness and sympathy for suffering of any kind. His heart would swell with indignation at any story of tyranny and injustice. Intellectually, he was one of the most honest people who ever lived. He was a hero-worshipper and he had a genius for friendship. He would defend a person or a principle he believed in to the last ditch. If a writer, a painter, a piece of music or a book appealed to him, he proclaimed his discovery to everyone. He did not hide his light under a bushel but went about preaching his artistic and political beliefs fearlessly, trying constantly to make converts to his theories. The effect of this turbulent personality upon the staid inhabitants of Boston was startling, to say the least. But although Garland made a few enemies, he made many more friends. The young lady students of his classes at the Boston School of Oratory adored him. Curiously enough, for such an uncompromising radical, his attitude towards women was a compound of chivalrous admiration and almost mystical reverence. He had a habit of referring to his feminine students as “those poor little creatures,” but he spoke in affection, not condescension. His love for his mother, and his bitter resentment of the hardships she had suffered, which, because of his poverty, he had been unable to ameliorate, had fi lled him with compassion for the whole sex. Garland was a student of Spencer and Darwin and could quote pages verbatim from their books; he found the Hernes were also devotees of the great English philosopher and naturalist and many delightful hours were spent arguing over evolution, the theory of the survival of the fittest and the law of natural selection. Sometimes the talk turned on religion and the possibility of a future life. Herne did not believe in survival after death. He once said, “I do not believe that I, James A. Herne, will exist as an individual after I leave here.” Katharine was a strong believer in reincarnation. Herne, as we know, was a free-thinker and so was Garland. The fact that they shared the same liberal religious opinions created a bond between them. But Herne was not in complete agreement with many of Garland’s [27]

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views on art, literature and the drama. Garland was a forthright and often intolerant realist. At that period in his life he had no use for the classic or romantic schools. He was giving a series of lectures at The Boston School of Oratory, afterwards published under the title, Crumbling Idols, in which he demolished, to his own satisfaction, at least, most of the artistic principles and sacred conventions of the past. Walt Whitman, Sidney Lanier, Ibsen, Zola, Howells and James were his gods, and he proceeded to preach their gospel to the Hernes. Herne had always been a great admirer of Whitman, but the poet never appealed to Katharine. Garland introduced them to Lanier, who became their favorite poet, supplanting Tennyson and Longfellow in their affections. But, while Garland found the Hernes sympathetic towards the realistic movement, they were by no means prepared to abandon Shakespeare, Scott, Dickens, and Thackeray and stoutly defended them against Garland’s attacks. This led to some heated discussions, for when his feelings were aroused Garland could be devastating. In the fall of 1889, while the Hernes were on the road, Mrs. Richard Mansfield, known professionally as Beatrice Cameron, presented Ibsen’s The Doll’s House at a special matinee in Boston. Garland saw the performance, and afterwards burst into the Ashmont living-room, shouting triumphantly, “No more of Shakespeare’s hash!” Mollie and the children never quite recovered from the horror of this blasphemous utterance.1 Garland held strong opinions as to what constituted good and bad art on the stage. He disliked what he called “effectism,” by which he apparently meant melodrama. Herne, on the other hand, contended that melodrama was an essential part of the theatre, and he had little patience with Garland’s theories. Once he told his wife, “Garland’s idea of drama is a scene in which two people discuss, for instance, the purchase of a ton of coal. One says, ‘I think we are running short of coal.’ The other replies, ‘We have enough to last until next week.’ To him, that is realism. To me it is not drama.” In their arguments Katharine and Garland usually took opposing sides, while Herne adopted an impartial attitude. Katharine could be as dogmatic as Garland, and her remarks sometimes cut deep. Once or twice, after some particularly acrimonious discussion, Garland departed white with anger, declaring he would not return. But in a few days he would reappear, with some fresh enthusiasm to celebrate, or some new theory to expound. After one such absence he brought the Hernes the manuscript of a play [28]

Julie Herne

he had just finished and asked them to read it. They did so, and on his next visit Katharine handed him the manuscript and said, with ominous calm, “Mr. Garland, does this play express your idea of drama? Is it an example of what you think a play ought to be?” “Yes,” replied Garland with great solemnity, for he was always very serious about his work, “I think that it pretty well represents me.” “Well,” said Katharine, “it is a very fine play and in it you have embodied all the dramatic principles that James A. and I have been fighting for and which you said you didn’t believe in.” Garland was highly gratified by her approval. The play, entitled A Member of the Third House, never saw production, however, and Garland later turned it into a novel.2 In this sort of give and take, in their arguments and their enthusiasm, their friendship was cemented, and grew in strength. Garland soon became an established visitor at the Ashmont home, and almost every summer afternoon would see him pedaling his bicycle out Dorchester Avenue on his way to Beale Street. Arriving at the garden gate he would ring the little bell on the handlebar of his machine, and the children would run out to greet him. He would park his “fiery, untamed steed,” as he called it, inside the fence, where it was at once surrounded by the children of the neighborhood, the object of their admiring wonder and probably the first “safety” that had ever been seen in Ashmont. Inside the house, Garland and Herne would immediately plunge into some discussion. Katharine and Mollie would leave their work in the kitchen or sewing-room and join the men, Mollie to listen, Katharine to take an active part in the debate. On very warm days they would adjourn to the garden; on cool afternoons they would wander over the lovely Dorchester Hills, the children gamboling about them. Sometimes the talk would concern a new book Garland had read, an art exhibition he had attended, a symphony concert he had heard. Whatever it was, he would describe it vividly, making the others share what he had felt. But mostly they talked about their work. Herne read his unfinished play, The Hawthornes, to Garland, who liked it and urged him to go on with it.3 Also, encouraged by Garland’s generous praise and discerning criticism, Herne began to revise Drifting Apart for the third time. Garland read the Hernes a group of short stories he was working on, soon to be published as Main-Travelled Roads. Sometimes Herne would read Garland’s poems [ 2 9]

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aloud; but his quiet, restrained style did not bring out “the swirl and the swoop” of his verse, and he would take over the reading himself, his voice vibrating under the stress of his powerful emotion. Sometimes Garland would be accompanied by his brother Franklin, his complete opposite, as quiet and self-contained as the other was dynamic. Franklin was trying to get a foothold on the stage. Herne offered him a small part in Drifting Apart and for the next ten or twelve years he acted in Herne’s plays. With the eagerness of a lonely young man, Garland told the Hernes all about his early life, and the struggles and wanderings of his pioneer family which he has described so eloquently in A Son of the Middle Border. Katharine was especially touched by his loyalty and devotion to his mother. But, although Garland loved to talk, he was also an excellent listener. At first, he found it difficult to penetrate Herne’s reserve, but when he had won the actor’s confidence, he liked nothing so much as hearing Herne tell about the old days in the theatre. Herne’s stories, his humor, keen observation, and powers of mimicry were an endless delight to the younger man. He begged Herne to write his reminiscences. Regrettably, Herne never did so, and a few random magazine articles are the only personal records he left. To Garland, the work the Hernes were doing in the theatre was a vindication of the artistic principles he believed in; and as he came to know them better, and realized the courageous struggle they were making against great odds, his admiration for them grew, and he constituted himself their champion. Now he had a new enthusiasm, and he threw himself into it in his usual whole-souled way, and did not rest until he had brought their work to the attention of Howells, Flower, Enneking, Chamberlin, Perry and others in the Boston literary and artistic world. With characteristic generosity, Garland wanted his old friends to know these new friends and so, for the next two years, whenever the Hernes were at home, a parade of Boston intellectuals, proudly escorted by Garland, made pilgrimages to Beale Street. It was a rich and exciting experience for the Hernes, for most of these people were advocates of various religious or political causes which were agitating the public at the moment. Outwardly, they were gentle, softspoken, quiet folk, self-contained and well-bred in the best of Boston sense, but one soon discovered that most of them were strongly radical in their views. They were socialists, Nationalists, Christian Scientists, Swe[ 30]

Julie Herne

denborgians, and suff ragists. Nearly all of them became converted to the Single Tax through the efforts of Garland and Herne. . . .4 All these people and many others became staunch supporters of the Hernes through Garland, whose friendship was proving an increasingly vital factor in the artistic development of Herne and his wife. With his dogged determination, Herne would undoubtedly have achieved recognition in the long run. But Garland’s appreciation and encouragement not only hastened that recognition but inspired Herne and his wife, at a critical time, to continue their fight for a hearing. But Garland’s most significant contribution to their lives was his conversion of the Hernes to the doctrines of Henry George. At that time Garland was probably the most ardent of George’s disciples and in his desire to spread George’s theories, he talked about them to everyone he met. He had not known the Hernes long before he began inculcating them with the principles of the Single Tax. He says this occurred at their second meeting (Roadside Meetings, p. 70.). The Hernes shortly became as staunch supporters of George as Garland himself but it must not be supposed that they followed Garland’s proselytism blindly. They were independent thinkers, and long before they met Garland they had been interested in current affairs, and were deeply disturbed at the evidences of social injustice, and political corruption that they observed everywhere, and by the increase in poverty and the growing power of the moneyed class. But while they deplored these things, they did not know how they could be remedied. Garland gave their sympathies direction. Their minds were already prepared to receive this new philosophy. . . . [Garland and the Single Tax] Just when Herne decided to make public speeches in favor of the Single Tax is not known. It is probable that Garland, who was always talking at Single Tax meetings, suggested that Herne should join him, for at first they appeared together. One of their earliest platform appearances took place in a small hall in Field’s Corner, in Dorchester, near Ashmont, before a group consisting almost entirely of working men. This must have been about 1890 or early in 1891. Herne made a strong plea for the Single Tax and finished by reading Garland’s powerful short story, “Under the Lion’s Paw,” one of the group published in Main-Travelled Roads. This was his favorite of all of Garland’s stories, and he read it with telling effect. Later on, he ceased to [ 31 ]

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use it, substituting for it a long passage from the opening of Sidney Lanier’s poem, “The Symphony,” which begins: — O Trade! O Trade! Would thou wert dead! The Time needs a heart — ’tis tired of head: —

and which provided an impressive and singularly appropriate ending for his talks. At the meeting at Field’s Corner, Garland volunteered to answer questions when Herne had finished speaking. He was bombarded from all parts of the hall. What did he think of Free Trade, the Labor Unions, strikes, lockouts, the eight-hour day? Garland, an old hand at this, plunged into the fray with zest, and parried his hecklers’ questions skillfully. After he had been talking for about fifteen minutes he took out his watch to learn the time. “I don’t want to keep you people too long,” he said. “Of course I can stay here all night if necessary.” The hall emptied in a twinkling. Herne said this was a lesson to him never to look at his watch while on the platform. . . . One of the minor manifestations of their complete emancipation from convention on which Herne and Garland prided themselves, was their refusal to wear evening clothes, which they considered a badge of plutocracy. In spite of jeers on the part of Katharine and Mollie, they applauded and upheld each other in this determination. It was a great shock to Herne, therefore, when, some years later, Garland, upon returning from his first visit to England, confessed that he had bought a tail-coat in London, and had actually appeared in it in public. Such attire was obligatory in the British capital, he explained apologetically. Herne accepted his explanation without a word of reproach, but privately he deplored Garland’s fall from grace. [Garland and Psychic Phenomena] One of Garland’s keenest enthusiasms was the investigation of psychic phenomena, a pursuit which interested him all his life. I do not think he actually believed in spiritualism, but he realized that certain psychic manifestations, such as telepathy and clairvoyance, cannot be explained on this material plane; and, while his philosophical training, and his naturally analytical mind prevented him from accepting the idea of a future existence without scientific proof, he was nevertheless tireless in seeking that proof. [ 32 ]

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In those early years he was a faithful attendant at the meetings of the Society for Psychical Research,5 and he spent a great part of his time going to spiritualistic séances and investigating mediums. These activities invariably ended in disappointment, but he remained undismayed. Almost every week he would arrive at the Herne home eager to report the discovery of some new medium whose extraordinary powers were apparently genuine, and who had, moreover, consented to undergo tests of his or her psychic abilities under the most rigid conditions. A few days later he would return, slightly crestfallen, and announce that his latest find had turned out a fraud. Katharine was inclined to sympathize with Garland in his spiritualistic inquiries, but Herne was skeptical, and when Garland suggested that they try some table-tipping, he consented to it under protest, declaring the whole business was ridiculous. Katharine, Mollie, Garland and Herne spent several evenings in the darkened living-room with their hands resting on a wooden kitchen table, but the spirits failed to appear. One afternoon Garland arrived in a state of unusual excitement, and announced that he had had a most remarkable experience at a séance the previous night. The medium, — a man this time — had balanced an ordinary walking-stick between his knees, where it stood upright, unsupported by any visible means, controlled only by the magnetism of the medium’s waving hands. “That’s an old trick, Garland,” said Herne. “I’ll do it for you after supper.” That evening the family gathered in the study, which was lighted only by a lamp, turned low. Herne seated himself in a chair, took his walking-stick, rubbed it several times impressively “to set the magnetic currents flowing,” placed it between his knees and removed his hands. The stick remained upright, swaying a little to the right or left as Herne waved his hands. Garland was dumbfounded, and Katharine turned up the lamp for a better view, and moved it to the edge of the table. Her eyes caught the gleam of a black silk thread fastened low down on either side of Herne’s trousers. It was this thread which kept the stick upright. Herne had not been able to resist playing one of his practical jokes. Garland took it in good part, but he attempted no more psychic experiments when Herne was about. . . . Garland continued his visits to Beale Street, probably in the belief [ 33]

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that the household needed cheering up [after the failure of Margaret Fleming’s 4 July 1890 performance], as indeed, it did. He was preparing Crumbling Idols, his book of lectures, for publication, and after their evening tea he would read a chapter to Katharine and Mollie. After a long day spent in housework, the sisters had difficulty in keeping awake during these readings, especially as the rhythmic “swirl and swoop” of Garland’s voice had a very soothing effect. So as not to hurt his feelings, they took turns dozing on the sofa; one would listen while the other napped. If Garland ever suspected what was going on, he was considerate enough to make no comment. Notes 1. Mollie Corcoran, Katharine’s sister, was a member of the Herne acting company. 2. Garland gave a single performance of the play as an “Author’s Reading” at Chickering Hall on 30 October 1890; he later transformed it into a novel and published it with the F. J. Schulte firm in 1892. 3. The Hawthornes was eventually produced as Shore Acres, James A. Herne’s most successful play, with Franklin Garland in the role of land speculator Josiah Blake. 4. Here Julie Herne summarizes the visitors, who included B. O. Flower, editor of the Arena; John J. Enneking, impressionist landscape painter; Mary Shaw, an actress famed for her performances in Ibsen’s Ghosts and Shaw’s Mrs. Warren’s Profession; Minna Smith, Edgar A. Chamberlin, and Mildred Aldrich, Boston journalists; and William McCracken, novelist. 5. The American Psychical Society, founded by B. O. Flower in 1891. Garland became its second president in 1892. Julie Herne, “James A. Herne, Actor and Dramatist,” unpublished biography, James A. Herne Collection, 1890–1960, University of Maine Library, 243–57, 261–62, 264–66, 294.

[ 34 ]

[Garland and The Arena, 1890] B. O. Flow er

X Benjamin Orange Flower (1858–1918) was the editor of the Arena, a reformminded journal founded in January 1890 as a forum for debate on contemporary issues. When he first met Flower in May 1890, Garland was having difficulty placing his fiction, whose realism often challenged the conventions of more genteel magazines. The Century had declined his story “A Prairie Heroine,” a grim tale of a defeated farm wife who sees so little hope for her future that she contemplates suicide. As Flower mentions in his reminiscence, what attracted him to Garland’s fiction was the outspoken reformism that embodied the editorial agenda of the magazine so well. Flower became the most important editor of Garland’s early career, for in the years from 1890 to 1894 Garland published thirty-three stories, essays, and book reviews in the Arena, as well as his first three books with the magazine’s book publishing wing. As Garland later recalled in a 19 March 1938 letter to F. Carleton Mabie Jr., “I have very vivid memories of his kindness and sympathy with my work. . . . He was an idealist. He lived for the good of the world. I never knew a man of higher altruistic aims” (Selected Letters, 402).

one morning, some time after the founding of the Arena, my morning mail brought a typewritten short story, bearing the title of “A Prairie Heroine,” and signed Hamlin Garland. The manuscript was travel-worn and the author had drawn his pen through several tell-tale lines that spoke of the enthusiastic reformer who had come under the influence of the economic philosophy of Henry George. The emphasizing of noble social truths in such a way as to make one think, and think seriously, was considered very bad form by the editors of the literary magazines of that day, as “Art for art’s sake” was as much a popular shibboleth then as when Victor Hugo raised in opposition the slogan, “Art for progress.” And from the appearance of this manuscript I concluded that the author had learned how perilous a thing it was to run counter to accepted literary canons. [35]

garland in his own time

On reading the story I was impressed with its splendid strength, virility, and verity. Having lived on a farm myself, I knew how true was the picture. Moreover, the story revealed in the author a strong imagination and a certain grasp of basic truths that are germinal and redemptive in their power, compelling the reader to think and touching the nobler side of life. I at once accepted the story, but I wrote the author that I should prefer to retain his lines referring to the single tax.1 The following day I had a visit from Hamlin Garland. He was then pursuing some academic studies in Boston. He said he was very glad to get the check for the story, but he was even more pleased to find an editor who would publish it in unexpurgated form. The economic truths were incorporated in the conversational lines and did not appeal to him as being “lugged in.” He said he had some critical essays and several other short stories “in brine.” I accepted several of these, and as I felt they would prove a better introduction for the gifted young writer than “A Prairie Heroine,” they were given preference in time of publication. Mr. Garland’s stories struck a popular chord. They were widely quoted and he soon received many requests for work from other publications. . . . To return to Hamlin Garland. He was at that time strongly under the influence of Henry George’s noble economic philosophy and full of faith and enthusiasm for that broad freedom that is vital to the happiness of the individual and to the fullest unfoldment of brain and heart. He became a frequent visitor at my home, and I cherish the memory of many happy hours spent with him. I remember that on one occasion, when he was spending an evening with us, Mrs. Flower asked what he meant by the expression, “He had seen the cat,” which occurred in one of his stories.2 And Mr. Garland laughingly told the story of how Judge Maguire3 of San Francisco had come to New York to address a great gathering on the single tax, and during the course of his lecture had said: The other day I was walking down Broadway and saw a crowd of persons before a window in which hung a large framed landscape. Under the picture was the legend, “Do you see the cat?” No one in the crowd seemed to be able to find anything resembling a cat. At last I stepped into the street, some distance from the picture, when the entire white outline assumed the form of a large and perfectly proportioned cat. I could no longer see anything but the cat; it fi lled the picture.

[ 36]

B. O. Flower

“And so,” said the Judge, “it is with the single tax. When you once understand the philosophy, palliative and make-shift propositions fade into the background before this great and fundamentally just philosophy that squares so perfectly with the theory of democracy and the noble demands of freedom.” “From that time,” said Mr. Garland, “the question, ‘Have you seen the cat?’ became a common expression with the single-taxers, and buttons, like the one in my coat, bearing a cat’s face, are now worn by many of us.” Notes 1. Flower had written to Garland on 30 April 1890: “I notice you have seemed to suppress your thoughts in two or three instances and have erased some lines from your story. In writing for the Arena either stories or essays I wish you always to feel yourself thoroughly free to express any opinions you desire or to send home any lessons which you feel should be impressed upon the people. I for one do not believe in mincing matters when we are dealing with the great wrongs and evils of the day and the pitiful conditions of society and I do not wish you to feel in writing for the Arena at any time, the slightest constraint” (qtd. in Keith Newlin, Hamlin Garland, A Life, 138). 2. In Garland’s play Under the Wheel, Walter Reeves says, “I’ve seen the cat,” amid a discussion of the effects of land speculation (Arena 2 [1890]: 202). 3. James G. Maguire (1853–1920) was a San Francisco judge who served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1893 to 1899. From B. O. Flower, “Leaders I Have Known: Hamlin Garland, Will Allen Dromgoole, W. D. McCracken, Bolton Hall, Ernest Howard Crosby,” Twentieth Century Magazine 6 (August 1906): 357–61.

[ 37 ]

[Garland at the Populist Convention in 1892] Eli a Pe at t ie a nd Robert Bu r ns Pe at t ie

X Elia Peattie (1862–1935) and Robert Burns Peattie (1857–1930) were journalists writing for the Omaha World-Herald at the time Garland knew them. The Peatties later moved on to newspapers in Chicago and New York, and Elia also published a number of novels and short stories over her career. The Peatties were in Omaha to cover the first national convention of the People’s Party, an independent political party organized to address the interests of farmers. Garland attended the convention after campaigning widely throughout the Midwest on behalf of populist candidates. Both Peatties left somewhat conflicting accounts of their impressions of Garland in their unpublished autobiographies.

[Elia Peattie] Rod must have still been feeding on his bottle when Hamlin Garland came to our house as a guest at the time of the Populist Convention. He had written to me in appreciation of a review I wrote of Sidney Lanier’s poems; then afterward, of my warm praise of his own Main-Travelled Roads. His letters contain an almost startled imagination. His own experience in the West had been so stark that he could hardly credit it that a person living in Omaha could appraise Lanier — or himself. We were very happy to receive him at our home, and he seldom sees me without referring to his amusement at finding me at one hour reporting a convention, and at the next giving the bottle to my baby or busying myself with the details of a dinner. Garland had come to the Convention as a delegate from the Henry George faction and his Single Tax theories, and instead of a speech he was to read his powerful story “Under the Lion’s Paw.” I cannot forget the whirlwind of applause that greeted him, the whole audience rising and fluttering their handkerchiefs, white being the insignia of their faith — that and the head of a cat worn in the buttonhole. I was sitting in the wings of the theater writing my report for my paper and noticed near me a sturdy old man who [38]

Elia Peattie and Robert Burns Peattie

stared incredulously at this demonstration. Then, as the hall rang with the cries: “Garland! Garland!” he dropped his head on his arms and his body shook with sobs. It was Garland’s father who had come at Hamlin’s invitation to be present at the Convention. The story of this old man’s grim and determined life is told in A Son of the Middle Border in which Garland redeemed himself after many volumes of little significance. It was not, however, his fault that he compromised with the juvenile taste of America. The publishers positively would not take his work while it retained the austere and tragic qualities of Main-Travelled Roads. He was compelled to write the innocuous sort of material for which the lady writers of New England had set the example, and he lacked the indubitable charm which they gave to their work. A really vigorous and heroic talent was wasted on the inane proprieties. At Garland’s suggestion I went to Chicago in company with himself and a number of the homeward bound delegates, and Garland introduced me to Mr. and Mrs. Herne who were then playing in Shore Acres, perhaps the first successful play of the “American realists” and a protest against artificial drama and the echoing of European life and ideas. It was felt to be “native.” Later Garland married Zuleima Taft, the sister of my friend Lorado Taft,1 a woman of great charm who insisted that her husband should conform to the social amenities, against which he had in the old days, been a passionate rebel. Garland’s wife has been a great help to him. . . . Notes on Guest Book. Hamlin and Mrs. Garland: No need to descant upon Hamlin. A good friend to me — he and R. not so congenial. Zuleima, his wife, sister to Lorado Taft, a sculpturess but gave up her work when she married. Fine woman and great civilizer — of Hamlin. [Robert Burns Peattie] In 1892 the People’s Party held their convention in Omaha. Hamlin Garland came on as a delegate. We asked him to come to our house as a guest. Elia and he were acquainted through their stories. He was affable and earnest and showed little of the egotism he afterward developed. . . . We saw Garland pass through several stages of his career. We saw him first as a radical, a rather vague and wild one with a hatred of evening dress. He was very canny when it came to money, although he had begun to accu[ 39]

garland in his own time

mulate a good deal. He sometimes, later, accompanied Elia to plays, as did Henry Fuller,2 but it was not they who bought the tickets, and they barely paid the car-fare. When Garland married Zuleima Taft, Lorado’s sister, she saw to it that he developed some of the social amenities. She bought him a dress suit, and he tamely wore it to dinners and the opera. He even went to Shakespearean plays though in his book Crumbling Idols he had said Shakespeare was a dead duck; so was Corot and many another of the supposed immortals. We saw Garland become so inflated with the praise of Howells — whom didn’t that kindly man praise? — that he assumed the appearance of Jove and the finality of judgment of Dr. Johnson. We saw him gradually shake off his political heresies and take the side of the reactionaries. So dense was his egotism that when Fuller cruelly satirized him in a story he inquired who Fuller meant. Of course he was chosen to enter the American Academy, that self-satisfied and complaisant Sanhedrin. He never surpassed his first book Main-Travelled Roads, although his late series on the Middle Border has some fine things. But in between he wrote some miserable pot-boiling stuff. Notes 1. Garland met Lorado Taft (1860–1936), a Chicago sculptor who specialized in large monumental works, at the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893; he married Zulime Taft (1870–1942) on 18 November 1899. Her fi rst name was frequently misspelled, occasionally even by Garland himself during their courtship. 2. Henry Blake Fuller (1857–1929), a Chicago novelist, was one of Garland’s closest friends. Fuller satirized Garland in “The Downfall of Abner Joyce,” a story in Under the Skylights (1901). Elia Peattie, “Star Wagon,” unpublished manuscript transcript; and Robert B. Peattie, “Story of Robert Burns Peattie, Written for his Sons, Edward, Roderick, and Donald,” unpublished manuscript transcript; Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

[ 40]

[Garland as a Radical in 1892] Willi a m A llen Whi te

X William Allen White (1868–1944) was a journalist, biographer, and novelist who worked as an editorial writer on the Kansas City Star in 1892 and later was the owner and editor of the Emporia Gazette. He wrote frequently on populist topics, helped Theodore Roosevelt form the Progressive Party in 1912, and received the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing in 1923 and (posthumously) for autobiography in 1947. Though he later became a close friend, when he first met Garland he was surprised by his political activism.

in those days I met and formed a casual acquaintance that became a lifetime attachment — my first literary man — Hamlin Garland. I had read his “Main Travelled Roads,” and other slight books describing the farm people. I had accepted his political heresies, his sympathies with the farmer’s wrongs, yet I accepted these heresies in a rather highty-tighty mood. But when I talked to Garland for two hours on a train, as we were going to a Populist meeting some place in Kansas where he spoke, his passion for his cause disturbed me. It did not quite upset me. But it was strange, I thought, that a man with such competent literary powers should be so deeply touched with the political insanity of the hour. From William Allen White, The Autobiography of William Allen White (New York: Macmillan, 1946), 217.

[41]

[Journal Comments on Garland in 1893] Edw in M a r k h a m

X Edwin Markham (1852–1940) was a public school principal in Oakland, California, and an aspiring poet when he arrived in Chicago in June 1893 to attend the World’s Columbian Exposition. He met with Garland at the office of the publisher F. J. Schulte, who had published Garland’s A Member of the Third House (1892) and who issued Prairie Folks (1893) shortly before going bankrupt. Markham studied Garland’s work and wrote a number of poems and stories influenced by the younger writer; his first book, entitled The Man with the Hoe and Other Poems, appeared in 1899.

[notebook, 6 june 1893] Met Garland and Schulte. They are on the eve of starting a new magazine on the new lines of thought. It will take up the literary uses of the problems discussed in the Arena. Garland is to be the editor and proposes “The Western Magazine” as the title of the journal. I propose “The Widewest” or “The Great West.” (Perhaps the “New West” would serve.) G. thinks I should put my boyhood experience into a story, showing the heroism of the mother while all along she was not in sympathy with his romantic aspirations. G. thinks “The Man under a Stone” would be a good title for my book of poems. Keep in touch with the earth — have about your work the smell of the furrow, the odor of stones, the noise of larks in the heading wheat. There be glimpses of a girl looking back from down the path, her arms thrown up and her hands clasped behind her head, a glint of evening light upon her hair: a boy setting out at morning for the fields with a wild feather stuck in his hat, and a quick glad step as tho there was a pleasant thought in his heart. [Manuscript, n.d.] In Hamlin Garland we meet an earnest man — one who believes in his own work so thoroughly that he cannot fail to impress others. His characters are real men and women. He has lived with them, toiled with them, suffered and resented wrong with them. It would be im[42]

Edwin Markham

possible for him to write anything else than those dreary, hopeless stories of life upon Western ranches. His shabby, work-worn characters live in the Coulés and he has no power to make them dress attractively and pose in pleasant places, while he paints their pictures for waiting critics. One peculiarity of Mr. Garland’s style is its freshness and for this we easily account: he goes into the fields every summer to work; he sees the same grinding poverty, the same inequality in conditions that existed years ago, and his wrath is rekindled, his enthusiasm as a land reformer re-newed. No wonder he is a “Veritist.” [Manuscript, 25 September 1893] Garland. His calm, white, open face, his clear kind eyes, bespeak a man whose life is founded on reasoned principles of conduct. He is a man that you could not think of as engaging in any selfish intrigues; he belongs rather to the school of Mazzini and those who measure things not by expedience, but by the fi xed principles of natural justice.1 There need be little wonder, then, if Mr. Garland seem to run counter to the conventional and convenient ideas of time-servers. He is with the advance guard — the hardy pioneers of thought who are breaking and blazing a road in the wilderness of today for the [people] of the 20th century. Note 1. Giuseppe Mazzini (1805–1872), Italian revolutionary and proponent of Italian unification. From Jesse Sidney Goldstein, “Two Literary Radicals: Garland and Markham in Chicago, 1893,” American Literature 17 (1945): 152–60.

[ 4 3]

[The Battle of the Realists and Romanticists in 1893] Eugene Field

X By 1893 Garland had emerged as one of the most vociferous critics extolling the virtues of realism, and his aggressive articles in the nation’s magazines had begun to attract derisive commentary and ad hominem attacks, as well as satire. In July, Garland was in Chicago to attend the World’s Columbian Exposition, in particular its Literary Congress, at which a number of speakers spoke on a variety of topics. At the last minute, he was asked to substitute for the novelist Thomas Nelson Page, who could not attend. In his address “Local Color in Fiction,” he prophesied that local color is the only form of fiction that is destined to prevail, which was the argument he had been making in his articles. When the novelist Joseph Kirkland began to speak on the realistic movement, according to the reporter for the Chicago Tribune, he was interrupted by Mary Hartwell Catherwood (1847–1902), a romantic historical novelist who had spoken earlier, “to say a few words in defense of the old heroes she admired so much and whom she seemed to think had not been accorded due reverence by some of the speakers.” Thereafter followed “a joust, in which Mrs. Catherwood and Hamlin Garland figured as principals. Mrs. Catherwood bravely championed the cause of the dead past, Mr. Garland nobly threw himself into the breach in defense of the living present” (“Octave Thanet on the Short Story,” Chicago Tribune, 15 July 1893, 8). The humorous columnist Eugene Field (1850–1895), who was not present, subsequently mined the incident for material for his “Sharps and Flats” column in the Chicago Record, and for the next several weeks he featured letters from the principals and from readers debating the merits of realism versus romanticism. Garland immediately responded to Field’s tomfoolery in a letter to Field, but his evangelism soon mastered his humor.

[44]

Eugene Field

the chances are that to the end of our earthly career we shall keep on regretting that we were not present at that session of the Congress of Authors when Mr. Hamlin Garland and Mrs. Mary Hartwell Catherwood had their famous intellectual wrestling match. Garland is one of the apostles of realism. Mrs. Catherwood has chosen the better part: she loves the fanciful in fiction — she believes with us in fairy godmothers and valorous knights and beautiful princesses who have fallen victims to wicked old witches. Mr. Garland’s heroes sweat and do not wear socks; his heroines eat cold huckleberry pie and are so unfeminine as not to call a cow “he.” Mrs. Catherwood’s heroes — and they are the heroes we like — are aggressive, courtly, dashing, picturesque fellows, and her heroines are timid, stanch, beautiful women, and they, too, are our kind of people. Mr. Garland’s “in hoc signo” is a dung-fork or a butter paddle; Mrs. Catherwood’s is a lance or an embroidery needle. Give us the lance and its companion every time. Having said this much, it is proper that we should add that we have for Mr. Garland personally the warmest affection, and we admire his work, too, very, very much; it is wonderful photography. Garland is young and impressionable; in an evil hour he fell under the baleful influences of William D. Howells, and — there you are! If we could contrive to keep Garland away from Howells long enough we’d make a big man of him, for there is a heap of good stuff in him. Several times we have had him here in Chicago for eight or ten days at a stretch, and when he has associated with us that length of time he really becomes quite civilized and gets imbued with orthodoxy: and then he, too, begins to see fairies and flubdubs and believes in the maidens who have long, golden hair and cannot pail the cow: and his heroes are content to perspire instead of sweat, and they exchange their cowhide peg boots for silk hose and medieval shoon. But no sooner does Garland reach this point in the way of reform than he gallivants off again down east, and falls into Howells’ clutches, and gets pumped full of heresies, and the last condition of that man is worse than the first. We can well understand how so young and so impressionable a person as Garland is should fall an easy prey to Howells, for we have met Howells, and he is indeed a charming, a most charming gentleman. So conscious were we of the superhuman power of his fascinations that all the time we were with him we kept repeating pater-nosters lest we, too, should fall a [45]

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victim to his sugared and persuasive heterodoxy: and even then, after being with them an hour or two, we felt strangely tempted to throw away our collar and necktie and let our victuals drop all over our shirt-front. The fascination of realism is all the more dangerous because it is so subtle. It is a bacillus undoubtedly, and when you once get it into your system it is liable to break out at any time in a new spot. But Garland is not yet so far gone with the malady but that we can save him if he will only keep away from Howells. In all solemnity we declare it to be our opinion that Howells is the only bad habit Garland has. So we are glad to hear that there is a prospect of Mr. Garland’s making his home here in Chicago, where the ramping prairie winds and the swooping lake breezes contribute to the development of the humane fancy. Verily there will be more joy in Chicago over one Garland that repenteth than over ninety and nine Catherwoods that need no repentance. Hamlin Garland to Eugene Field, 27 July 1893 I had my share in the general hearty laugh over your most excellent fooling yesterday, for I realized (as no doubt others did) that a layer of serious meaning ran under it all. It certainly is a curious thing to see the lords and ladies who partake of ambrosia and sip nectar making a last desperate stand in the west — the house of Milwaukee beer and Chicago pork. It is decidedly suggestive to find Pikestown and New Palmyra producing romantic novels. I am sorry, of course, to dispel any illusions you may cherish, but the fact is that the lords and ladies are in sad straits; they are mainly reduced to the pages of the Saturday Evening Romancer. True, the Romancer sells in unnumbered tons, but it is the Saturday Evening Romancer, for all that, and is a lowly home for the hero and heroine. The baleful influence of Mr. Howells seeks them out even there and makes life miserable for them. There is no pause now in their story from start to finish; they appeal to the reader’s sensibility in a piteously direct fashion; they can’t languish any more, or stride in stately pride through lordly halls; they rush and gasp and talk in husky whispers; their ancient dignity is almost a memory. Realism or veritism or sincerity in Americanism (at bottom these words mean practically the same thing) is on the increase. We are in a minority, we admit, but we’re fighters, and we’ve got Truth on our side. We’re a minority that grows; we’re likely to be a majority soon. [ 46]

Eugene Field

Because (and this is the most terrible fact of all) realism or Americanism pays. People buy the poems of James Whitcomb Riley in unheard of quantities — the plain people buy him; they buy Miss Alice French’s novels and Mr. Cable’s and Mr. Harris’, and even Mr. Howells contrives to live on $10,000 or $15,000 a year. And it is this sorrowful revelation which casts gloom over Chicago romanticism — judging from the tone of your plaintive pipe. I admit I have so few acquaintances among people who really believe in the lance and morlon and nectar and tapestry that only at rare intervals do I get a glimpse into the sad court where you romanticists sit upon the ground and wail the death of kings. Now, seriously, do you want to know what we content for — we disturbers of the dreamers and breakers of graven images? We stand for Sincerity; we are warring against Effectism — that blight upon every art where the question of Effect is put before the question of Truth, and Success is raised above Sincerity. We plead for a sincerity which forbids imitation and makes every work of art an individual creation — an individual expression of the wonder and mystery of human life. This, we claim, leads necessarily to the treatment of average American life. The case is simple and probably hopeless for the aristocratic party in literature to which you seem (to us) unwisely to belong. The first thing you know we’ll have an American magazine in this town — I mean a real American magazine — and then the war of the pitchforks and the lances will be on in earnest; and, however well the gallant knight may bestir himself, he’ll go down, for he is old, forsooth, and stiff of joint and incumbered in medieval armor and unaccustomed to the untempered light of our modern day. And, moreover, when the legions of the butter-ladle muster, of what avail the embroidery-needle in the lily-white hands of her trailing garments? I warrant you there be valiant women in the ranks of the veritists. Then let the battle begin, the pitchforks and the butter-ladles be couched and ready, and their eager bearers cry “Let death be the utterance — the battle-ground the west!” Yours in the fight, Hamlin Garland. From Eugene Field, “Sharps and Flats,” Chicago Record, 27 July 1893, 4; Garland to Field, “Sharps and Flats,” Chicago Record, 28 July 1893, 4.

[ 47 ]

[Garland in West Salem, 1893–1915] Ida E . Tilson

X During the summer of 1893, Garland established a home for his aging parents in West Salem, Wisconsin, and set about making many improvements. The following April, he moved to Chicago to be at the center of its literary activity, intending to spend his summers in West Salem. At first he called the home “Maple Shade” after the three large maples fronting the house, but he soon began to refer to it as the “Garland Homestead,” thereby confounding writers ever since who confuse this house with the place of his birth, which was a squatter’s shack on the edge of town. For the next twenty-two years he would find the quiet village a congenial place to write before leaving it permanently in 1915, when he relocated to New York City. Ida E. Tilson (1854–1936) was a West Salem neighbor who wrote a number of articles on poultry for publications of the Wisconsin Farm Institute.

about 1893, the Garlands were again settled in West Salem. Though I made neighborly calls, [I] did not happen to meet the author till one evening his mother brought her two sons to our house. I was quite scared and uttered some commonplace of being pleased to see them, when Hamlin Garland said, “You’ve surely already heard [of] us.” Both young men and their mother played chord accompaniments and were natural, pleasing singers of old favorites. They had the first piano player I ever saw, or at least noticed, and one of the earliest phonographs. Many years later, with even greater pleasure, I saw and heard Hamlin’s daughters dramatize and sing such old English ballads as “Sowing the Barley,” and “Sir John’s Wooing,” of which I never tired, since the girls already showed artistic temperament and touch. It is possible that I was the salvation of Mary Isabel once when she was about two years old.1 Left alone with the maid and toddling around in the yard, she got a leaf lodged in her throat. The maid screamed to me that “Mebbe” was choking. I directed her to hold the child firmly, head down, and slap between the shoulders, while I ran for more help. When I returned [48]

Ida E. Tilson

with Mrs. Oliver Gullickson, the leaf was already dislodged, but Mary Isabel flew to Mrs. Gullickson and had no confidence in the maid nor myself for some time. I always considered the author an indulgent man in his family, courteous to his wife, thoughtful of his mother and entertaining to his children. His gifted daughters did not need much discipline, but what little they did need, seemed to fall upon their mother. He read aloud a great deal from classics, especially poetry. When one day I found him reading what was plainly beyond their ken, his argument was somewhat to the effect that shallow, lapping waters develop neither swimmers nor children like the real current, a belief I have come to share, and that renowned instructor, Mrs. Stoner, has also demonstrated. Mr. Hamlin Garland once told me he had an orderly mind, that if he wrote at the same time each day, his mental processes were familiar and easy, but was he interrupted and did he change, the novelty played havoc with time and effort. This seems to explain his reserve and why in his necessary calls at postoffice, he hasted back and forth sometimes not speaking to acquaintances met. All they wanted was a mere friendly nod, just a little flower by the wayside. They did not expect to play in his yard. When he evidently became persuaded the neighbors realized and appreciated his need of undisturbed, unbroken thought, and did not purpose to intrude or hinder, he gradually unbent. Mr. Garland was the first author to use the literary possibilities of the middle west. His earlier stories portrayed the tragic futility of struggle with heavily mortgaged farms, in unfavorable seasons, on the bleak prairies. They were powerful books, but, as he admits in his autobiography, somewhat grim. A paper of that time reported Henry James as saying that Mr. Garland was saturated with the atmosphere of Wisconsin, which I privately amended to Dakota, for life never was so trying in this more favored State.2 The silos, tractors and automobiles of present Dakota prove conditions then were not so much the fault of farm life as of the early era, privations of which soon ease up. “A Son of the Middle Border” is a powerful book, realistic yet idyllic, intimate yet semi-historical. But does he not score his early life too severely? Its hardships perhaps gave him the strong character he has. Shall the vase condemn the machine which shapes it? When I asked Mr. Garland why he no longer wrote political stories of [ 49]

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reform tendency, he said others could write those, but he had discovered description was his forte, with which the reading world agrees. It is a wise, fortunate man who understands his own genius. The agony of drouth, fury of blizzard, mystery of slough, expanse of prairie, glory of dawn, sweetness of flowers and spirit of the land are portrayed in a way unsurpassed by any other writer with whom I am acquainted. Sometimes a reader fairly holds his breath during these descriptions, as over the suspended denouements of other novelists. Yet probably most of these unforgettable pictures were etched in the long, solitary hours of farm labor, and the colors washed in with sweat. The circumstances which made for good descriptions in future books, did less for conversations therein. People met by me in Minnesota Farm Institutes before the day of autobiography, often said, “If I do not afford a whole set of Hamlin Garland’s works, what one book shall I select?” I asked the author whether my answer “The Captain of Gray Horse Troop” was proper. He assented, because it portrays a certain stage of Indian life on the reservation, when green agents, for instance, tried to introduce cheap, callusing shoes instead of soft moccasins. He believed as a historical work, it should live. My mother’s favorite of Mr. Garland’s works was a story of mental healing amid Nature’s noble balms, running in Ladies’ Home Journal as “Spirit of Sweetwater” and put in book form as “Witches’ Gold.” W. D. Howells, veteran of American letters, considered that “Money Magic” showed best workmanship. His friendship, for advice to and praise of Mr. Garland, is one of the generous things in literary history. Unknown to each other, Hamlin Garland’s summer home and our old farm, later VonderOhe’s, were each named Maple Shade. But since the dismemberment of that farm, his homestead has the only claim to [the] title. Many other authors have loaned distinction to Maple Shade cottage. Here visited Ernest Thompson Seton, lover of wild animals and leader in [the] Boy Scout movement. My connection with chickens helped him always to remember me. Juliet Wilbor Tompkins proved as brilliant a conversationalist as writer, a caressing teaser, with a recent story in Ladies’ Home Companion. 3 Henry Fuller, veteran prolific Chicago author of novels of travel and exclusiveness, insisted on picking for exercise, some berries I engaged one day. Before delivery, he decorated the box with ivy. When the Garlands in return bought some eggs of me, I adorned the dish with bittersweet, to maintain Salem’s rank in refinement. . . . [ 50]

Ida E. Tilson

Naturally I did not become acquainted with nor interested in the many artists who came, with the exception of Mrs. Hamlin Garland’s distinguished brother, Lorado Taft, sculptor of Columbian Exposition and author of the leading history of sculpture. It will be recalled that Mrs. Zulime Garland, herself, spent some years abroad, studying art. She painted a picture of Hamlin’s mother, which we all preferred to any photograph. I am sure a copy of it is at front of “A Daughter of the Middle Border.” Its companion was taken of Mrs. Zulime Garland when first married. In much larger size it appeared in Harper’s Weekly.4 I cut out and framed the picture, which still hangs on my wall, because to know and neighbor Mrs. Zulime Garland is a whole liberal education in itself. Too much cannot be said of her comprehension, tolerance, and poise. Notes 1. Mary Isabel Garland (1903–1988), Garland’s eldest daughter. 2. In his “American Letter,” James noted that in local color fiction, “there is nothing like saturation” of detail to convey time and place, and that “I fi nd myself rejoicing, for example, in Mr. Hamlin Garland, a case of saturation so precious as to have almost the value of genius.” James concluded by calling Garland “the soaked sponge of Wisconsin” (Literature, 9 April 1898, 422). 3. Ernest Thompson Seton (1860–1946), an English-born author, artist, and naturalist, wrote several books on wildlife and woodcraft, including Wild Animals I Have Known (1898) and The Book of Woodcraft and Indian Lore (1912). He was also one of the founders of the Boy Scouts of America. Juliet Wilbor Tompkins (1871–1956), novelist and the editor of Munsey’s Magazine from 1897 to 1901. 4. Photographs of Isabelle McClintock Garland and Zulime Garland serve as the frontispiece to A Daughter of the Middle Border; the photograph of Zulime previously served as a full-page illustration for a review of The Captain of the Gray-Horse Troop, “White Man’s Road,” Harper’s Weekly, 5 April 1902, 433. From Ida E. Tilson, “Old Timer,” West Salem Nonpareil-Journal, [22 January 1922], clipping, Item 725, Hamlin Garland Papers, Collection no. 0200, Special Collections, USC Libraries, University of Southern California.

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[Garland as a West Salem Resident, 1893–1915] M a ry Ja ne Ew i ng

X Mary Jane Ewing (?–?) prepared a pamphlet about West Salem’s most famous son as part of the West Salem centennial celebration in 1951. In it she compiled a number of anecdotes about Garland that revealed an occasionally testy relationship between a successful author accustomed to the finer things in life and neighbors who were often bemused by his eccentricities.

during the years while his parents lived at Maple Shade, Garland spent part of each year in West Salem and the residents came to know him either by sight or word. He was a quiet man who few knew well and the stories of his eccentricities are well remembered. One year when he was wintering in New York and writing a new story, an article appeared in the Saturday Sentinel which was devoting space to well known writers. The article about Hamlin Garland stated, “His winter home is in a small, quiet village in La Crosse county, the inhabitants of which have never been troubled by the fact that he writes books. From the society of these blissfully unliterary persons he departs each year into the book sets of Chicago and New York where he is more profoundly terrorized at the display of new books.” This item reached the eyes and ears of West Salem residents and the local newspaper took exception with the remark: “Anything new from Mr. Garland’s pen is quite eagerly read and our interest in him grows, but because the ‘inhabitants have never been troubled by the fact that he writes books’ they do not like to be stigmatized as ‘blissfully unliterary persons.’” This unfortunate incident plus the distant and quiet personality of Garland touched a chord of distaste in the gregarious community which has not to this day been dispelled. Many people in Salem know of Hamlin Garland, rather than knowing the man himself. His desire for beauty overruled his practical side and he [52]

Mary Jane Ewing

often conflicted with the pioneers of the village who saw their future in mastership of nature rather than appreciation of its inherent beauty. During the years that Garland “visited” in West Salem his literary friends came often to pass a few days in the quiet village and enjoy the hospitality of the Garland family. Among these were William Dean Howells and Ernest Thompson Seton, an illustrious gathering indeed, for so small a town. Although Garland was a solid family man and well liked by those who knew him well he was not a mixer, and demanded privacy. He was eccentric and many stories are told of his odd personality. On one occasion the late Mrs. Tilson who had lived across the street from Garland for many years met him on the street. She greeted him cheerfully and the greeting was heartily returned. An amazed passerby stopped Mrs. Tilson and remarked, “How did you ever get Mr. Garland to speak to you?” “It isn’t too unusual,” replied Mrs. Tilson. “I’ve been working on it for twenty years.” Hamlin Garland’s business and financial problems are well remembered by B. A. Mau, cashier of the Union State Bank of West Salem. When Garland was writing a book his business matters became secondary and were, in fact, completely neglected. During one of these periods of complete literary concentration the local plumber sent him a bill which was ignored. The following month he sent another and the following month he sent another with a notation that if it were not paid it would be put in the hands of a collector. Another month went by and the plumber received a check for the amount due. In another week he received a check for the same amount, which was returned with a statement that the amount was paid. The next week he received another check which he likewise returned. Thereafter the plumber sent only one bill and waited patiently for payment which always came even though it might be as much as three months overdue. Mr. Mau recalls that at one time Garland owned six properties in West Salem. “I sold one mercantile building and three residences,” said Mau. “The renters in the remaining house left their rent at the bank. After about five years, I wrote him and advised that he had an accumulation of cash in the bank on which there had been no withdrawals for five years. Garland wrote and asked where the cash came from and I replied that it was rent for the iron clad house. In his reply he said he thought he had disposed of all his properties except the homestead and if he still owned a dwelling, would I please sell it for him.” [ 5 3]

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On another occasion Garland approached his friend George Dudley with a problem which was confronting him. “Say George,” Garland queried, “my roof leaks. What should I do about it?” “Put on a new roof,” was Dudley’s practical reply. “Would that mean taking off the shingles?” asked Garland. “Yes.” “I would not think of that because the moss on those shingles is too pretty to destroy,” declared the aesthetic author. Dudley saw no answer to this problem. “If that is the case,” he said, “you’ll have to put up with a leaky roof.” “How about building another roof over the present roof so the moss could remain?” asked Garland. “If you build another roof over the present roof you would be unable to see the moss and besides on account of the lack of moisture the moss would dry up,” said Dudley. The discussion came to no satisfactory conclusion and some time later when the leaks got so bad that Garland saw that his house would be ruined he had the moss scraped off and the roof covered with metal. Garland was notably a poor penman. Before he acquired a typewriter he wrote all letters by hand and many are almost illegible. At one time George Dudley received a letter from Garland which he was completely unable to decipher. Mr. Dudley wrote to him telling him that he was unable to read his writing and therefore could not answer the letter. When Mr. Garland returned to West Salem, Mr. Dudley asked him to read the letter, which he readily did and seemed surprised that others were unable to do so. Another story told of Garland was on the occasion when the house caught on fire.1 When the fire department arrived it looked as though the house could not be saved and the fire chief, Roy Gilfi llan, went into Garland’s study and found that on a large table a new book was in preparation. The chapters were arranged around the table. It appeared that he worked on all chapters at one time. If something came to mind he would fit it into the proper chapter. Roy located chapter one and picked them up one at a time and arranged them by criss-crossing every other chapter. Garland later sent the fire department a check and thanked the firemen for saving his house and especially thanked the chief for so carefully arranging the book, as it would have caused him hours of work to re-arrange the chapters had they become mixed. [54]

Mary Jane Ewing

The fire had been started when the maid was lighting the fire in the oil stove to heat water for the morning washing. As the stove lit it exploded and the maid, clothes aflame, rushed through the house to Mrs. Garland’s bedroom, igniting the other rooms as she ran. Mr. Garland was working in his study and his first thought was for his daughters. Constance was yet a baby and Garland wrapped her in a blanket and with Mary Isabel rushed to the garage where he stowed both away safely in the surrey. Going back to the house he threw out as many precious items as he could, including books and manuscripts. Later he got the two children and took them across the street to the home of Miss Hulda Sander. There he drew the blinds so that he could not see his beloved home going up in flames. The fire had destroyed the entire west wing of the lower floor and Garland’s study on the upper floor and many precious possessions were lost, including hundreds of books. However, the home was immediately rebuilt in exact counterpart of the original. The book which Roy Gilfi llan saved from the fire was probably The Captain of the Gray Horse Troop which was written about that time at the homestead.2 His first book written in West Salem was Rose of Dutcher’s Coolly in 1895. When the Garlands installed a bathroom in the house it was the first in Salem and a tinge of envy swept the town. “What will those Garland boys do next?” was the common gossip. Hamlin’s brother, Franklin, had turned his artistic heritage to the theater and became a noted actor. He also became a real estate broker in Muskogee, Oklahoma. He visited frequently in West Salem with the same devotion to his mother that Hamlin showed throughout his life. The Garlands had the first tennis court in West Salem and tennis parties were frequent on the spacious lawn. Garland himself was a devotee of the game and it is often told that once, while competing in a lively foursome in which interest was at a fever pitch, he walked to the sideline, laid down his racquet and went into the house without a word to anyone. His typewriter was soon heard beating out a new addition to his current book. Notes 1. Garland described the burning of his home in chapter 24 of A Daughter of the Middle Border, “The Old Homestead Suffers Disaster.” News of the fire, which occurred on 7 October 1912, made the front pages of the New York Times and the Chicago Tribune. See “Hamlin Garland in Fire,” New York Times, 8 October 1912, 1; “Hamlin Garland in Peril

[55]

garland in his own time When His Residence Burns,” Chicago Tribune, 8 October 1912, 1. The maid, who was badly burned, was Fern Fox. 2. Since The Captain of the Gray-Horse Troop was published in 1902, it is not clear which manuscript Ewing refers to. From Mary Jane Ewing, ed., Hamlin Garland as West Salem Knew Him (West Salem, WI: West Salem Historical Society, 1951, 1977), 18–21.

[ 56]

[An Alternate View of Garland in West Salem, 1893–1915] M a ry Ja ne Ew i ng

X Coincidentally with the publication of Hamlin Garland as West Salem Knew Him, Mary Jane Ewing received a letter from Eldon Hill, and in her response she speaks more frankly than she had for publication about Garland’s standoffishness and the villagers’ resentment.

Mary Jane Ewing to Eldon Hill, 23 February 1951 . . . Several biographies of Garland have stated that he was born in Green’s coulee. I hope you have the facts correct. He was born here in West Salem according to his own words in a letter which I have here, and according to the son of the attending physician, John A. Stanley who wrote of the incident in From Then Until Now published in 1949: “Late one night there was a heavy knocking on our West Salem door and an excited young man urged my father to hurry — his wife was about to have a baby. His name was Garland. Father dressed and was driven several miles into the country, where he ushered into the world a baby boy who was christened Hamlin — Hamlin Garland.” Stanley also tells of once visiting with Garland when Garland was in his teens. This is an error of course since Garland left here when he was nine years old. Stanley is quite old and his memory may have erred. I don’t believe that any biography has ever been written which included the opinion of Garland formed by his neighbors and friends, rather than his literary associates. He is thoroughly disliked here because he was not a sociable person on the level of common interests. Recently we attempted to convince the town that one of the streets should be named Garland Ave. One old timer remarked: “If you do I’ll sell my property and move off of the street.” Another said, “Why name it after a man who wrote smutty books.” Still another remarked, “We don’t want anything to do with him. No one [57]

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spoke to Garland and Garland spoke only to God.” One woman said, “What’s in a name, Garland by any name would stink.” It was said that one lady who had lived across the street from Garland for many years once spoke to him on the street and he returned the greeting with all of his charm. A passerby remarked, “Why Mrs. Tilson, how did you ever get ‘Ham’ to speak to you?” “It’s not so remarkable,” replied Mrs. Tilson, “I’ve been working on it for twenty years.” On another occasion a group including Garland was playing tennis on his court, the first one in Salem, when at the height of the game, Garland walked from the court without a word to anyone. The party ended abruptly with great ill feeling. His daughter, Constance, slipped into the house and found him busily working on the next chapter of his new book. The few here who were his friends like him immensely. Mr. and Mrs. Meyer found him a gracious neighbor. He always consulted them when their interests were concerned. He built his garage on the back of his lot so that the Meyers’ home would not be marred. Mrs. Meyer recalls that on hot summer nights the music which rose from Maple Shade soothed the whole neighborhood. They all played instruments and his daughter Isabel sang. Mrs. Eva McEldowney, one of the old timers who was one of the children mentioned in A Son of the Middle Border thought him a very nice man. In short the ones who liked him were those with an understanding of the finer things of life; those who disliked him were the “hail fellows well met” who found him pre-occupied and distant. It is a common ailment of the talented. . . . Before I end let me ask another question. When and why did you become interested in Hamlin Garland? My reason for asking is that Garland is not a particularly well known author although an able one. He was not required reading when I was in school in Columbus or Ohio State even though I was a journalism and English major. However, my cousin, Charles Ridenour, who graduated from Miami had read most of the Garland works. I hope I have answered your letter fully. Sincerely, Mary Jane Ewing Mary Jane Ewing to Eldon Hill, 23 February 1951, Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

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[Letters about Garland, 1894] Theodor e Roosev elt

X Garland first met Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) in 1896, when the future president was police commissioner for New York City. They eventually formed a long-lasting friendship, during the course of which Roosevelt relied upon Garland’s advice concerning life on Indian reservations and entertained him at dinners at the White House; they exchanged and commented upon each other’s books, and Garland wrote numerous letters to Roosevelt about cultural matters, as well as some details of his personal life. After Roosevelt’s death, Garland published a number of articles about Roosevelt and featured him prominently in his memoirs. But in 1894, with the publication of Crumbling Idols, Garland’s literary manifesto in which he argued that writers needed to break the idols of the past and throw off the influence of New York as a literary center, his aggressive rhetoric prompted much derision in the press. As Walter Hines Page, the editor of the Atlantic, told him, “over a thousand editorials were written upon my main thesis” (Daughter, 25). (James) Brander Matthews (1852–1929) was a professor of literature at Columbia University and an influential critic; with Garland he later helped found the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1898 and its offshoot, the American Academy of Arts and Letters, serving as president of the Institute (1912–1914) and as chancellor of the Academy (1920–1924, when he had much interaction and an extensive correspondence with Garland).

Theodore Roosevelt to Brander Matthews, 21 May 1894 By the way, I saw a review in the Tribune of Hamlin Garland’s new book of Essays.1 He is a man with some power and with half an idea, but he is such a hopeless crank that nothing can be done with him, I fear. He is one of the very men who give us most trouble in producing a spirit of sane Americanism, because his excessive foolishness creates a reaction against us. [59]

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Theodore Roosevelt to Brander Matthews, 29 June 1894 After receiving your letter I got Hamlin Garland’s book and read it. I think you are right about Garland, excepting that I should lay a little more stress upon the extreme wrong-headedness of his reasoning. For instance, he is entirely wrong in thinking that Shakspeare, Homer and Milton are not permanent. Of course they are; and he is entirely in error in thinking that Shakspeare is not read, in the aggregate, during a term of years, more than any ephemeral author of the day. Of course every year there are dozens of novels each one of which will have many more readers than Shakspeare will have in the year; but the readers only stay for about a year or two, whereas in Shakspeare’s case they have lasted, and will last quite a time! I think that his ignorance, crudity, and utter lack of cultivation make him entirely unfit to understand the effect of the great masters of thought upon the language and upon literature. Nevertheless, in his main thought, as you say, he is entirely right. We must strike out for ourselves; we must work according to our own ideas, and must free ourselves from the shackles of conventionality, before we can do anything. As for the literary center of the country being New York, I personally never had any patience with the talk of a literary center. I don’t care a rap whether it is New York, Chicago, or any place else, so long as the work is done. I like or dislike pieces in the Atlantic Monthly and the Overland Monthly because of what they contain, not because of one’s being published in San Francisco or the other in Boston. I don’t like Edgar Fawcett any more because he lives in New York, nor Joel Chandler Harris any the less because he lives at Atlanta; and I read Mark Twain with just as much delight, but with no more, whether he resides in Connecticut or in Missouri.2 Garland is to me a rather irritating man, because I can’t help thinking he has the possibility of so much, and he seems just to fail to realize this possibility. He has seen and drawn certain phases of the western prairie life with astonishing truth and force; but he now seems inclined to let certain crude theories warp his mind out of all proper proportion, and I think his creative work is suffering much in consequence. I hate to see this, because he ought to be a force on the right side. Theodore Roosevelt to Brander Matthews, 7 December 1894 By the way did you see Hamlin Garland’s piece in the last Harper’s Weekly?3 It is very good, and is much less morbid than his pieces have [ 60]

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grown to be. It looks to me as though he were going to, in a somewhat different way, suffer as Howells has done, by taking a jaundiced view of life. This is not an uncommon development of the reform spirit, unfortunately. Even in this piece I am amused at one thing. He often predicates the unhappiness of people accustomed to entirely different surroundings from his because he, or because cultivated men brought up in ease, would mind such surroundings. I really doubt whether he has seen from the inside the life he describes nearly as much as I have, and he certainly must mind it far more. For instance, I have been a great deal in logging camps such as the one he describes in this last article in Harper’s, and I know that the men in them regard a good logging camp as a first-rate place, very comfortable, very warm, with an abundance of good food, and often pleasant company. I have thoroughly enjoyed such camps myself. He speaks of the greasy quilts, etc. Well, they are distressing to an over-civilized man; but for my own pleasure this year when I was out on the antelope plains I got into a country where I didn’t take my clothes off for ten days. I had two cowpunchers along, and the quilts and bedding, including the pillows which they had, were quite as bad as those Garland describes in his logging camp; yet they both felt they were off on a holiday and having a lovely time. Our food on this ten days’ trip was precisely like that he describes in the logging camp, except that we had venison instead of beef, and we ate it under less comfortable surroundings as a whole, or at least under what my men regarded as less comfortable surroundings. I have worked hard in cow camps for weeks at a time, doing precisely such work as the cow punchers, and I know what I am talking about. I did’n’t play; I worked, while on my ranch. There is a great deal of toil and hardship about the out of door life of lumbermen & cowboys; and especially about some phases which he doesn’t touch, such as driving logs in the springtime and handling cattle from a line camp in bitter winter weather; but the life as a whole is a decidedly healthy and attractive one to men who do not feel the need of mental recreation and stimulus — and few of them do. However, this story of Garland’s is a good one, and I am glad that he should go back to writing good stories, and not try to evolve some little school of literary philosophy, where the propriety of his purpose is marred by the utter crudity of his half-baked ideas, and where he is not tempted to group himself and one or two friends under some such absurd heading as “veritists.” [ 61 ]

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Notes 1. In an unsigned review of Crumbling Idols in the New York Tribune, the critic concluded a lengthy refutation of Garland’s thesis by observing, “The trouble with Mr. Garland is that while he is a young man of good natural powers, his intellectual training has been scanty and defective. Matters that were trite when his great-grandfather was a little boy he advances as new discoveries; his unbalanced enthusiasms leave him unable to see the just relation of things” (“A Western Image-Breaker,” New York Tribune, 20 May 1894, 20). 2. Edgar Fawcett (1847–1904) was the author of several satirical novels and plays about New York society, including the novel Purple and Fine Linen (1873) and the plays The False Friend (1880) and Americans Abroad (1881). Joel Chandler Harris (1848–1908) was a Georgia writer of plantation tales that appeared in several collections beginning with Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings (1881). 3. “Only a Lumber Jack,” Harper’s Weekly 38 (8 December 1894): 1158–59, a story about a musician’s attempt to overcome his drunkenness by becoming a lumberjack. Roosevelt to Brander Matthews, 21 May 1894, 29 June 1894, 7 December 1894, in The Letters of Theodore Roosevelt and Brander Matthews, ed. Lawrence J. Oliver (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1995), 80–84, 88–89.

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[Satiric Commentary on Garland, 1895–1899] Elbert Hu bba r d

X Elbert Hubbard (1856–1915) was the editor of the Philistine: A Periodical of Protest, which he founded in June 1895 as a means to attack the editors of magazines such as Harper’s Weekly, Ladies’ Home Journal, Century, and McClure’s Magazine, who had rejected his work. While he published the work of other writers, most notably Stephen Crane, he wrote much of the content of each thirty-two-page issue himself. In a section usually headed “Side Talks with the Philistines; Being Sundry Bits of Wisdom Which Have Been Heretofore Secreted, and are Now Set Forth in Print,” he delighted in ridiculing pretention, conveying literary gossip, and caricaturing the writers and literary fads of the day. Garland, with his work and name increasingly in the press, provided grist for Hubbard’s satirical mill.

[june 1895] the editor of The Baseburner, who claims to be a veritist, states that it is not true that the Garland stoves were named after Ham Garland of Chicago Stockyards; but the fact is Garland named himself after the stoves.1 [August 1895] When Shem Rock, Ham Garland and Japhet Bumball conspired to spring on an unsuspecting world that three-cornered story entitled The Land of the Straddle Bug, they bought two whole bushels of hyphens.2 In one chapter, by actual count, forty-seven compound words are used. They have even hyphenated such words as dod-rot, dodd-mead, slap-jack, goll-darn, do-tell and gee-whiz. Ham’s own pet “yeh” is used in the story sixty-four times, which does not include four plain “you’s” and three “ye’s,” where the Only Original Lynx-eyed Proof-reader nodded. [August 1895] Ham Garland has gone up the coulee to his farm near La Crosse and is writing another novel. He is daily in receipt of letters and telegrams from people in all parts of the country asking him to pull the coulee up after him. [September 1895] I hope no one suspects me of any disrespect toward Ham Garland of the Chicago Stock Yards, heretofore noticed in these col[63]

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umns. A correspondent reminds me that Mr. G. is favorably mentioned in the oldest records. The historian of the creation remarks “And Ham was the father of Canaan.” [November 1895] When in 1892 Mr. Ham Garland prophesied that Chicago would soon be the literary center of America, the Ink-Stained of the East said “shoo!”3 But the prophecy is fast coming true. The first edition of Mr. Thomas W. Mudgett’s book was sold in a week; and the good people of the Windy City are taking a justifiable pride in the achievement of their best known citizen. “H. H. Holmes” is Mr. Mudgett’s nom de plume.4 [October 1896] On the authority of Mr. Frank L. Stanton of Atlanta,5 Hamlin Garland is quoted as saying, “I will stick to the soil till I die.” That is a very sub-tropical way of putting it, and I don’t wonder the Georgian likes it. To be more accurate, the soil will stick to Hamlin — and it will do so after he dies too. [July 1897] Hamlin Garland still maintains that literature is a sectional affair, and gives as many reasons as the devil could say in six weeks to seduce a Sunday School Superintendent who was a Country Treasurer. [December 1897] I have received a letter from the Secretary of the Woman’s Club at Kokomo, Indiana, asking, “Is it true that the name Hamlin Garland is a nom de plume and that the man’s sure-enough-name is McGuire? If it is true does not the gifted author lay himself liable to the Michigan Stove Co. in using a copyrighted trade-mark?” I have referred the letter to Aunty Ruth for reply. [November 1898] [On authors who read their manuscripts to an unwary public] But of all men to be avoided I place Hamlin Garland first. He was taught the trick by B. O. Flower, one of the worst sinners in this respect the world has ever known; but Hamlin Garland has seen Mr. Flower and gone him one better. I am told that Mr. Flower is very proud of his pupil. Chester Lord of The Sun6 tells me (so it must be so) that the reason the Spanish capitulated so quickly at Santiago was because Shafter had Hamlin Garland read to them thro a megaphone from an unpublished Sex Novel.7 [August 1899] The following is the motto recently adopted by the Armour Packing Company. I am not very sure, but I think it was devised by Mr. Hamlin Garland who belongs to the Chicago Pre-Raphaelites: Worth makes the man, & want of it the chump; To win: Lay hold, hang on, and hump.

[ 64 ]

Elbert Hubbard

[December 1899] Mr. Ham Garland is a person so essentially unhumorsome that one may be allowed to wonder what possible sort of entertainment he is expected to give the public for its good money. Yet the McClure managers are featuring him in the same style as the mighty McManus.8 To have written novels which obtain only a forced sale and to have evolved a system of literary ethics from the slaughter stalls of Chicago — are these imperative recommendations to the McClure Continuous? If so be, then is Ham entitled to his top liners and three-sheet posters, and the McManus has nothing on him. To the Elect Few the spectacle of Ham Garland’s unselfish devotion to the Ego projected by his own literary consciousness is, in the McClure parlance, alone worth the price of admission. But we tremble for the receipts at East Sheboygan and Cohoes! Notes 1. This is a reference to the Garland Stove manufactured by the Michigan Stove Company. In 1893, a mammoth wooden replica of the Garland Stove, measuring twenty-five feet high, thirty feet long, and twenty feet wide, was exhibited outside the Manufacturers and Liberal Arts Building at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. 2. Herbert S. Stone (“Rock”) and Hannibal Ingalls Kimball (“Bumball”) published Garland’s “The Land of the Straddle-Bug” serially in the Chap-Book from 15 November 1894 to 15 December 1895. The plot concerns the adulterous affair of a woman who is married to a weak husband. 3. In “The West in Literature” (Arena 6 [1892]: 669–76), Garland had called upon Western writers and critics to end their reliance upon Eastern standards and instead to cultivate a native literature. 4. This is a reference to Herman Webster Mudgett (1861–1896), whose alias was Henry Howard Holmes, a notorious serial killer who preyed upon visitors to the World’s Columbian Exposition. In the latter 1890s, several books appeared about the case. 5. Frank L. Stanton (1857–1927) was a poet and columnist for the Atlanta Constitution. 6. Chester S. Lord (1850–1933) was managing editor of the New York Sun. 7. In July 1898 Major General William Rufus Shafter (1835–1906) led the siege of Santiago de Cuba during the Spanish-American War. 8. This is probably a reference to advertising for Garland’s lectures, or to his biography Ulysses S. Grant: His Life and Character, which Doubleday and McClure had published in September 1898 after serializing portions of it in McClure’s Magazine. Elbert Hubbard, Philistine 1 (June 1895, 16; August 1895, 97–98, 103; September 1895, 133; November 1895, 196); 3 (October 1896, 154); 5 (July 1897, 47); 6 (December 1897, 19– 20); 8 (November 1898, 183); 9 (August 1899, 95); 10 (December 1899, 4–5).

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From “I State My Views on Taxation” (1896) Eugene Field

X In June 1893, just before the World’s Columbian Exposition, Garland interviewed Field for the inaugural issue of McClure’s Magazine. In a dialogue between interviewer and subject in which Garland himself becomes a character in the interview being recorded by an “objective” observer, Garland used the occasion to reinforce the themes of his polemical writing on behalf of local color writing, putting words in Field’s mouth to have him exclaim, “I tell you, brother Garland, the West is the coming country. We ought to have a big magazine to develop the West. It’s absurd to suppose we’re going on always being a tributary to the East!” (“Real Conversations. — II. A Dialogue between Eugene Field and Hamlin Garland,” McClure’s Magazine 1 [August 1893]: 204). Elsewhere in the interview, Garland took pains to describe Field’s appearance and habits of speech — characteristics at odds with Field’s actual demeanor and vocal habits. The interview was published in August, but Field took his revenge in his semifictional autobiography The House, in which he poked fun at Garland’s single-tax advocacy and his recent novel Rose of Dutcher’s Coolly (1895), in which Rose (the “blackberry”) moves from an idyllic farm to the city, as well as Garland’s celebration of rural life.

of the many friends who hastened to congratulate us when they heard that we had acquired a home, none was more delighted than Gamlin Harland. I take it for granted that you have read Mr. Harland’s numerous books, and that you know all about Mr. Harland himself. Not to know of him is to argue one’s self unknown. My first meeting with Mr. Harland was at a single-tax convention six years ago; he was a delegate to that convention from Wisconsin, and I was a delegate from Illinois. I was a delegate because the manager of the party, who lives in New York, couldn’t find anybody else to serve as the delegate from the congressional district in which I lived. I thought that rather than have that district unrepresented I ought to serve, and so I did. The acquaintance I then made with Gamlin Harland soon ripened into friendship, and [66]

Eugene Field

this intimacy has lasted ever since. Mr. Harland insists that I am a singletax man, and it may be that I am in theory, although I certainly am not in practice; for I never have paid any tax of any kind, be it single or double. As soon as he heard of our purchase Mr. Harland came out to inspect the premises, and of course he was delighted. “This will make a new man of you,” said he to me. “It will take your mind off your impracticable star-gazing and moonshining, and divert your attention into the channels of realism. These premises are so spacious as to admit of your engaging to a considerable extent in agriculture; you can now lay aside the telescope and the spectrum for the spade and the hoe; the field of speculation can be abandoned for this noble acre which I hope soon to see smiling into an abundant harvest.” “Yes,” said I, “it is my purpose to engage largely in the cultivation of flowers.” “Pshaw!” cried Mr. Harland, “there you go again! Don’t you know that flowers are wholly worthless except in so far as they pander to the gratification of a sensuous appetite? It would be a crime to surrender these opportunities to ignoble uses. You must raise vegetables here, or perhaps some of the small fruits would thrive better in this rich sandy soil.” Investigation satisfied Mr. Harland that blackberries were the particular kind of small fruit to which the soil seemed adapted. I was not surprised at this, for I knew that the blackberry was a favorite with Mr. Harland — in fact, Mr. Harland is the only author I know of who has written a novel whose plot hinges (so to speak) upon a blackberry. So passionately fond of this fruit is he that he devotes a part of the year to cultivating blackberries on his Wisconsin farm. There are invidious persons who intimate that his only reason for cultivating the blackberry is to be found in the fact that nothing else will grow on his farm, and presumably you have heard the epigram which the romanticists have perpetrated at Mr. Harland’s expense, and which represents that ambitious and aggressive gentleman as raising blackberries in summer and — in winter. After getting me thoroughly inoculated with the blackberry idea, and having duly impressed me with his theory that true manhood consisted of making one’s self unspeakably miserable and sweaty with a shovel and a hoe, Mr. Harland broached his favorite topic, and ventured the assertion that now that I was the possessor of taxable property I would become as rabid a single-tax advocate as Henry George himself. I answered that I al[ 67 ]

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ready advocated a single-tax system, for the reason that if we could only once get a single-tax system in vogue we should then be but one remove from no taxation at all, and would have less difficulty in securing that desirable end ultimately. The truth of the matter is, I object to taxation only in so far as it affects me. I have no objection to other folk being taxed, but I do not fancy being taxed myself. I agree with Brother Harland that there is palpable injustice in making an industrious and public-spirited man pay for the so-called privilege of building himself a home; he pays the carpenters and masons and painters for making that home, and he is then expected to pay the city and the State for having invested his hard earnings in a permanent enterprise which gives employment to the laborer which beautifies the neighborhood, and which enhances the value of the adjacent property. The object of taxation (as Mr. Harland asserts and as I believe) is to enrich the office-holding class, a class of loose morality, utterly heartless and utterly conscienceless, and I agree with Mr. Harland in the opinion that the time is not far distant when the honest people of this country will arise as one man and subvert the corrupt hand of politics which is now grinding us under the iron heel of oppression. It is seldom that I give expression to my views upon this subject, for the reason that I fear they may be misinterpreted. I have always had an apprehension that I would be mistaken for an anarchist, which I am not; I am an advocate of peace and of the laws; I do not believe in violence of any kind. From Eugene Field, “I State My Views on Taxation,” in The House: An Episode in the Lives of Reuben Baker, Astronomer, and of His Wife, Alice (New York: Scribner, 1896), 185–89.

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[Satiric Commentary on Garland in 1896] Ch a r les Fletcher Lu mmis

X Charles Fletcher Lummis (1859–1928) was the editor of The Land of Sunshine magazine, which was established in 1894 and renamed Out West in 1901. As a former newspaperman and free-lance writer, he did much to popularize the American Southwest, a term he originated. He had lived at the Iseleta Pueblo in New Mexico and became a leading activist for the American Indian. In 1896 he read Garland’s syndicated article “Despotism in Mexico” (Los Angeles Times, 28 June 1896, 23), in which the writer described his impressions as he visited Mexico while doing research for his biography of Ulysses S. Grant. Since he did not speak Spanish, Garland limited his observations to the more picturesque scenes and sounds before concluding with an admiring portrait of President Diaz that depicted him as a benevolent despot who was “the man best fitted” to be leader and whose “plans seem to point toward the glory of Mexico rather than toward his own aggrandizement.” Those remarks prompted Lummis in his column “In the Lion’s Den” to use Garland as a representative of those travel writers who describe without really understanding. Three months later Lummis responded more positively to Garland’s article about his experience observing portions of the Hopi Snake Dance ceremony (“Among the Moki Indians,” Harper’s Weekly 40 [15 August 1896]: 801–7). Later, Garland helped Lummis form the Sequoya League, an organization whose motto was “to make better Indians” and which was dedicated to improving conditions on reservations by lobbying government officials and publicizing concerns through Lummis’s magazine.

Bunco “Travel” Hamlin Garland is a worthy young man and a talented writer who has already been laughed at probably more than he deserves. Lacking the sense of humor himself, he naturally provokes the smiles of those who have it, even while they respect his astonishing seriousness. Now seriousness, though dangerous when untempered with proportion, is a good thing in a flippant age; and the Lion does not much care to swell the chorus of laugh[69]

garland in his own time

ter. But really there are things more vital to be preserved than the peace of a conscious young man — and among them is the dignity of literature. Mr. Garland is just now promulgating himself about Mexico, where he passed a few weeks as a peripatetic deaf-mute. He did not see very much, and understood less than he saw; and the result is naturally painful. But — and here comes in the principle against which he is not the only nor the greatest sinner — he seems to think that the important thing to be recorded is not some alleviation of our current ignorance of Mexico, but — the color of Mr. Garland’s mind during the various stages of his ride over the Ferrocarril I-M. This is a vice which is eating deep into literature, particularly periodical literature. The West has suffered enough from the miswritings of innocent young-men-from-a-car-window; but the one misrepresented is no more sufferer than the cheated reader. Our average “traveler” adds to the sum of ignorance and multiplies intolerance by giving us knowledge not of the countries he sees, but of the various ways in which he can be smart or impressive. Mr. Garland could not talk with the people he met, who might have told him what things mean; and he is not a good guesser. His observations would set the Chihuahua kindergarten on a grin; but he delivers them with Delphic solemnity. And really it is too bad. If Mr. G. will travel in Mexico — or any other country of whose habits, history and language he is ignorant — let him keep his eyes and ears open and a bit of common sense up his sleeve. Let him believe only one-quarter that brakemen and cheap interpreters tell him, and only one-eighth of the brilliant suggestions that arise in his own fertile brain — and he will begin to get some of the real education of travel. But the longer he goes to school to his present methods, the less and less his readers will know. Evening the Score If Hamlin Garland sometimes makes one itch to pick up the first thing that comes handy to be thrown, he has also a redeeming way of impelling one to choose a bouquet for missile. His recent description (in Harper’s Weekly) of the Moqui Snake-Dance is a fine, broad piece of work; and so long as he will travel with that sort of baggage no one will question his right to travel and tell. The ethnologic explanations, learned from a wholly unnoted expeditioner, are not much important; but what Mr. Garland saw [ 70]

Charles Fletcher Lummis

and thought about it is uncommonly interesting and instructive. If he was pompous in Mexico toward a people he did not know, he is dignified here among equally unguessed strangers — and all that makes so important a difference is that in the latter case he did not bring a prejudice along. To see a little in-door man patronizing the achievements of the great Mexican who has lived and done more than a thousand lives of his would balance is amusing enough once, but grows indigestible when every tuppenny tourist repeats it. And on the other hand it is encouraging and warming when a traveler can see the human and elemental in a primitive race. Perhaps all that Mr. Garland needs, after all, is to get out West and stay long enough for it to soak in — but the really West, and not the Nebraska farm-hand area with its pig-pen horizon. His first taste of the large aperient seems to have worked very well. He should, however, while he is making so good a job, abandon the impertinence of that spelling “Moki” — an atrocity invented by certain halfeducated ethnologists who will probably never grow old enough to know any better. Moqui has had a place in literature and history since long before any of these mis-spellers had ancestors; and people who know anything of bibliography or of linguistics and have any sense of fitness will retain it. From Charles Fletcher Lummis, “In the Lion’s Den,” Land of Sunshine 5 (August 1896): 171–72; “That Which is Written,” Land of Sunshine 5 (November 1896): 248–49.

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[Garland in London in 1899] Gr a nt R ich a r ds

X Grant Richards (1872–1948) was the publisher of the English edition of The Captain of the Gray-Horse Troop (1902). Among his authors were James Joyce, George Bernard Shaw, G. K. Chesterton, and John Masefield. Garland had arrived in London in April 1899 to arrange for the English edition of his novels.

a recent notice of Hamlin Garland in the London Times sent my mind back through the decades on what, in this circumstance, was an especially felicitous voyage. I found myself in the high summer of 1899 in one of the orchard gardens of Cookham Dean in Berkshire, in that horseshoe of the Thames which is there the neighbor of some of the loveliest river scenery in the world, that “river of liquid history,” as John Burns called it. Cliveden, Hurley Lock, Marlow and Cookham are all well within that horseshoe’s compass. But to go back to my garden, the garden of Busham Park Farm. There in its midst I see seated Hamlin Garland, in a padded armchair which had been specially brought out of the house and placed on the aged lawn on that very hot June afternoon so that Garland, then thirty-eight, should avoid, as far as was possible, chills from the soil and drafts from the surrounding shrubberies. He had come down for a few hours to lunch and to see something of the countryside; but on that day, I am sorry to say, although he was politeness itself and good company and attractive in the way that the people of the Middle West know so well how to be, he was not at heart very content. The rest of us were a great deal warmer than we cared to be, for it was a very hot afternoon, and we were wearing as little as in those Victorian days was considered proper, but Hamlin Garland — or Hamlin, may I say? — had done his best to secure himself against the rigors of an English summer by wearing his warmest and darkest suit, a black felt hat, and a black overcoat. And still, poor chap, he was cold! And he did not very much like the food, although he made exception for Berkshire straw[72]

Grant Richards

berries and cream in a bowl with sponge fingers to help the flavor — “My! this is almost as good as strawberry shortcake as Mother makes it!” I had pleasant letters from him later, and we all liked him; but find him I could not when, two years later, I searched for him in Chicago in May, and I was not surprised to hear that he was somewhere south, for May, 1901, was cold indeed in those northern States. From Grant Richards, “Looking Back,” Monitor (Boston), 1 July 1940, 8.

[ 7 3]

[Garland’s Marriage, 1899–1906] Isa bel Ga r l a nd Lor d

X In 1926 Garland’s eldest daughter Mary Isabel (1903–1988; in her teenage years she dropped her first name) married [James] Hardesty Johnson (1899– 1952), a tenor with the Jean de Reske Singers, a quartet that had trained in Europe, where Isabel first met him, and that had come to New York on an American tour. Their marriage was unhappy, and she divorced him and married Mindret Lord (1903–1955), a writer, in 1936. Garland had long nourished his daughter’s interest in writing, and after his death Isabel published her first novel, entitled Abandon Hope (1941, also published as Death Comes Courting, 1941), followed by four others in collaboration with her husband, under the name “Garland Lord”: Murder’s Little Helper (1941), She Never Grew Old (1942), Murder with Love (1943), and Murder, Plain and Fancy (1943). Mindret Lord’s success in writing scripts and his growing involvement with Holly wood celebrities led to jealousies, and in 1947 the marriage ended. Eight years later Mindret was dead, a suicide. In the 1960s, Isabel read her father’s diaries in preparation for depositing them in the Huntington Library in San Marino, California. Garland had begun keeping a daily diary in 1898 and had continued the habit until a week before his death. In them he had recorded the minutiae of a busy author and also a great deal about his family, especially about Isabel, the daughter he adored. Reading the diaries gave her a renewed appreciation for the meaning and scope of Garland’s life, as well as her own part in it. Before the diaries left her hands, Isabel made a selective transcript, some 146 single-spaced pages. At some point in the process she decided to use them as the basis for a memoir. That was the genesis of A Summer to Be, which Isabel had originally titled “This Loving Daughter.” Despite her occasional conflicts with her father, Isabel wished the book to stand as a testament to her deep and lasting love for the father who had cherished her, perhaps not fully realizing how revelatory it would prove of her own complex attitude toward him. Isabel also intended A Summer to Be to document her love for Mindret, with whom she finally emerged from her father’s shadow. The memoir is of particular value for its revelations about Garland’s personal life, as well as for the events he omitted from his many volumes of reminiscences that are at odds with the family mythology he constructed.

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Isabel Garland Lord

back in her brother’s studio on the Midway in Chicago, Zulime was commissioned to model an heroic-size group for the World’s Fair of 1893. As I remember, Education was the subject, and from the photographs it turned out to be a handsome, professional job.1 It was not long before she met the rising Western novelist, Hamlin Garland, whose realistic literary approach was causing shocked comment in intellectual circles. Henry Blake Fuller wrote the story of their courtship in his sly, charming Under the Skylights,2 and Father’s own account appears in his Pulitzer Prize–winning A Daughter of the Middle Border, a book, by the way, that my mother steadfastly refused to read. When I asked her why, her face shadowed and she looked away from me with her lips tightening. “Because it isn’t true,” she said, and nothing could persuade her to say more. Many years later, Mother and I came together in a way we never had before. Though I had always loved her, depended on her, used her, there was a shyness between us that prevented full confidence. Then the day came when I found a deep, rewarding, romantic love, and she seemed to want to share it with me, to prove to me that she really understood. It was an extraordinary story that she told me, and not a suggestion of it appears in either Hamlin Garland’s books or his diaries. Zulime Taft was not in love with Hamlin Garland when she married him. She had numerous admirers, and Father was frank in explaining the difficulty he had in persuading the lovely, young artist to accept him. Mother said she had admired Hamlin, and liked him, but love as a physical passion had no part in it. “I don’t quite know why I did it,” she said with a half-smile, lying back on her pillows in the darkened room where I sat by her bedside. “Except he was handsome, distinguished, much talked about. And Lorado liked him.” There was no question about it: Father was a strong character, and I imagine his wooing was pretty hard to withstand. They went out to Kansas for the wedding, where the bride wore a blue serge suit she had made herself, and the bridegroom was confined to a wheelchair, temporarily, with rheumatism. “Zulime looks after me as if I were a baby,” Father confided in his diary. “She is a wonderful girl.” [75]

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To the Colorado Springs friends they were to visit, Father had written in his atrocious handwriting, “I am eager to have you meet my wife who is a panther.” The Ehrichs were enormously intrigued but somewhat relieved when the lady turned out to be a “painter” and not a “panther.”3 Their marriage, at first, sounds ideal. Father was a literary lion, and money and honors flowed in upon the Garlands. Proudly he took his dazzling young bride (he was ten years older) to New York where they were feted and courted and wined and dined to the point of exhaustion. In his diary Daddy tells of returning to their hotel suite in the early evening with a bottle of champagne and two roast beef sandwiches in his overcoat pocket, to spend an evening of peace, alone. When he took his wife back to the little town of West Salem, where his mother and father were living in the old house he had bought for them, life for Zulime became far from idyllic. Isabelle McClintock Garland was a semi-invalid and a furiously jealous and possessive mother. While she came eventually to love her daughter-in-law, it was a difficult, discouraging time. “I tried my best,” Mother said, “but she couldn’t bear to have us alone together. She was always coming to the foot of the stairs and calling, ‘Hamlin, aren’t you coming down?’ and usually Hamlin went.” I understand my mother’s exasperation, but Father gives no hint of this side of the picture.4 Never was there a more loyal and devoted son. To him these were merely signs of motherly affection. His father, on the other hand, frankly doted on his new daughter, and when she presented him with a granddaughter (me), he professed himself completely content. It was five or six years after their marriage that it happened. Mother told me that it was months before she would even admit it to herself. The man was from out of town, dynamic, handsome, vastly rich, with just one idea in the world: to take Zulime away with him. Mother’s voice faltered. “I was tempted, horribly. . . . I had never felt anything like that before. It was as if I were . . . another person. I couldn’t think what to do. Hamlin was away a great deal, lecturing, attending to business in the East. Larry would take a taxi from the station and keep it waiting out there in the street hour after hour, while he tried to persuade me. . . .”5 Oh, as a child I remember those stolen visits: the low murmur of voices downstairs in the fire-lit drawing room, the throb of the taxi motor in the [ 7 6]

Isabel Garland Lord

silent, snow-fi lled street. I would wonder sleepily in my cozy bed who it was who came so late and stayed so long. If I had known it was Uncle Larry, I would have been down the stairs in a minute. I adored the big, striking man who, on official visits, showered me with preposterously expensive presents and swung me high in the air before he kissed me. He smelled wonderfully of tweeds and tobacco and fine masculine cologne. I remember remarking once, artlessly, “It’s too bad Daddy’s never here when you come. He would like to see you so much.” I was on the floor, absorbed in a great new doll, but I remember the silence and can imagine the long look that passed between them. Mother told me the man had a wife but they were estranged and planning a divorce. Surely, he argued, if she told Hamlin the truth, he would agree to a divorce. But there was the baby, Mary Isabel. Without question, Mother loved me as passionately as Father did and would not for an instant consider giving me up. Yet the thought of robbing Hamlin of the light of his life was intolerable. Mother and I were both weeping now. “I couldn’t see a chance for happiness anywhere . . . so, at last, I sent him away. . . . It was worse than . . . dying. The long, empty years seemed to stretch on forever.” I was holding her small, trembling hands. “Did Daddy know?” She drew a long breath. “Yes. . . . But we have never spoken of it since. After little Constance came, there was so much demanded of me that life became . . . easier.” Nowhere in the writings of Hamlin Garland is there a hint of this bitter, foredoomed episode, but once I had heard Mother’s confession, many things about my father became clearer to me. He was a proud, self-centered man. It must have turned his world to dust and ashes. Notes 1. For the Columbian Exposition, Zulime sculpted Learning for display in the Art Building, as well as a statue of Victory for display in the interior of the Manufacturers’ Building. Her colossal figure of Freedom Breaking Her Chains caused one reviewer to marvel, “One can scarcely believe that the slender girlish figure has the physical endurance, or the small white hand the strength to model those great forceful figures, but all unaided she has accomplished that which will crown her with honor, for she has embodied in plaster much of the grace and dignity of her own soul.” As a result, she was featured, with a striking engraving of her, in an issue of the Illustrated American as part of a story on Exposition sculpture by women artists (clippings in Zulime Garland’s scrapbook, Item 712c, 4 [USC];

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garland in his own time “Sculpture at the World’s Fair,” Illustrated American, 25 March 1893, 373–74). Original annotations in this and in other selections from the memoir have in some cases been edited, augmented, or moved to other locations for consistency. 2. Henry Blake Fuller (1857–1929) was Garland’s closest friend. Garland met him soon after Fuller published his most important novel The Cliff-Dwellers (1893). In “The Downfall of Abner Joyce,” one of the stories in Under the Skylights (1901), Fuller wickedly satirizes Garland’s climb into social preeminence. 3. Louis Ehrich (1849–1911) was a Colorado Springs businessman and art dealer. Garland and Zulime were married on 18 November 1899, at the home of Zulime’s father in Hanover, Kansas. Garland describes his honeymoon visit with Louis and Henriette Ehrich in A Daughter of the Middle Border, 140–42. 4. While Garland’s autobiographies consistently portray his devotion to his mother, Zulime’s recollection is borne out by Garland’s diary, where he describes their contentment in isolating themselves in their room, only to be interrupted by Mother Garland, who “is jealous of our companionship and often comes to the door if she thinks we are staying up stairs too long. She likes to have us sit where she can see us” (11 February 1900, GD 1–43, Huntington Library). 5. Zulime’s lover remains unidentified. “Larry” is likely not his name, given Isabel’s concealment of other names in the memoir. Here and elsewhere the ellipses are Lord’s. From Isabel Garland Lord, A Summer to Be: A Memoir by the Daughter of Hamlin Garland, ed. Keith Newlin, foreword by Victoria Doyle-Jones (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2010), 34–39.

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From “On the Trail with Hamlin Garland” (1907) C. Wat t Br a ndon

X C. Watt Brandon (1871–1958) was a journalist who founded the Pinedale Roundup in 1904 before selling it in 1907 and moving to Kemmerer, Wyoming, where he became the publisher of the Kemmerer Camera and later the Kemmerer Gazette. In early August 1907 Garland left Chicago for a trip to Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming to soak up atmosphere for his fiction, and later that month he arrived in Pinedale to explore the high country of what is now the Wind River Wilderness. Brandon served as his guide and wrote the following account for his newspaper. An abridged version appeared in Harper’s Weekly 51 (5 October 1907): 1465. Garland’s own much briefer narrative appears in Companions on the Trail, 366–67.

how many of those who have heard of Hamlin Garland, and are familiar with his works, have stopped to think of that brilliant author as a common man in private life. Mr. Garland’s late visit to our midst has developed many of his pleasant traits of character, showing the common-place unassuming gentleman that he is. Mr. Garland arrived in our little village on the stage Monday evening, having left Kemmerer on the Saturday evening preceding, and remaining over Sunday at the McGinnis Midway ranch. His arrival here was of no moment. He passed the evening pleasantly talking with our people, but it was not until next morning after breakfast that the fact dawned upon us that the stranger was none other than Hamlin Garland, and that he was here for the purpose of making a trip back into the unknown hills of the Wind River mountains in search of new material and scenes, and to get a full breath of the Wyoming wild — which we can truly say was grand to him — especially as it was located in the very center of the great nation which is his pride. Mr. Garland spent the day Tuesday very pleasantly, being a great admirer of fresh air, and took two of his long walks, in addition to a ride in the afternoon with Forest Supervisor Zeph Jones. But the object of his visit was not accomplishing. An attempt had been made to secure a guide to go back [79]

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into the hills with him, but the search was futile — all were busy in the hayfields, and owing to recent resignations of three of the older Forest Rangers, there was not enough of these boys to properly patrol this side. Late that evening, after every plan had been threshed over to get started for the hills, the evident unrest caused by his delay was apparent, and the editor gave in to Mr. Garland’s plan for both of us to take a pack outfit and horses and go back into the forest trails alone for several days — to the very summit. Consequently, bright and early in the morning the horses were wrangled and the pack prepared for the trail. Mr. Garland superintending the packing, and carefully selecting the “grub” to be taken along — only two pounds of bacon, he said, to be used to flavor the grouse with, and it was evidently his intention to feed on the game bird. Plenty of coffee and sugar, with flour and butter, was all that was needed, but hostess Peck of the Pinedale Hotel very thoughtfully passed us three loaves of bread before leaving which we promptly wrapped in a “gunnie” sack and stored in the panniers. The start from Pinedale was made at about 11 a.m., and of course as soon as we were on our way, the gentle drops of rain gathering force, succeeded in making the first part of the journey just a little disagreeable. The route led north from Pinedale, along the Jorgensen and Glover fences by the Binning meadows, until Spring Creek was reached, thence on and up the trail, passing the Lily pond and foothill lakes, and rising to the summit of the divide between the heads of Fremont and Willow lakes, where the first camp was established in Spring Creek Park, from where the blazed trails spread out into the forest. Here it was the understanding of Mr. Garland for camp life first came vividly before me. Much of the first part of the journey was spoiled for myself, wondering how I was to cook the young sage-chicken, killed on the way up and what success I would have with the coffee, but the moment had come, so I put on a bold face. Mr. Garland relieved his horse of his pack while I unsaddled our mounts, and prepared the horses for our first night in the hills, realizing that the full responsibility of a guide was upon me, and trying to guess what that duty was. Shiner was put on the picket rope, the Blue horse hobbled, and Barney, the pack horse, was allowed to run with his rope. Returning what was my surprise to find the camp already established, the fire going, the coffee pot boiling, and the young chicken [ 80]

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sizzling in the pan, my wonder and uselessness became apparent, and my appetite at the limit. I was cautioned to sit down and rest a few moments and that supper would soon be ready. I realized that I was in camp with a master-hand, and that my understandings of camp-life were quite meager. After an enjoyable supper, and a cup of some of the finest made coffee, I had ever tasted, the camp-fire was built up, and we sat down for a talk. It was here that Mr. Garland told me of his long trips over the trail — of the 400-mile trip he took with a pack outfit into the Yukon country, toward Dawson in 1898, on the gold trail, and each mile taking them further from civilization,1 and of his numerous trips over the trails in Colorado and in Montana. Then I realized that I would probably be little more than a companion for the trip, leaving all plans to Mr. Garland. Mr. Garland goes on the trail prepared to enjoy every comfort possible, and when bed-time came and his kit was unrolled, I observed that he particularly enjoyed the rest which might be gained at night. First he drew forth a neatly folded rubber mattress, which when spread out gave us the first impression of what it was. Seating himself by the fire and placing the blowing tube in his mouth, in the course of a five or ten minute conversation, he had a regular single mattress spread out on his tarp. It was then that I found his abhorrence for sleeping in a tent. He folded the tarp very neatly, so that it would protect the bed from the dampness, and spreading his sleeping bag of heavy paraffined ducking, covering a flannel sack completely lined with down, he disrobed and crawled in, lacing the sack up and folding the tarp over all, passed quietly into slumberland, with the threatening heavens the only covering. I just simply crawled into the tent and truly “rolled in.” It was not long however until I certainly envied him for the night was extremely chilly, and the narrowly folded blankets would not allow for changing of position without exposure to the cold and the damp ground became very hard. The sleeping outfit of Mr. Garland’s was made to his order, and complete weighed less than 25 pounds (while on the subject I might just mention that after the trip was over and Mr. Garland preparing to leave I fell heir to the sleeping sack and tarp). Bright and early the next morning I was awakened from a light slumber I had entered into, by the crackling of a fire, to find Mr. Garland was up and dressed, with the pot a-boiling and breakfast almost ready. It was then a simple matter to finish up and break camp. Mr. Garland took charge of [ 81 ]

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the packing, while I got up the saddle horses, and when the pack was completed it was a true mountaineer’s pack, evenly balanced and riding freely on the pack horse. We spotted the first blaze and followed that trail in the direction of Fremont peak — north. It was a beautiful morning, one of those we have read about. The trail was well cut, and we had truly taken to the tall timber. The squirrels chattered at us as we passed and the elk whistled on our right. The trail finally made a precipitous descent, and we came out on Lake creek, the main stream which feeds Willow lake. Following the winding trail now which crossed and re-crossed the little stream, thru the large meadows, where our only guide to the trail was the blaze on the opposite side of the meadow, our trail continued up. It was in one of those little parks that we ran across three bull elk, possibly 2-year-olds, playing in the opening, meeting and testing their strength with antlers as is their wont. They were not long to our view, however, for instinct if nothing else, warned them of our presence, and they disappeared. Taking the east side of the creek and following the trail almost straight up, we finally came out at Trapper’s lake, a beautiful little body of water, but only one of the many beautiful lake spots we see while on the trip. Passing along the north edge we took the up trail again following terraces of lakes until Heart lake was reached. One would have no trouble in picking Heart lake out from all the lakes in the mountains. It was named from its shape. Continuing around the west side and over a small divide we came on a beautiful little stream, rushing down with all its fury — east. Here we camped for dinner. This stream afterwards proved to be the west prong of Pike Creek, the main feed for Fremont Lake. After a two-hour rest we again started out, the trail winding up the canyons, the timber gradually becoming scarcer, until it disappeared, and we realized that we were in the pass on the summit. Garland was in his glory. Monuments occasionally were taking the place of the blaze, to guide us on. All was wild and in the hands of nature. Beautiful colored flowers grew here and there, and they were of various varieties. But Garland knew them all by name. The rare little bird, the water ouzel, floated and darted here and there in the icy streams that drain from the snow. The sun shone brightly and there was not a cloud in the sky. We stood almost on a level with the giant peaks, above timber line. Old Fremont peeked out at us from behind a small range to the east, while the giant Snow-Cap dome looked [ 82 ]

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frowningly down upon us from his position further to the north. Garland left his horse and viewed the grand nature in all its madness, lost in observations. I was dumbfounded. Little realizing that within one day’s travel from Pinedale such wonderful scenery could be found and be in the heart of the perpetual snow. The journey was soon continued, little knowing whither we were bound, but desiring to know that we had reached the summit. We soon came upon the summit lake, back up from which a huge monument denotes the summit of the pass. From here we could see little lakes and streams gradually working their way down east and west. Our curiosity prompted us to continue on down the west slope a ways, and camp was made that night on the third prong down from the head of Green river — in the wonderful canyon of the great Green river, and on the trail which leads up to the glacier beds on the north side of the range. We were in the heart of the beaver country, and while we could get a glimpse of none of them, during the night their working in the water could be plainly heard. Their trail thru the grass and from bank to bank of [the] river were plainly visible. Coming down the Green river trail that afternoon we watched for a few moments the antics of a gray wolf, which was evidently looking for prey, but before the rifle could be unslung he disappeared. During that night a rain came on, but Garland slept on in his downy robe, fully protected from the moisture which came directly down upon him, and bright and early next morning he was up getting breakfast while I looked after the horses. The rain continued incessantly, but Garland clothed in a long rain coat worked cheerfully over the fire singing verses occasionally of a song which is sung by Frank Campeau, who takes the part of Trampas in the “Virginian.” It runs something like this: Ten thousand cattle straying, while I sit here delaying; They left their range, the sons o’guns —

but here it would break off. Mr. Garland is a great admirer of Owen Wister, who wrote the above by request to be used in the dramatization of his wonderful work.2 He describes him as a typification of the model man, coming from one of the best families, with independent means, and handsome in all the word implies. The rain spoiled our plans for the day, as we had intended to go on up the main prong of the Green river canyon, so we packed and started back [ 83]

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up the trail for the summit. We had been on the way but a very short time when the rain changed to snow, and when we came out on the summit a blinding blizzard was raging, and for awhile it was impossible to discern the monuments. Mr. Garland showed nervousness here for the first time. All was a sheet of snow and it had turned terrifically cold, where the day before the sun shone beautifully, and all was green, and with the declaration that unless we found a monument very soon to guide us on, we would have to turn back to the timber where a fire could be built, he started out to find a monument; which was shortly done; and we pushed hurriedly on across the pass with the blizzard only allowing us to see about 50 yards ahead. We managed to come out alright; losing the monuments occasionally, but coming upon them again, until we hit the head of the canyon; down which we headed for Heart lake, where we dismounted about noon, and built a fire to warm up with, the snow and rain continuing to fall, and our limbs and hands almost benumbed, and this on the 30th day of August. We then decided to go to Trapper’s lake and camp until the next morning, where we arrived shortly after 2 o’clock. The camp was established, and long before the horses were cared for Garland had the repast ready, and soaked thru we sat down to eat. We had been unfortunate in finding any grouse, and our frugal meals of bacon and bread were becoming tiresome. That night we went to bed in the rain which was still pouring. Mr. Garland took his tarp and using poles made a shelter for his bed and apparently enjoyed the novelty of going to bed in such a condition, but far different when we woke up the next morning, with a chill in the air which would do grace to a Klondyke region; and all which was damp the night before frozen stiff. The hanging clouds and threatening weather soon decided us to cut our stay short and we packed and started on the down trail for Pinedale; where we arrived in time for supper. Mr. Garland was more than pleased with his short stay, and will be back again to make further explorations in the Wind River range of the mountains where he now knows there is much of the wild. Very little game was seen; although fresh tracks denoted the nearby presence of plenty of elk and deer; but we were unfortunate in gaining their presence. He is a prince, as they say to be on the trail with, and his camp life is simple. He is restless when idle and loves the fresh air and wild. In stature he is a man about 5 feet, 10 ½ inches high; weighing about 170 pounds. He is in his 47th year and wears a Van Dyke beard and mus[ 84 ]

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tache, which together with his hair is beginning to turn grey. He is a pleasant congenial companion to be out with, but in his quiet moments, when lost in thought and resting, a sad expression is seen to steal across his face, which is quickly lost again when his attention is attracted away. He rides with a General Grant saddle, which he carries with him, and is always at ease in the saddle, riding with grace. He thinks the world of the wife and two children, one about four years and the other about nine weeks old, who are at their home in Chicago, and the news of the illness of his little daughter gave him a great worry. 3 Mr. Garland does not use tobacco in any form, and refrains from the use of alcoholic beverages, and absolutely abhors profanity. . . . Mr. Garland had expected to spend about six weeks in this country, but his trip was delayed in reading final proofs on his last story,4 so that his visit here could be but short. The particular value of his visit here will be to his lecture[s] on the wild country, although he undoubtedly has another theme in view. However, we feel safe in saying that any story which may originate from this visit, other than possibly short ones,5 will not deal on the sheep question, which is stated as the object of his visit, by the daily press at the road, which has mentioned his coming to Wyoming. In “The Eagle’s Heart,” Mr. Garland dealt with the sheep question, and the range war, and if we understood him aright, he will not deal on that question again.6 Should he, however, at some future day, decide to revise this story, I believe he has many notes which will materially strengthen those already most interesting chapters. We were glad to have Mr. Garland here with us, and trust that his plans for a visit again next August may not be turned aside. Notes 1. Garland relates his experience of traveling one thousand miles of mostly unsurveyed trail in The Trail of the Goldseekers (1899). 2. The stage version of Owen Wister’s The Virginian opened in New York in 1904. Frank Campeau (1864–1943) played the part of Trampas. Wister wrote the song “Ten Thousand Cattle Straying (Dead Broke),” the opening lines of which are “Ten thousand cattle straying, / They quit my range and travell’d away.” 3. Constance Garland, born 18 June 1907, had a milk allergy. 4. Money Magic was serialized in Harper’s Weekly from 17 August to 12 October 1907 before being published in book form by Harper that fall. 5. Garland used his Wyoming visit as the background for his story “The Outlaw and

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garland in his own time the Girl” (Ladies’ Home Journal, May–July 1908; subsequently published as “The Outlaw” in They of the High Trails, 1916). 6. In The Eagle’s Heart (1900), the protagonist Harold Excell is an archetypal “bad boy” who becomes, by turns, cattle driver, sheep rancher, cowboy, and professional bad man. From C. Watt Brandon, “On the Trail with Hamlin Garland,” Pinedale Roundup, 11 September 1907, 1.

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From “Mr. Garland’s Books” (1912) Willi a m De a n How ells

X William Dean Howells (1837–1920), the foremost American man of letters of his day, became Garland’s most significant mentor and an important friend. When they first met on a spring day in 1887, the magazines were aflame with a debate over the merits of realism, and the two shared a similar outlook and similar passion. While Garland published many accounts of his meetings with and impressions of Howells, and while Howells reviewed most of Garland’s books and commented privately on others in an extensive correspondence with Garland, Howells himself did not leave a reminiscence comparable to other recollections in this volume. The closest he came was in the first pages of the following essay-review of the Sunset Edition, the first collected set of Garland’s books, which included Main-Travelled Roads; Other Main-Travelled Roads; Money Magic; Rose of Dutcher’s Coolly; The Captain of the Gray-Horse Troop; Cavanagh, Forest Ranger; The Eagle’s Heart; and Hesper.

the life of any man of letters who has lived long with strong convictions becomes part of the literary history of his time, though the history may never acknowledge it. Or, if the reader will not allow so much as this, then we may agree that inevitably such an author’s life becomes bound up with that of his literary contemporaries, especially his younger contemporaries. He must have been friends or foes with nearly all of them; in the wireless of print, whether he ever met them otherwise or not, he must have exchanged with them flashes of reciprocity or repulsion, electrical thrills, which remain memories after they have ceased to be actual experiences. Shall I own at once that in this abstract case some such relation was concrete in me and the author of these admirable books; that he is the younger contemporary and I the man of letters who has lived long with strong convictions? I suppose we were friends in the beginning, and never foes, because he had strong convictions too, and they were flatteringly like mine. When we first met, twenty years ago or more, in a pleasant suburb of Boston, there was nothing but common ground between us, and our convictions played [87]

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over it together as freely and affectionately as if they had been fancies. He was a realist to the point of idealism, and he was perhaps none the less, but much the more, realist because he had not yet had time to show his faith by his works. I mean his inventive works, for he was already writing radiant criticism in behalf of what he called veritism, a word he had borrowed, with due thanks, from a French critic whom he was reading with generous devotion and talking into any body who would hear him. There were as yet only a few years between him and the Wisconsin farm which grew him as genuinely as if he had been a product of its soil. He was as poor as he was young, but he was so rich in purposes of high economic and social import that he did not know he was poor. Someday, perhaps, he will himself tell the tale of that struggle to make both ends meet, the artistic and the economic ends, in those Boston days, and by teaching and lecturing to earn the time that he wished to spend in literature. He gladly wrote in the Boston newspapers for nothing, and in the best of them he was given the free hand which was far better for his future than a conditioned salary could have been. As to his present, he was such an ardent believer in Henry George’s plan for abolishing poverty that with his heart and hopes fi xed on a glorious morrow for all men he took no thought of his own narrow day. He seems at that time to have gone about preaching Georgism equally with veritism in the same generous self-forgetfulness. A large public, much more intelligent than the public which reads novels instead of listening to lectures, already knew him, but I was never of this worthier public so far as hearing him speak was concerned, while we continued of the same thinking about fiction. When we both left Boston and came to New York, neither of us experienced that mental expansion, not to call it distension, which is supposed to await the provincial arriving in the metropolis; we still remained narrow-mindedly veritistic. This possibly was because we were both doubly provincial, being firstly Middle Westerners, and secondarily Bostonians; but for whatever reason it was he had already begun to show his faith by his works, in those severely conscientious studies of Wisconsin life, which I should not blame the reader for finding the best of his doing in fiction. But it is not necessary to make any such restriction in one’s liking in order to vouch one’s high sense of the art and the fact in Main-Travelled Roads and Other Main-Travelled Roads. The volumes are happily named: these highways are truly the paths that the sore feet of common men and [ 88 ]

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women have trodden to and fro in the rude new country; they are thick with the dust and the snow of fierce summers and savage winters. I do not say but they lead now and then through beautiful spring times and mellow autumns; they mostly seek the lonely farmers, but sometimes they tarry in sociable villages where youth and love have their dances. I do not think that I am wrong in taking “The Return of the Private” and “Up the Coolly” for types of the bare reality prevailing with the hot pity which comes from the painter’s heart for the conditions he depicts. At the time he was telling these grim stories of farm life in the West that is, in the later years of his Boston sojourn our author was much in contact with that great and sincere talent James A. Hearne, whom it was a dramatic education to know. So far as one influenced the other I do not think Mr. Garland owed more to Hearne than Hearne to him in practising in their art the veritism which they both preached. If I may confess a dreadful secret, I suspected them both at that time of being unconsciously romantic at heart, and only kept to reality because they did not know unreality. Hearne, in spite of such cunningest pieces of excelling nature as “Margaret Fleming” and “Drifting Apart,” was often tempted to do the thing that was not — beautifuly not, as Mr. James might say — in his other plays, and was willing to please his public with it, for of course the thing that is not will mainly please any public. I have no doubt the author of these books did very greatly help to stay the dramatist in his allegiance to the thing that was, while on his part Hearne doubtless helped his younger friend to clarify his native dramatic perception. At any rate, some plays relating to the nearer and farther West which Mr. Garland wrote in the heyday of his Hearne friendship (it lasted to the end of the great player’s life) may have been inspired by his association with a man who was to the heart of his true humanity essentially representative. As both were secretly romantic a little, so both were openly idyllic a good deal. Of course Mr. Garland’s treatment of country life is more direct, more authentic, more instructive, and there is pretty sure always to be a thrill or a throe of indignant compassion in it which the milder poet did not impart to his hearers. Some plays which the novelist wrote at this time (notably “Under the Lion’s Paw,”1 a tragedy of Far Western farming) expressed this compassion, still more directly and explicitly than the stories of Main-Travelled Roads, and I believe it the loss of our theater that they have never got upon the stage. [ 8 9]

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Note 1. Howells means Under the Wheel (1890). From William Dean Howells, “Mr. Garland’s Books,” North American Review 196 (October 1912): 523–28.

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[Letter about Interviewing Garland in 1915] Fr ed Lew is Pat tee

X Fred Lewis Pattee (1863–1950), a professor of American literature at Pennsylvania State College (now Penn State University), first met Garland on 13 January 1915, when he interviewed Garland about his role in the development of realistic fiction in the 1890s. He had written to him on 27 December 1914 to test the thesis of his A History of American Literature since 1870 (1915), a landmark work in the field, that “after the war a new spirit came over America, a new national spirit, and that it swept away the atmosphere through which the mid-century school viewed literature” (Selected Letters, 232n1), and queried him about the writers who influenced his early years. Later Garland lectured at the College, met with Pattee several other times, and entered into an extensive correspondence that suggested a cordial relationship contradicting the tone in Pattee’s letter to Eldon Hill. While Garland remembered of this initial meeting that “we parted with a mutual and very genuine liking” (Contemporaries, 36), Pattee’s animosity may be explained in part by a later and more public exchange. In 1923 Garland published “Current Fiction Heroes” (New York Times Book Review, 23 December 1923, sec. 3, 2), an essay in which he blamed the loss of decorum and decency in literature on “unrestricted immigration from the Old World” and “alien citizens” who clamor for jazz, sensation, and tales of sex. Pattee responded with “Those Fiery Radicals of Yesteryear: A Letter to Hamlin Garland on Generations and Literary Manners” (New York Times Book Review, 24 February 1924, sec. 3, 12, 26), in which he chided Garland for being out of touch and reminded him that those writers he objected to were the logical heirs to the principles he had advocated in Crumbling Idols.

Fred Lewis Pattee to Eldon Hill, 25 October 1947 . . . I saw considerable of Garland during one period of my work. When I was writing my History of American Literature since 1870, 1915, I was greatly handicapped because most of the new young creators I was to deal with had not yet been written up. Garland’s publishers had issued some [91]

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biographical facts concerning him and others had come in book reviews. I did what I did in the case of many others, asked for an interview. I found that he was to be in Philadelphia on a certain day and asked him to dine with me at the Franklin Head Club and be interviewed. He consented. After we had dined we went upstairs to a private room and he talked about himself and his work for more than two hours. Later I found that he had given me in brief detail the autobiographical matter that appeared in his A Son of the Middle Border. All he told me later appeared somewhere in his autobiographical writings. He visited me at State College and presided at a lecture I gave in Philadelphia years later. I found him very self-centered and domineering. Mr. Ellsworth, president of the Century Company Pub. Co., told me once he considered him the leading American jackass.1 Ridiculous, of course, but anyone who has ever worked with him will tell some such story. A play he supervised at the Cliff Dwellers house I think was so domineered by him [that] all connected with it spoke harshly of him. He was a member of a small committee once that was to meet at a designated hour to award a prize. He came an hour late and his explanation was “A little girl came to me for an autograph just as I was starting. I wrote it and then sat and talked to her. I would be cheating her of a valuable experience not to stay and talk. She will remember it as long as she lives how Hamlin Garland once talked to her an hour.”2 He and I argued about the relative value of his works. He contended that The Captain of the Gray Horse Troop was his best fiction. I said his best books were his first Prairie-life stories. When he left the land of his boyhood he ceased to be utterly convincing. Good luck to you in your Garland studies. How quickly the best sellers of a day drift away into the land of the forgotten. As old Rip Van said “Are we then so soon Forgot?” Who is reading Garland to-day? Sincerely, Fred Lewis Pattee Notes 1. Pattee later included a slightly different version of this paragraph in his autobiography, in which he attributes the “jackass” remark to H. L. Mencken, who when refusing a Pattee article on Garland had written: “Garland is such an obnoxious fellow that I don’t want to mention him at all if I can help it. His conduct in the Dreiser case [Garland’s refusal to sign a petition against the suppression of The “Genius”] seemed to me to be not only silly but also downright dishonorable. He is, in brief, a cad and a jackass, or I

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Fred Lewis Pattee misjudge him sadly” (Penn State Yankee: The Autobiography of Fred Lewis Pattee [State College: Pennsylvania State College, 1953], 308). 2. In his autobiography, Pattee attributes this remark to the drama critic Richard Burton (1859–1940), who had served with Garland on the Pulitzer jury that awarded the prize to Eugene O’Neill’s Beyond the Horizon in 1920, during a dinner party in May 1937 (308). Fred Lewis Pattee to Eldon Hill, 25 October 1947, Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

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[Garland at the Cliff Dwellers in 1915] R a lph Fletcher Sey mou r

X In 1907 Garland founded the Cliff Dwellers, a Chicago club organized to bring together writers, artists, and patrons and modeled after New York’s Players Club. He served as its president until 1915. Ralph Fletcher Seymour (1876–1966) was a Chicago artist, book designer, and publisher (of Alderbrink Press among others) who was present at many of the club’s activities. Garland, who was known to club members as “Czar Hamlin the First,” apparently ruled the club with an iron fist, forbidding alcohol on the premises and not permitting the presence of women until after 6 p.m., for fear of upsetting the business lunches that had become commonplace. When the members rebelled and enacted an amendment to the bylaws prohibiting a president from serving more than two consecutive terms, Garland naturally became upset, resigned, and decided to abandon Chicago and relocate to New York City in early 1916.

hamlin garland was its first president and remained in that office for the next seven years. He poured limitless energy into its growth, vise’d everything and gave it the stamp of his moral and mental viewpoint. He supervised too much and finally became something of a nuisance to the more free spirits of the club. As when the popular Irish Players came to town on one of the earliest of their tours.1 They were given a Sunday afternoon tea in the club rooms at which certain lady wives of members publicly smoked cigarettes. Mr. Garland at the next board of directors’ meeting demanded that a house rule be passed forbidding public smoking of cigarettes by females in the club rooms. One of the directors softly remarked he hoped no action would be taken that would exclude his wife from coming to the club. Mr. Garland was, nevertheless, of great benefit to the club in much the same way that the United States has benefited by the influence of New England forefathers. When he finally removed to New York his portrait was painted by Ralph Clarkson, hung in a place of honor in the large room and a dinner arranged for him. It chanced, however, that he could not attend [94]

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the dinner, whereupon a few modifications in the program were made. An attractive and glittering bar was rigged up at one end of the room below the ex-president’s portrait and a perfect type of jovial “bar-keep” installed behind it; — none other than thin, long nosed, red faced Roswell Field.2 The portrait was turned face to the wall and a large sign hung across it on which was lettered “this place has changed hands.” Notes 1. In 1911 and 1912 Dublin’s Abbey Theatre sent a group of players on tour with John Synge’s The Playboy of the Western World, among other plays. Garland, who was also involved with the Chicago Theater Society, saw their plays, dined with them, and hosted a gathering at the Cliff Dwellers. 2. Roswell Martin Field (1851–1919), Eugene’s brother, was a journalist and music and drama critic. From Ralph Fletcher Seymour, Some Went This Way: A Forty Year Pilgrimage Among Artists, Bookmen, and Printers (Chicago: Ralph Fletcher Seymour, 1945), 161–62.

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[Life in the Garland Home, 1916] Isa bel Ga r l a nd Lor d

X The Garlands moved to New York City in May 1916, first renting rooms at the Schuyler Arms before leasing a seventh-floor flat in July at 71 East 92nd Street.

one of father’s most admirable traits was his enthusiasm for and appreciation of creative talent. Stephen Crane was one of his early discoveries, and all through his life he was generously promoting young literary talent. There was no professional jealousy in Father. The thing that counted was craftsmanship. The plays and fiction of the later years of his life fi lled him with distaste, with actual physical pain. What he would think of this era’s ugly output I would rather not imagine. It was about here that the Garland household was increased to five with the arrival at Christmas of a small, woolly-white Maltese terrier. She had a card tied to her collar with the inscription, “My name is Blinkie and I belong to Mary Isabel and Constance.” She was the gift of our friends, Dr. and Mrs. Fenton B. Turck.1 Connie and I detested her on sight. We didn’t want a dog. We didn’t want the chore of taking her down six flights of stairs four or five times a day. She would obviously yap and misbehave and fall sick, and intent as we were on our school and our planned careers, we felt we had no time for that sort of thing. But you couldn’t hurt the kind Turcks, so we dragged her home, quite literally, and dumped her on Mother’s bed, and there she stayed for eleven years. Inevitably, we all came to adore her. She was the daily pest we had anticipated, but, on the other hand, she was so bright, so high-spirited, so full of overflowing love that we succumbed. In fact, she became the center of our daily life, and her tricks and ways were endlessly endearing. Nothing escaped her. A box of candy brought by a beau and opened with in[96]

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finite care in the drawing room would bring Blinkie charging the length of the apartment, curls streaming, red tongue quivering with anticipation. Blinkie loved everybody and in the end even Father gave in. I came home late one night and opened the front door quietly on a scene that twists my heart to this day. Daddy was sitting in half light before the gas log, a small, curly white mat stretched out ecstatically across his knees. His big, broad hand was fondling the long silky ears, and in a sort of tender, masculine croon he was saying over and over, “Was a little dorgie-dorgie. . . . Was a little dorgie-dorgie.” Interesting to think that while my father had a myriad pet names for his children — baby, daughtie, Mizabel, Mebsie, Conniekin, childababe, kidlets — terms of affection exasperated him. “Don’t call me dear!” he would charge fiercely. The same applied to darling, dearest, sweet, love — any of the fond words that flow so easily from us all in these days. I never heard him call my mother anything except Zulime, yet he was a warm, demonstrative man. Probably his dislike stemmed from the old stage days with their easy assumption of familiarity. Father was a formal man. Happy as Connie and I were in our school life, Mother was under more and more of a strain. The thing she had anticipated, dreaded, was ever present. New York was worse than Chicago, for it was the center of the American creative world. Everyone came through New York to be wined and dined, and night after night, there in the center of the Speaker’s Table, handsome and distinguished and competent in white tie and tails, was Father; and there, on the right of the guest of honor, Joff re or Tagore, Galsworthy or Stanley Baldwin, would be Mother, radiant in one of Aunt Lily’s or Aunt Irene’s cast-off evening gowns, looking as though she hadn’t a care in the world.2 If she hadn’t hated it so, she could have had a wonderful time. Father was pretty outspoken about it. “Your mother sits by the guest of honor and gets interesting talk. I get the dull wives.” Mother, herself, was not one of the dull wives. Gracious, sympathetic, and witty, she tried to pass on her technique to Connie and me. “Find out what they are interested in and ask questions.” Her own first formal dinner party when she was sixteen proved her point, for she sat next to a middleaged gentleman who addressed himself solely to his plate. Mother artfully [ 97 ]

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discovered that his wealth and position stemmed from the manufacture of pearl buttons and professed such an intelligent interest that he scarcely left her side thereafter. Despite the colorful social life, things with the Garlands were tough. In Chicago, we had lived in comparative affluence. In those days, on his trips to New York, Father could — according to his diaries, did — set out in the morning with seven manuscripts in his pocket and place them all before nightfall. Now, with the war raging, nothing was selling, lecture dates were few and far between, and our finances grew tighter and tighter. We walked everywhere, or took the five cent street car or subway to save the ten cents the Fifth Avenue bus would have cost, and anxious planning was necessary in all things. I asked Daddy for a dollar one day, and his face was stony as he opened his checkbook to me. “Nine dollars — ” he said harshly. “That’s all we have in the bank now, daughtie — nine dollars.” It was not as bad as it sounded — there were some bonds — but it was a cruel thing to do to an emotional child of thirteen. I had always suffered from an excess of imagination, and now I was terrified, defenseless. At any moment, I expected we would be put out on the street. I shivered and wept all night and in the morning went to Daddy with my resolve. I would leave school, falsify my age, and get a job in a ten cent store. At least, my family should not go hungry. Daddy soothed me, explained that money would be coming in shortly and that his credit was good, but I imagine he felt somewhat conscience-stricken. There was no minimizing, however, the fact that things were grim. To add to the financial worry, Father had developed a deep, painful arthritis in his shoulder and back. He wasn’t able to lift his right arm high enough to dip his pen in the ink, so he would slowly and agonizingly dip it in with the left hand and transfer the pen to his crippled right. Some nights the torture was so overwhelming that he would walk the floor, tears streaming down his cheeks, while Mother or I walked behind him, pounding on his back with all our strength to counteract the pain. The despair he must have known, lying there on his narrow, sagging cot through the sleepless hours. Yet we entertained constantly. Daddy was the most gregarious of men and rarely came home from the club without some distinguished man in tow. Carl Akeley, the African lion hunter; Stefansson, the Arctic explorer; Edward Wheeler, editor of Poetry Magazine; were the regulars. William [ 98 ]

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Dean Howells, William Allen White, Charles Breasted, Robert Frost, Mark Sullivan, and a procession of actors, artists, and musicians — our little dining room received them all. 3 It meant usually that the meal, never lavish to begin with, would have to be stretched to include another healthy appetite. Mother worked miracles. We were too poor for roasts and steaks and chops, so dinner would consist of a big wooden bowl of mixed green salad at Mother’s end of the table and a casserole or a chafing dish of some creamed thing at the other. Milk would extend the creamed thing and so would toast underneath. There were always mashed potatoes and plenty of hot biscuits and honey, and we wound up with one of my pies or cakes or the steamed puddings that Daddy so loved. I do not think anyone ever went away hungry, but there were no second helpings. The climax, of course, was the coffee, which Daddy painstakingly brewed himself, and superb stuff it was, dark, winey, fortifying the soul. Daddy made the coffee in the mornings, too — it was his admitted vice — and Connie and I would be awakened at seven by the entrance of Father, holding a large, saucerless cup in each hand, a slice of haphazardly buttered bread balanced across the top of the cup. “I will not spread hard butter on crumbly bread for any child,” he would announce as we sat up in bed to receive the cups. Nothing ever tasted better than that wonderful coffee in the cold, gray, New York dawn. As the heat from the coffee rose up through the bread, the butter melted and it became a very memorable breakfast. Connie and I became good cooks and waitresses and tackled cheerfully the washing up afterwards. Some of our male guests were inclined, in a fatherly way, to become amorous, but Connie and I would escape to the kitchen, where we gossiped and giggled and broke dishes in peace. It was valuable training and we really giggled when, as part of the course in Domestic Science that Finch insisted on (Mrs. Cosgrave announced that one of her goals was to make rich girls into competent, poor men’s wives),4 I was solemnly instructed in the scientific approach to dishwashing. What a contradiction our lives were. Culturally, we were having the best the city offered: opera, theaters, concerts, lectures, art exhibits. Chauffeured limousines called for us and brought us home. The Plaza, where the Guggenheims occupied thirty-two rooms on the third floor, the Waldorf, the Ambassador, and the Ritz, depending on which of our rich friends [ 99]

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were in residence, were familiar stamping grounds. We wore hand-medown, remodeled clothing and velvet and fur coats, and thanks to Mother’s skill with a needle, we always felt ourselves adequately turned out wherever we went. Mother was so clever that she could take an original model of a Worth or Vionnet, rip it apart, spread the pieces out on new fabric, and cut from them, then reassemble the whole garment in its pristine smartness. From Mother I inherited an interest in dressmaking but not, alas, her dash. On Sundays, after a late breakfast, Connie and I would wash our hair, then we three females would don aprons and do the week’s washing — sheets, pillow cases, towels, Daddy’s long winter underwear, table linen, blankets, everything — and hang it out on the roof, one flight up. Often it was so cold that everything froze stiff, and to remove a rigid sheet from a line in a strong north wind on a New York rooftop is something of an experience. Connie and I did the hanging out — assisted by Blinkie — while Mother mopped floors and cleaned the bathroom. Afterward, we would turn to and polish silver and run the vacuum. Father hated these domestic chores and would escape to the club as soon as his morning’s literary stint was finished. Mother used to see him go with frank relief. “Children, whatever you do, don’t marry a man who works at home. Marry one who goes to work at eight every morning and doesn’t come home till five.” In spite of that sensible advice, I married a singer-musician and a writer. As for my sister, who eventually married the desirable office-goer, she complains because he isn’t home enough. Notes 1. Fenton B. Turck (1857–1932), biologist and physician, won acclaim for his research in cell biology. Garland, who had been suffering increasingly from arthritis beginning in 1915, found Turck’s treatment to be miraculous and championed Turck frequently among his friends. 2. The French general Joseph Joff re (1852–1931) was appointed to lead the French military mission to the United States in 1917; Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941), Indian author, received the Nobel Prize in 1913; John Galsworthy (1867–1933) was an English author; Stanley Baldwin (1867–1947) became the British prime minister in 1923. “Aunt Lily” is Constance Lily Rothschild Morris (d. 1954), wife of Ira Nelson Morris (1875–1942), a financier and later the U.S. envoy to Sweden (1914–1923). “Aunt Irene” is Irene Rothschild Guggenheim (1868–1954), wife of Solomon R. Guggenheim (1861–1949), the businessman

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Isabel Garland Lord and philanthropist. Their daughters Constance Morris and Eleanor Guggenheim were Isabel’s close friends. 3. Those not previously identified are Carl Akeley (1864–1926), a noted taxidermist who specialized in African mammals; Vilhjalmur Stefansson (1879–1962), an arctic explorer noted for his travels among the Inuit; Edward J. Wheeler (1859–1922), the editor of Current Opinion, not Poetry Magazine, who was the founding president of the Poetry Society of America; Charles Breasted (1898–1980), the son of noted Egyptologist James H. Breasted and the author of a memoir of his father, Pioneer to the Past (1943); and Robert Frost (1874–1963), the poet. 4. Jessica Finch Cosgrave (1871–1949) was the founder and president of Finch School, a preparatory school for girls, which both Constance and Isabel attended. She was married to John O’Hara Cosgrave (1864–1947), the editor of Everybody’s Magazine, which published the serial of Garland’s novel The Shadow World in 1908. From Isabel Garland Lord, A Summer to Be: A Memoir by the Daughter of Hamlin Garland, ed. Keith Newlin, foreword by Victoria Doyle-Jones (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2010), 104–9.

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“An Appreciation of Hamlin Garland” (1917) Theodor e Roosev elt

X By 1916 Roosevelt had drastically revised his initial 1894 impression of Garland, for they had been exchanging books and working together on many cultural activities for years. When Roosevelt read Garland’s They of the High Trails, published in April 1916, he drafted an appreciation, which Garland transcribed (with Roosevelt’s permission) and sent to Harper for use as promotional material for the serial version of A Son of the Middle Border in Collier’s. That serial resumed on 31 March 1917 after having been interrupted with the fifth installment, entitled “Lincoln Enters Hostile Territory” (8 August 1914), so that the magazine could devote space to war issues. Roosevelt’s appreciation was added to the 1917 reprinting of They of the High Trails.

hamlin garland is a man of letters and a man of action, a lover of nature and a lover of the life of men. For thirty years he has done good work; and never better work than he is doing now. The forests and the high peaks, the green prairies and the dry plains, he knows them as the city man knows his streets and he brings them vivid before the eyes of the reader. Moreover, he knows the men and women of the farms, the cattle-ranchers, and the little raw towns; he knew the old-time wilderness wanderers in their day; and their successors, the forest-rangers, the stockmen who own high-grade cattle, the officers of the law, are his friends to-day. His heart is tender with sympathy for those beaten down in the hard struggle for life, and aflame with indignation against every form of evil and oppression. Whether the crime be one of cunning or of brutal violence; whether it be by the rich man against the poor or by the mob against the doer of justice; whether it be by the white against the Indian or by the foul man-beast against the woman — it matters not, against all alike he bears burning testimony. And above all, his people are real men and real women; and those for whom he cares, we, who read of them, grow likewise to love; and we are more just [102]

Theodore Roosevelt

and gentle toward our fellow-men, and toward the women who are our sisters, because of what he has written about them. From Theodore Roosevelt, “An Appreciation of Hamlin Garland,” in Hamlin Garland, They of the High Trails (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1916), viii.

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[Garland and the Automobile in 1920] Isa bel Ga r l a nd Lor d

X With the proceeds from selling “The Spirit World on Trial” (McClure’s Magazine 52 [March 1920]: 33–34), Garland decided to purchase a seven-hundreddollar Ford automobile to ease transportation difficulties at Camp Neshonoc, the rustic cabin he had bought in 1917 near Onteora, New York. To commemorate the event, his daughter Constance painted the name “Spook” on its doors. Garland’s account of his automobiling adventure appears in BackTrailers, 151–54.

one of daddy’s close literary friends and an object of fervent admiration by the Dudleys was the old naturalist, John Burroughs, whose “Woodchuck Lodge” was forty miles or so from Onteora. One day we all drove over to call. Cars were new and still exciting then, and Daddy and I, sitting in front with Uncle George, were impressed and envious.1 “Listen to it purr!” Daddy said. “All that machinery going round and round and hardly a sound. And the speed — the convenience!” It was only an hour’s trip by car. By train, it would have taken six. I could see the percolation begin in Daddy’s brain. John Burroughs clinched it. He not only had a car, but at seventy-eight, he drove it. In fact, only a few days later he drove it over to see us, sitting up like Santa Claus at the wheel, a nervous secretary huddled beside him. “All right,” said Father, “that does it. If Oom John can own a car and drive it, so can I.” The fact that Uncle John drove it into the barn a few days later and right on out through the back wall, getting only slightly “shook up” in the process, disturbed Father not at all. He had made up his mind. It was a Ford, naturally, a black, incredible thing, as incongruous among the tall grasses and wild flowers of our hillside as a black beetle on a dining table. Daddy spent hours each day polishing it and “tinkering,” as he called it, “with the mixture” — which was possibly why it was always so reluctant to start. [104]

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Daddy and I both took lessons from Fred, the chauffeur of our generous friend, Dr. Jones, and I am frank to admit they did not go well. If I loathed learning to ride a bicycle, I hated even more learning to drive a car. It could have sat there under its tarpaulin till Kingdom Come for all I cared, but again Daddy won out. Neither he nor I was in the least mechanically minded and had only the vaguest idea of why the thing went — or stopped. I was in the back seat one day when Fred was giving Daddy a lesson in the Joneses’ driveway. In his nervous excitement, Daddy mistook the gas for the brake and clung to it, while the car went cavorting back and forth from one hedge to another. Fred was not a patient man and he was notoriously profane. Now, as we leapt and crashed and jerked, he shouted at the top of his lungs, “Damn you, Garland! Get your foot off that gas!” No “mister,” no please, no respect, just naked self-preservation, and my fiery father took it as meekly as a mouse. Anyhow, every single afternoon Daddy insisted I get out and drive that car. The steering came easily enough, and when we putt-putted along I quite enjoyed it, but the thing was always breaking down. I never went down the long hill at East Jewett without burning out the brake band and usually low and reverse gear as well. Then it would suddenly cough and die by the side of the road, and Daddy would get out and “tinker,” and sometimes it would cough again and start, but more often I had to phone the local garage for help. Note 1. Garland’s friendship with the naturalist John Burroughs (1837–1921) began with correspondence in 1888. “Uncle George” is George Dudley, a La Crosse banker and West Salem neighbor. From Isabel Garland Lord, A Summer to Be: A Memoir by the Daughter of Hamlin Garland, ed. Keith Newlin, foreword by Victoria Doyle-Jones (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2010), 123–24.

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[Letter about Garland in New York in 1921] Osc a r Ca rgill

X Oscar Cargill (1898–1972) was a professor of English and at the time of this letter chairman of the Department of English at New York University. He was the author of many books and critical editions, including The Social Revolt: American Literature from 1888 to 1914 (1933) and Intellectual America: Ideas on the March (1941). He had written to Garland in 1931 for permission to include “Under the Lion’s Paw,” “Literary Emancipation of the West,” and “A Visit to the West” from A Son of the Middle Border in The Social Revolt and thereafter met Garland to talk about his recollections of Crane and other writers (Cargill to Garland, 29 September, 8 October 1931, Eldon Hill Collection). Eldon Hill had acquired copies of Cargill’s letters and wrote to Cargill about his impressions of Garland.

may 9, 1950 Dear Mr. Hill: I am glad that someone is undertaking at last a biography of Hamlin Garland and I am especially glad that you are doing it. I knew Mr. Garland nearly thirty years ago, for he came to Connecticut Wesleyan when I was an undergraduate there. He was then serving on the Committee of Award for the Pulitzer Prize. The Committee on Selection, as I remember it, had given the prize to Sinclair Lewis’s Main Street. The Committee of Award took the prize from Lewis and gave it to Mrs. Wharton’s Age of Innocence. Garland was full of this at the time, though I cannot remember specifically what he said.1 He denounced most of contemporary literature and was especially angry at Dos Passos. He made fun of Dos Passos’ portmanteau “goddam” and said that men did not swear that way. Garland came with me to a meeting of a short story club of which I was a member and talked with the group after the meeting. He was much interested in student writing, which he hoped would be better than contemporary writing of that day. Later, when I was working on The Social Revolt, I saw Mr. Garland again in New York. In fact, he had me up to the Century [106]

Oscar Cargill

Club, as I recall, and talked with me about Henry Fuller. He would not admit that he was hurt by Fuller’s satire of him, though he did acknowledge that he was the person meant by Fuller.2 I remember his speaking of getting up at five o’clock that day and going for a long walk. Apparently he did most of his writing early in the morning after a stimulating hike out of doors. Mrs. Garland came in at the end of our meeting and this was the only occasion on which I saw her. If I corresponded with Mr. Garland, I have forgotten all about it. When I contemplate my own haziness in regard to my meetings with Garland (from which I got a good deal of lift at that time) I am surprised at the exactness of other people’s recollections. I have clearest the impression of an iron-gray man in a slightly rumpled suit, who retained still a good deal of vigor. I remember, too, his square-toed, black, but dusty shoes — if you want that sort of detail. I wish I could help you more, but this is the extent of my recollection. I have kept no copies of letters from Garland. If I had, I should cheerfully turn them over to you. Thank you for your kind words about Intellectual America. If you are ever in New York, come to see me. Sincerely, Oscar Cargill Notes 1. Garland was chair of the Pulitzer Prize novel selection committee for 1920; other members were Stuart Pratt Sherman and Robert Morss Lovett. In conveying the committee’s selection of Main Street as the prize winner, Garland did so half-heartedly and suggested, by way of a footnote, that he thought The Age of Innocence was more deserving. The Pulitzer board awarded the prize to Wharton, which resulted in Lovett complaining about the process in an editorial in the New Republic (“The Pulitzer Prize,” 22 June 1921, 114). See Fritz H. Oehlschlaeger, “Hamlin Garland and the Pulitzer Prize Controversy of 1921,” American Literature 51 (1979): 409–14. 2. Garland’s only published comment about Fuller’s satire of him in “The Downfall of Abner Joyce” appears in Roadside Meetings: “In ‘Under the Skylights’ he made a game of me and my boyish plans for ‘advancing Western Art’” (270). Oscar Cargill to Eldon Hill, 9 May 1950, Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

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From “Hamlin Garland — The Hardy of the West” (1926) Joseph E . Ch a mber lin

X Joseph Edgar Chamberlin (1861–1935) was a member of the editorial staff of the Boston Evening Transcript and author of The Listener in the Country (1896), The Listener in the Town (1896), The Ifs of History (1907), and The Boston Transcript: A History of Its First Hundred Years (1930). In his column “The Listener,” he frequently commented on Garland’s activities and reviewed his books. Garland found Chamberlin to be a valuable supporter of his controversial work and later remembered, “I read his column with care and valued his comment for its quiet depth of feeling. To the readers of the Transcript he was only an essayist, but to me he was a thinker of unusual powers, tenacious yet reasonable. With him I discussed American fiction and drama with greater freedom than with any other man” (Roadside, 33). This reminiscence later appeared in Hamlin Garland, A Son of the Middle Border (New York: Macmillan, [1926]), a Macmillan pamphlet issued to promote Trail-Makers of the Middle Border (1926).

inasmuch as hamlin garland has always belonged, in the literary sense, to the Younger Element, it is hard to believe that my memory of him as a story writer and as a lecturer to small classes goes back forty years. But it does, though not much in my recollection of him shapes itself concretely before the year 1887. In that year he was a frequent visitor at the Transcript office. Some three years before this he had broken into life in Boston in the cheekiest way that a boy possibly could. Without anything that Boston would have been ready to recognize as an education, without friends here, he had mortgaged his land claim in North Dakota for $200, and had come here in a queer Gopher Prairie outfit of store clothes to embark on a career of letters. He lived in bleak little attic rooms, breakfasted on eight cents, dined on fifteen and supped on ten; wore his prairie-born coat to a shine and his cuffs [108]

Joseph E. Chamberlin

to a frazzle, and was shrunken thin by low fare; but his head was up and his manner, though grave, was confident; and in his eyes shone that “high light by which the world is saved.” He went to afternoon teas — particularly to the great “salon” of the time, Mrs. Louise Chandler Moulton’s;1 he was a friend of Howellses, and knew the literary editors. He wrote essays and lectures on poetry and the drama, which he delivered very acceptably to groups of high-school girls or Roxbury matrons. He had no “bounce”; was no button-holer, but just a sincere, wholesome prairie spirit. It was characteristic of him that he could walk up to the house of Edwin Booth on the hill, linger until some chance opening had revealed to him a hat-rack, a mirror and possibly a dark figure passing through the hall before the door closed again, and then go back to his little attic room and write a glowing and perfectly plausible essay on “The Art of Edwin Booth,” which people would want to listen to.2 In the School of Oratory they soon called him “Professor.” And little by little after he had got a hearing under the guidance and recognition of Charles E. Hurd, literary editor of the Transcript,3 he developed rapidly, and was cheered and encouraged by Mr. Howells. The Transcript boosted him a little when proper occasion offered. He studied at the library, read enormously and always ego-centrically. He made use of Boston to the best advantage in his literary education; he absorbed the city; but Boston, while giving him every opportunity, was never to be his abiding home or his theme. He wrote of the West, except when he was writing literary lectures. As soon as he had achieved success as a writer of Western stories, he realized that a Western writer should live in the West, and fled to Chicago. That was in 1893. He had been here about ten years. Boston had helped to make him. It was natural that it should have done so. His people were Yankees from Oxford county, Maine, and his father, Richard Garland, had clerked it, as a youth, for three years in Amos Lawrence’s warehouse here, and had acquired the Boston habit. On the Western Wisconsin farm away up in Green’s Coulee, by the Mississippi, where Hamlin was born in 18604 (his parents named him Hannibal Hamlin after the big swarthy Vice President from their native State) he was brought up on Whittier and Longfellow and all the old New England songs. He may be said to have inherited Boston. As he himself has said, the Son of the Middle Border is the grandson of New England. How could he help coming back for his literary apprenticeship? In appearance, in the ’80s, Garland was a young man of certain singular[ 109]

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ities, but of great beauty. He was of medium height, of supple figure, with abundant brown hair, and wore a rather long, brown beard, that gave him a sort of apostolic appearance. His grave, meditative manner heightened this apostolic effect. He would have made an excellent model for John, the Beloved Disciple. A very young man then he had the weight of studious centuries on his excellent square shoulders. Also he had joined the Anti-Poverty Society, and espoused the doctrines of Henry George; and he deeply felt the sorrows of the disinherited laboring man. I doubt if ever Garland has been as serious in his life as he was in 1887 or if he ever will be again. Ere many years, while retaining the most benevolent opinions, he lost the reforming habit. He had, as he has now, a rather high-pitched, very clear voice, in which he spoke with due western regard for the r’s and in that broadly cadenced way that seems to have been developed in the voices that ring over the rolling prairies. He lifted up his voice freely in defense of certain theories and causes that were not popular in Boston. He was like Garrison5 — he would not equivocate or compromise or deny anything that he really believed in. He would not write anything that his heart was not in. When he was earning eight dollars a week, and sending a part of that to support his father and mother, whose crops on their claim in Dakota had for two years running been entirely eaten up by grasshoppers and chinch bugs, he refused to write anything for a newspaper that he was not willing to sign with his name, or to write romantic love stories for a magazine. “We have had enough of those lies,” he said, in his sharp, high voice — and went off and dined on a dime. I can remember that in November, 1887, I went to a meeting of the Anti-Poverty Society which Garland addressed — and addressed very eloquently — in support of the Single Tax. Next day I wrote about the talk in the “Listener,” and told how he presented the poetic side of the question — pictured the homes of the poor, bodied forth their aspirations, expressed their aesthetic moods, and so on.6 I thought then, as I think now, of Garland more as a poet than anything else. But this treatment seemed to “rile” Garland a good bit. He wrote the Listener a scornful letter — and affection has prompted me to keep that letter all these years. Here it is now. He said he had not drifted off into pictures. “I am afraid, Friend Listener,” he wrote, “that you have not got over your long dissipation on amusements, balls, theatres and the like! I was speaking on the abolition of poverty, not [ 1 10]

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on the abolition of prose.” This was a pretty wild shot; and then there was another: “Had you not been so much of a literary man you would have seen that I did show why the dispersion of the units of our social group kept down the level of our civilization — that I did show how the monopolization of land made rural America a semi-solitude, producing by reaction abnormal crowding in the city. I have not,” he went on rather resentfully, “the time to discuss the subject here, and the Listener, having the inside track, would have the last word anyway.” Garland seems to have ceased to worry about the land question a good many years ago. At all events, there was no rift in his friendship and mine. The tie tightened between us. With so strenuous a beginning as a reformer, one might have looked for a heady propagandist in Garland, but fortunately for American literature he did not turn out that way. He is by instinct too much the artist to be a reformer. Too much, if you analyze his work, a romanticist to narrow his soul with ethical or social problems. It is true that his first stories were strongly tinged with a purpose to reveal the Western farm people as a race crushed by hard work and half-crazed by isolation. His people were all the most pathetic of toilers, just struggling to have as good a time as possible. The women, particularly, in his early stories, lead a life of doleful slavery. It was said of his people, “They do not live, they work.” These are the words he puts into the mouth of a farm woman in his poem “Growing Old”: It ain’t been nothin’ else but scrub An’ rub and bake and stew This hull, hull time, over stove or tub — No time to rest as men-folks do. I tell yeh, sometimes I sit and think How nice the grave’ll be, jest One nice, sweet, everlastin’ rest!7

In connection with his mother’s death, Garland pictures in “A Daughter of the Middle Border,” the tragedy of toil of which he himself was the child. “Visioning the long years of her drudgery, I recalled her early rising, and suffered with her the never-ending round of dish-washing, churning, sewing, and cooking, realizing more fully than ever before that in all this slavery she was but one of a million martyrs. All our neighbors’ wives walked the same round. On such as they rests the heavier part of the home and city building of the West.” That is his late and mature judgment. In his earlier [111]

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days, Garland, like any other poet, any other romantic — and that is what he is in his heart and soul and in his great work — wanted that everybody should flee to the bigness and out-of-door heavenly glories of the West, and yet he showed them that they would lead a terrible life if they went there. . . . Garland has been true to the Western life. He has done for it what Hardy has done for Wessex — Hardy, that other man of tragedies. But it does not seem to me that Garland has created great characters, as Hardy has done. He has described great scenes. He has made his people live in an environment that we can see, if anything, more vividly than we can see the cottages and the moors of Wessex. But no Jude, no Tess stands out from his pages immortally. Garland’s people are as real as flesh and blood, but they are commonplace people, just as he found them. All except some great Indians. The lives of the white people in his stories, the environment in which they struggled and aspired and loved, are more than the people themselves. He is a great reporter, a good painter. Somehow Garland has to see them all as not only sad, but rather dull. This is the reason, perhaps, why the personalities in his autobiographical books, those sincere and vivid memoirs of himself and his family, “The Son of the Middle Border,” and “The Daughter of the Middle Border,” are more vivid, more outstanding than the characters in his fiction, and are sure to live longer. He has made an enduring figure of his simple, stalwart, patient father Richard Garland — Maine Yankee and Western pioneer, hard working up-builder of farms and townships and counties, restless mover-on to new scenes of toilsome usefulness, poet at heart, but content to be just a grain of wheat in the vastest of human warehouses; living contentedly an obscure life, but on his deathbed reading almost prayerfully his boy Hamlin’s “Son of the Middle Border.” “Something,” says Garland, describing the final scene, “almost sacred colored the pictures which my story called up. Its songs and sayings vibrated deep, searching the foundation chords of his life. They told of a bright world vanished, a landscape so beautiful that it hurt him to have some parts of it revealed to aliens.” He couldn’t talk about it to the boy. It is this sort of thing that makes the “Son of the Middle Border” a great book, a noble poem, and one which will always hold a high place in our purely American literature. It is frank, naive reality; it does not consist of reminiscences of notabilities, though Garland had met and known many famous individuals. It is the American document. It has the blood and breath [112]

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and sweat of life on it — the kind of life that Garland came out of, and lived, and that many thousands of other Americans have lived. Garland is not altogether successful in putting flesh and blood on the characters of his fiction. He is, perhaps, too much of what he would himself once have called a “veritist” to do that. Something of the consciousness that they are unreal may cling to his hand and brain in depicting them. But this is not the case with his autobiographical record in the “Son” and the “Daughter.” They are a real, a true, an unreserved and homely record of an actual American life. Also they are very interesting, and often thrilling. These two books of Garland’s prove the excellence of his own theories of writing. He was always bound to depict truly the life that he knew. He would not have completely accomplished the purpose without these plain, frank stories of his own life and the lives of those who were near to him. They are to me the summit of his production, though he has — must have — a great deal in him yet, since he is in his sixty-sixth year only — and it devolves on him to think what De Morgan did after he was seventy. Perhaps, with his own story out of his system, and the more meditative years being upon him, Garland will presently turn in and write his best fiction. I hope so. I am glad that the world has recognized him. His countrymen have made him an Academician — an “American immortal.”8 Some of his novels have been translated into foreign languages. They go well abroad, because a genuine contribution to a national literature is a contribution to world literature. He is highly esteemed in England. Where American critics sometimes call his style crude, the English say: “He writes good English.” He does, because no one can mistake a word of it. I should say that his work, together with that of some of the other American realistic or rustic authors, had influenced the fiction writers of Europe — particularly those of Norway, who have read him faithfully, and the newest school of regional fictionists in France. Louis Hémon, author of “Maria Chapdelaine” and “La Belle que Voilà,” must have read him faithfully.9 The French-Canadian pictures in “Maria” have the same grim fidelity to a hard pioneer life that you will find in “Main Travelled Roads.” It is pure tragedy — that story of the Canadian pioneers going north and ever farther north, just as Richard Garland pulled up stakes and went West and farther West. The atmosphere of bitter toil, and of nature’s unpitying, crushing hand is in both. [ 1 13]

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Garland has been reproached for the sadness, the grimness of his picture of the pioneer West. He has only told what he and his people went through. And at every step he has pictured the beauty not only of the natural scene but of the lives of the people, of even the terrible toil that they went through. Oh, he sees the beauty, and describes it, but he could not completely give himself up to it. Since he became a man he could never quite resume the rural life. He tried it once, in his maturity, at his old home at West Salem, in Green’s Coulee, running down to the Mississippi. He mingled literary with manual labor. He wrote in a letter, “My life goes on here like the hands on a town clock. I write three hours in the morning, and work in the garden, do carpentering, or build fences in the afternoon; go to bed at nine, and rise at 6:30 the next morning and take up the same routine. I sold $25 worth of strawberries and $40 worth of early potatoes. I’ve got the dog-gondest patch of Hubbard squashes!” He seems to have enjoyed it fairly, but he did not make it go for long. He went back to the busy cities. He says: “Theoretically my native village was an ideal place in which to write, but actually it sapped me and after a few weeks depressed me. . . . I clearly recognized that my friends in the city meant more to me than any of my Wisconsin neighbors, and it became more and more evident that to make an arbitrary residence in a region which did not itself stimulate or satisfy me was a mistake.” He confesses that his “powers grew as he went eastward.” In Chicago he was “a perversity, a man of misdirected energy.” (He means that this was what other people thought he was.) So at last he went to New York, and lived happily ever after. “Theoretically,” he says, “I belonged to Wisconsin, as Hardy belonged to Wessex or Barrie to Scotland, actually my happiest home was adjacent to Madison Square.” Garland has thus acknowledged the power of the cities. He cannot live out of them — no longer tries to do so. But he has never been able to depict their life. It seems to me that his Rose, in “Rose of Dutcher’s Coolly,” was a wonderful, a true, a vivid and noteworthy character — as long as she lived in Wisconsin. When he took her to Chicago, it was (to me) as if the real Rose had died, and a lay figure had taken her place. But though he surrendered to the cities in the matter of residence and ordinary association, Garland has managed to escape entirely the sophistication of them. He is the prairie man still in his quality and spirit. His personality is breezy; the wind of the wide open spaces seems to blow through [114]

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his plentiful slowly-graying locks. Long ago he sacrificed the apostolic beard, and now the gray moustache, the rather deep-set eyes and the good nose give him a striking resemblance to Nathaniel Hawthorne. Garland does not cultivate this resemblance — he simply cannot help it. Both very noticeable men! The Garlands and the Hawthornes may well enough be linked, back somewhere, in blood. The relationship of inspiration does not markedly appear. Garland has at least not been strong on Hester Prynnes. He is called a realist, and Hawthorne a romanticist, but I should call Garland quite as much romanticist as realist, and who had a more vital sense of realities than the author of “The Scarlet Letter”? It is an interesting thing that both these very American authors, Hawthorne and Garland, have come somewhat under the spell of old England. We know how Hawthorne yielded to the fascination of the “Old Home,” and Garland certainly likes to go to England very much, and has found many and appreciative friends there. As an American author Garland has not been hurt by this sentiment, any more than Hawthorne was. Notes 1. Ellen Louise Chandler Moulton (1835–1908) was an editor, poet, and short story writer. For several years Moulton was Boston literary correspondent for the New York Tribune, and from 1876 to 1892 she contributed a weekly letter on books to the Boston Sunday Herald. She also held a Friday salon in Boston that included guests such as Whittier, Longfellow, Holmes, and Lowell. 2. Garland’s lectures on the actor Edwin Booth (1833–1893) are extant in the Hamlin Garland Papers at the University of Southern California (Item 584). 3. Charles E. Hurd (1833–1910) was an important supporter during Garland’s fi rst years in Boston, engaging Garland to review books for the Transcript, introducing him to writers, and providing an important letter of introduction to Howells. 4. This is a frequent misstatement about Garland’s birth: Garland actually was born in a squatter’s shack on the outskirts of West Salem and later moved to a house in Green’s Coulee. 5. William Lloyd Garrison (1805–1875), prominent abolitionist. 6. In his critique of Garland’s speech, Chamberlin wrote that Garland “failed to prove that the land system was responsible for the present disintegration and overcrowding, and he failed to show just how the change he proposed would work an amelioration,” and that listeners perceived the “poetry” of the antipoverty movement rather than “the logic of it” (“The Listener,” Boston Evening Transcript, 28 November 1887, 4). 7. The lines appear as the seventh stanza (with the last two in italics) in Prairie Songs (1893). 8. Garland was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1918.

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garland in his own time 9. The French writer Louis Hémon (1880–1913) settled in Quebec, where he wrote his most famous novel, Maria Chapdelaine (1913). From Joseph E. Chamberlin, “Hamlin Garland — The Hardy of the West,” Boston Evening Transcript, 30 March 1926, part 6, 1.

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[Journal Comments on Garland in 1929] Eldon Hill

X Eldon Hill (1906–1987) became interested in Hamlin Garland when he was a twenty-three-year-old graduate student at Ohio State University. He initiated a correspondence with Garland early in 1929, and Garland became the subject of his doctoral dissertation, the first on Garland, which he completed in 1940 as “A Biographical Study of Hamlin Garland from 1860 to 1895.” Over the next ten years, he wrote over 175 letters to Garland and met with him several times. In the 1950s Hill completed an unpublished biography of Garland.

I Go on a Pilgrimage to Garland’s Coulee Country, 20 October 1929 It is not because I believe in the dictum “all autobiographies are lies” that I am ambitious to write of the life and writing of Hamlin Garland. I wish to observe him and his deeds (not in a manner that would especially please John B. Watson1) but with an understanding though not a predilection for my subject. Ruskin’s defense of Turner is partly analogous, 2 although I wish to lay stress upon the author’s outward events as determining his literary propensities. My aim is to write an Appreciation of Hamlin Garland; perhaps later I shall try to publish a selection from his writings. Fresh data being my quest, I made a trip this week-end to the Wisconsin Coulee Country. Here are some notes worth preserving. George Dudley, La Crosse banker, who lives at West Salem, Garland’s home town, granted me several moments of his time at the Gateway City Bank and then took me on a motor-hike through the Garland country. A coulee is the valley or bowl among several bluffs, usually wooded and always majestic. From three to twenty farms are comprised in the coulees, which are commonly named after some old settler. Thus we have Ebner’s, Green’s, Mormon’s coulee. Green’s coulee is a “closed” one, the only outlet being over a low part in the edge of the bowl. [117]

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The author’s father was a farmer & lumberman. McClintocks not of the highest standing around West Salem. 3 (Dudley.) The banker said Garland was high-headed and aristocratic when he returned to his native community. Dudley believes G. has not given his wife credit for her big part in his career. She is a most charming woman. Dudley, who has executed much business for G., says the author has little business sense. “Send him a business proposition & he will not answer, & after two weeks he will have forgotten all about it. His brother engineered the Oklahoma land investments which made Hamlin independent.”4 I talked with Mrs. Ida Ewell Tilson, a long-time friend and neighbor of the Garlands at West Salem. She said she had known Hamlin ever since he was about three years old. Used to see his mother leading him about at the La Crosse county fair. Mrs. Tilson was enthusiastic about Mrs. Richard Garland’s “roguish eyes & full complexion.” His mother was witty but never had much to say. When she did say anything it was worth hearing. Mrs. G. said she put Hamlin through Osage Seminary by “raising colts.” Hamlin Garland (said Mrs. T.) was a most devoted son. But when he returned to West Salem, “he stood off the public.” One woman was introduced to him many times before he recognized her as an acquaintance. Even Mrs. T. was presented socially several times before he would say, “We have met.” Lately, however, he has “mellowed,” averred Mrs. T. She said perhaps the reason the conversation in G.’s early books is so stilted is that he didn’t mix enough with the people. I believe the criticism of G. as being uppish is due to a misunderstanding. No one ever took himself and his work more seriously than did HG. Said Emerson: “I shun father and mother and wife and brother, when my genius calls me. . . . Expect me not to show cause why I seek or exclude company.” See “Self-Reliance.” He didn’t like the cement walk in front of his homestead. It hindered his study. “Hamlin is careless about things.” Hamlin always claimed the mornings for his own and his art’s. He never spoke even to his loved ones in the forenoon hours. (Dudley blames him for this.) Hamlin always an early riser. Fond of walking. Fond of picnicking. [ 1 18 ]

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Hamlin was the inspiration of Henry Fuller’s “Under the Eaves,” said Mrs. Tilson.* *She meant “The Downfall of Abner Joyce.” Notes 1. John B. Watson (1878–1958) was a behavioral psychologist whose controversial theories that nurture was more important than innate disposition were much in the news. 2. The English art critic John Ruskin (1819–1900) defended the art of J. M. W. Turner in the first volume of Modern Painters (1843) by arguing that the chief role of the artist is “truth to nature.” 3. “McClintock” is the family name of Garland’s mother Isabelle, who had many relatives in the West Salem area. 4. In May 1904 Garland acquired a number of properties in and near Muskogee, Oklahoma, and by the end of the year had invested ten thousand dollars in what he hoped would be oil-bearing land; he later increased the investment by purchasing city lots, a business building, and four houses (Keith Newlin, Hamlin Garland, A Life, 269). Eldon Hill, Journal Notes: “I go on a Pilgrimage to Garland’s Coulee Country,” Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

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From “Text of Sinclair Lewis’s Nobel Prize Address at Stockholm” (1930) Sincl a ir Lew is

X Sinclair Lewis (1885–1951) was a Nobel Prize–winning novelist, satirist of the middle class, and the author of Our Mr. Wrenn (1914), The Trail of the Hawk (1915), Main Street (1920), Babbitt (1922), and Arrowsmith (1925), which received a Pulitzer Prize (which Lewis declined). Garland had written to Lewis in 1915 to praise Our Mr. Wrenn and thought enough of Lewis to propose him for membership in the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1921, which Lewis declined. The snub offended Garland, and Lewis’s refusal to accept the Pulitzer for Arrowsmith to avenge the Main Street debacle only deepened Garland’s animosity. He often derided Lewis in letters to fellow members of the National Institute and the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Yet Lewis himself thought highly of Garland’s earlier work, as he reveals in the following speech accepting the 1930 Nobel Prize for Literature, after first deriding the American Academy for being out of touch for not having recognized Theodore Dreiser, Eugene O’Neill, Willa Cather, Sherwood Anderson, and Ernest Hemingway, among others. Ironically, despite his earlier rejection of Garland’s nomination of him to the National Institute, in 1935 Lewis accepted membership in the Institute and, in 1937, election to the Academy.

it was with the emergence of William Dean Howells that we first began to have something like a standard, and a very bad standard it was. Mr. Howells was one of the gentlest, sweetest, and most honest of men and had the code of a pious old maid whose greatest delight is to have tea at the vicarage. He abhorred not only profanity and obscenity, but all of what [H. G.] Wells called the jolly coarsenesses of life. In his fantastic vision of life farmers, seamen and factory hands may exist, but the farmer must never be covered with muck, the seaman must never roll out bawdy chanties, and [120]

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all of them must long for an opportunity to visit Florence and smile gently at the quaintness of the beggars. Strong Influence of Howells So strongly did Howells feel this genteel, this new humanistic philosophy that he was able vastly to influence his contemporaries, down even to 1914 and the turmoil of the Great War. He actually was able to tame Mark Twain, perhaps the greatest of our writers, and to put that fiery old savage into an intellectual frock coat and top hat. His influence is not altogether gone today. He is still worshipped by Hamlin Garland, an author who should have been in every way greater than Howells, but who, under Howells’s influence, changed from a harsh and magnificent realist into a genial and insignificant lecturer. Mr. Garland is, so far as we have one, the dean of American letters today, and as our dean he is alarmed by all of the younger writers who are so lacking in taste as to suggest that men and women do not always love in accordance with the prayer book, and that the common people sometimes use language which would be inappropriate at a Women’s Literary Club on Main Street. Yet this same Hamlin Garland, as a young man, wrote two most valiant and revelatory works of realism, “Main-Traveled Roads” and “Rose of Dutcher’s Coolly.” Impressed as a Boy by Garland I read them, as a boy in a prairie village in Minnesota, in just such an environment as was described in Garland’s tales. They were vastly exciting to me. I had realized, in reading Balzac and Dickens, that it was possible to describe French and English common people as one actually saw them. But it had never occurred to me that one might, without indecency, write of the people of Sauk Centre, Minn., as one felt about them. Our fictional tradition, you see, was that all of us in mid-Western villages were altogether noble and happy. But in Garland’s “Main-Traveled Roads” I discovered that there was one man who believed mid-Western peasants were sometimes bewildered, hungry and vile. And, given this vision, I was released to write of life as living life. I am afraid that Mr. Garland will be not pleased, but acutely annoyed, to know that he made it possible for me to write of America as I see it and not as Mr. William Dean Howells so sunnily saw it. And it is a completely reve[121]

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latory American tragedy that in our land of freedom men like Garland, who first blast the roads to freedom, become themselves the most bound. From Sinclair Lewis, “Text of Sinclair Lewis’s Nobel Prize Address at Stockholm,” New York Times, 13 December 1930, 12.

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[Journal Comments on Garland in 1931] Eldon Hill

X In 1931 Hill arranged to meet Garland in New York and to travel with him to his country home Grey Ledge, which Garland had purchased in May 1925 in the club community of Onteora, New York. Named for the ledge upon which it was situated above Camp Neshonoc, near the top of Onteora Mountain, the two-story house was far more comfortable than Garland’s cramped New York apartment.

New York City, 8 July 1931 Tonight I made a call on Hamlin Garland at his home, 507 Cathedral Parkway. He was genial, entertaining, and inspiring. We talked of a great many things — sensational journalism, decadent literature, the over-emphasis of the Jewish (New York) note in the American letters — and of a great many persons — Sinclair Lewis, William Faulkner, Vere Collins, Margaret Wilkinson, Roosevelt, John Burroughs, Sherwood Anderson, Mencken, Heywood Broun, Harry Hansen, Colonel E. M. House, and of course his (Mr. Garland’s) beloved William Dean Howells. Some we berated, some we damned with faint praise, some we lauded to the heavens. He led me out on several points, and I could see in the twinkle of his eye a degree of toleration if not always approval of my opinions. How immature they must have seemed to him! Mr. Garland believes that the salvation of American letters rests in the development of a new school of critics who will counteract the present criticism which approves the pornographic and otherwise indecent books of today. Novels are being published today which outrage the canons of common decency and, worse still, challenge the dignity of human personality. Have we not progressed beyond the morals of the barnyard? To read a book like William Faulkner’s Sanctuary one would not think so. What is the critic to do with a book which he cannot discuss with his sister or his daughter? At the risk of being called prudish and senile and [123]

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puritanical (what would the cynics do without that word?) let the critic come out flatfooted and aggressively against such fi lth. Let him call it to question as a misrepresentation of life seen from a broad point of view. Let him point out that the authors fail “to see life steadily and to see it whole.” Let him stand for decency. In a time like ours it requires courage. But it is worth the price. We talked of many other things. He told me the intimate story of Margaret Wilkinson’s death (suicide) (as I had noticed mention of her in his diaries which he was kind enough to show me). It seems she was a victim of melancholia, a psychopathic case. He told me that he & Mrs. Garland were close friends of the Wilkinsons.1 Mencken has no perspective. Berates Howells, ignoring that author’s great contribution to American letters of his day. Mr. Garland volunteered to give me a note of introduction to Editor Collins of The Bookman.2 Write of Criticism — Problem of perspective. Problem of moralizing. The tendency of some critics to glorify the indecent is a weakness akin to that of immature young men who smoke cigarettes because they think it smart. Cite the tendency to sit in judgment, scorning this & praising that as one having authority sent down from heaven. Cite review of Living Philosophies in which the reviewer censures a statement of Einstein’s regarding the fascination of the mysteries.3 Though it could hardly be called criticism. One is almost prone to say to the reader as he approaches a book “Let counsel of thine own heart stand, for it is wont to give the better tidings than the seven watchmen (critics) who sit above in a high tower.”4 Criticism may be prophetic. Criticism has responsibility. New York, 9 July 1931 I believe that all great writing is divinely inspired. I know that some thinkers (Hamlin Garland, Prof. [John Livingston] Lowes, Prof. [Frederick Clarke] Prescott) regard the subconscious as the source of skillful writ[124]

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ing. But merely to label it the subconscious or the deeper mind is not to rule God out of the process; He is still the Mighty River of inspiration no matter how many psychological terms are invented in an effort to describe the flow. Can you imagine John Ruskin getting drunk? Some persons are of such a nervous temperament that they might be regarded as gigantic dendrites. Hamlin Garland says G. B. S. does not chew, smoke, drink, swear or tell dirty stories.5 He says further that H. G. Wells has a high squeaky tenor voice, so ludicrous that it kept him from being elected to Parliament. This surprised me. The Visit to Grey Ledge, 18 July 1931 This is being written at Hamlin Garland’s desk in his own study. I am so overwhelmed with his kindness and generosity that it surprises me to think I can record this. In a literary sense, this is holy ground. Here have been painted some of the most vivid factual portraits of literary and artistic chieftains ever left for the enlightenment of posterity. Much of Back-Trailers from the Middle Border and Roadside Meetings the author wrote at this very desk. Yesterday — how can I capture the thought and impressions which now flood my whole being? — we drove up from New York City to this heavenly place through a veritable avenue of beautiful scenery and literary lore. It is the Catskill Country, the Irving Country, haunted still by Old Rip and Henrik Hudson’s men. (Last night I imagined I could hear them bowling in the ravine between the twin peaks across the way.) On our way up we stopped at Riverby, John Burroughs’ homeplace at West Park. Unhappily it is not in good repair, in fact, is rapidly decaying so that unless some work is done on it soon nothing will be left of it but the shell of its former quaint loveliness and charm. The National Institute of Arts & Letters should take it over. We peeped into “Uncle John’s” Bark Study in which he did a great deal of writing. Mr. Garland said it is “just fi lled with letters from Tennyson, Emerson, John Bright, Darwin, Walt Whitman, and others.” A veritable treasure house of literary lore! Yet it is only a little shack, the interior of which is neatly & artistically arranged, to be sure, but the general appearance of which is far from impressive. Externally it is not the temple which really it [125]

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was once when Burroughs was the high priest of nature writing. Through the window — we did not have time to accept Julian Burroughs’ kind offer to get the key and open it for us — I could see pictures of Whitman, Darwin and John Burroughs himself; and the little desk just as he left it when he lay down his pen for the last time, the writing book being open at the last page where he ceased penning words forever. Mr. Garland said the son, Julian Burroughs (I take him to be around 62, a thin little man with no mark of greatness in his appearance; I saw him in the nude as he was returning from a swim in the Hudson as we chanced to meet him near his father’s bark pavilion) is a lazy, shiftless kind of fellow. The Burroughs Memorial Association tried to buy Riverby, but the price Julian asked was prohibitive. Leaving the Burroughs place we came on up through the Catskills through a region dotted with quaint old Dutch stone houses (I thought of Mary’s love of stone residences). Then suddenly we came to a village now called Palenville but which Irving referred to as Falling Water. (Probably some rich old party by the name of Palen caused his own to supersede the more euphonious name.) Shortly after leaving this little town, Mr. Garland said, “Now this is the Rip Van Winkle trail. Here is where the old fellow with his dog and gun sought surcease from his bellicose wife. Over the way (with an indefinite gesture) is the rock on which he slept for twenty years. Yonder are the Twin Peaks between which Henrik Hudson and his men played ten-pins.” It was thrilling beyond words to have this veteran, this “dean of American letters” (so Carl Van Doren called him) to show me through the Irving and Burroughs haunts; it was like having an experienced guide whose life and work form a direct linking with the storied past. How can I express my gratitude for this high privilege? This is the nearest I have ever been to heaven, and it may be the nearest I shall ever be. We are 2600 feet above sea level, on the top of Onteora Mountain, with the clouds as my neighbors for the week-end. Mr. Garland’s cottage has a kind of studied rusticity, but yet a luxuriousness, too; though the three fireplaces are rude and the floors unpainted, each room has electric lights and the house has complete plumbing. Mrs. Vida Sutton, who now occupies Camp Neshonoc (the Garlands’ former home) down the Mountain a mile or so, rode up with us from New [ 1 2 6]

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York City.6 She is a most gracious and companionable lady, and seemed to enjoy talking with me. I like her. Mrs. Sutton is head of the National Broadcasting Company’s School of the Air for Good Diction. It was interesting to hear of her problems in that important work. She seemed pleased when I said, “Your work is a significant part of the present mighty movement for Adult Education.” Last night Mr. Garland and I called on Professor Jones (Richard, I believe) of the George Washington University Dept. of English. He and his wife are in the house next to this Cottage. Both were interesting persons, though not above prejudices. Mr. Garland was in the mood for conversation, and how he talked! Henry B. Fuller, Mark Twain and General U. S. Grant he brought back to us through the conjury of words; after listening those men seem like acquaintances to me now. We discussed Dakin’s Mary Baker Eddy, which Mr. Garland admires to the point of enthusiasm.7 The author told of what Mark Twain once said to him: “Now, I don’t object to Christian Science as a philosophical doctrine so much, but I’m after that female pope.” We retired shortly after 11 p.m., but I read page proofs of Companions on the Trail — which will be published next fall, probably on Sept. 16, his birthday — until well past midnight. I could hear his rhythmic breathing (a tactful phrase for snoring). 19 July 1931 Grey Ledge Cottage, on the top of Onteora Mountain, has a studied rusticity combined with a spacious luxury. Only an artist could have built it. The site is ideal. Overlooking, when the clouds have risen, a charming little valley town, the Cottage also commands a view of Twin Peaks and other mountains associated with Irving’s tale. This morning at 7 Mr. Garland called to me. “Well, I am going to have to waken you to see a sight. Come to the window.” I followed him in my pajamas to see a view fit for gods and men. Clouds had descended to form a misty lane below us, with the top of some mountains looking like islands and the majestic range across the valley resembling (Mr. Garland said) a rocky shore on the coast of Scotland. At times the fog would lift in places so that wisps of it simulated the smoke that rises from a steamer and others the [127]

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sails of a schooner. I could hear the baritone oo-o-o-a of automobile horns on the mountain roads below the clouds, a noise which seemed altogether out-of-harmony with the scene. Sea animals do not cry. Yesterday afternoon I had a long talk before the fire in the spacious living room of Grey Ledge with my gracious host who has lived the richest life of anyone I know or know of. To him has been the privilege of close acquaintances or friendships with such celebrities as Howells, Roosevelt, Burroughs, Stephen Crane, Henry Fuller, Henry George, Vachel Lindsay, Edward MacDowell, and many, many others of the great or near-great as anyone who has read his recent volumes of Reminiscences will know. Now, he has come to this — he & I are spending the week-end alone in Grey Ledge. — To get back: Yesterday afternoon before the fire we talked of Thomas Hardy, Vachel Lindsay, and in a while we arrived at the subject which has concerned us often, the pornographic note in current fiction. I had a conception of the word pornography different from the one Mr. Garland conveyed. “Of or pertaining to brothels” is the dictionary definition which I knew. He explained that it is “a celebration of the female libertine.” This note has become dominant — or almost dominant — in fiction since the beginning of the Feminist Movement, although it is the oldest of themes. Zola & Dreiser, his contemporary imitator, and their like are giving us nothing new. The sexual side of life is the most ancient and easiest of subjects with which to deal in plays and novels, said mine host. The hard task is to write a good story without it; that is what calls out the artist within the writer. Dreiser, Hemingway, Faulkner are mere journalists, reporters of raw facts without the artist’s interpretation based on the ideal. Their work will perish. It does something to a man for him to fi ll his mind with imaginings and conceptions of how the sexual libertine acts or thinks. It is degrading for him to contemplate such things for long. Mr. Garland said he had touched all conditions of life, known the language of the barroom and the mining camp; knew their indecencies — but that he did not write of them. “Why itemize the garbage pail?” I interjected. “That’s just the question,” he said. Continuing: “For the past fifteen years the road has been very hard for us who write the unsensational thing.” After a while, though, the public will become satiated and nauseated with cesspool fiction and then the clean wholesome type will become popular again; it will be the unusual. [128]

Eldon Hill

There are signs of it now. Wilder’s books, Willa Cather’s Death Comes for the Archbishop, Pearl S. Buck’s two novels of Chinese life are examples of clean fiction. Mr. Garland says it is a mystery to him, the career of Vachel Lindsay. How could a son of a doctor in a small ugly Illinois city have been so original a genius? His poem on “Poe” is a masterpiece; nothing to surpass it in American literature. Mr. Garland gave him his start in literature. “‘Come, eat the bread of idleness,’ said Mr. Moon to me” was a sentence in one of Lindsay’s early letters to Mr. Garland.8 This, the latter said, is bewitching — how can we account for it? Mr. Garland’s friendship makes me humble and proud. Millionaires cannot buy it, nor monarchs command. Notes 1. The poet Marguerite Wilkinson (1883–1928) drowned in the surf at Coney Island on 12 January 1928. 2. Seward Collins (1899–1952) was the editor of the Bookman from 1927 to 1933. 3. Living Philosophies (1931), a collection of philosophical reflections by Albert Einstein and twelve others. 4. Hill is quoting from the Apocrypha: “And let the counsel of thine own heart stand: for there is no man more faithful unto thee than it. For a man’s mind is sometime wont to tell him more than seven watchmen, that sit above in an high tower” (Ecclesiasticus 37:13– 14; The Holy Bible, King James Version [New York: Oxford Edition: 1769]; King James Bible Online, 2008. http://www.king jamesbibleonline.org/). 5. This is a reference to George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950), whom Garland first met during his 1899 trip to Great Britain. 6. Vida Ravenscroft Sutton (1880–1956) taught drama and speech at the Finch School and was a consultant to NBC in the training of radio announcers. 7. Edwin Dakin, Mrs. Eddy: The Biography of a Virginal Mind (1930). 8. The quotation comes from “The Light o’ the Moon,” in General William Booth Enters into Heaven and Other Poems (1913). The “poem on Poe” is “The Wizard in the Street,” which is in the same collection. Beginning in 1911, Lindsay (1879–1931) entered into a correspondence with Garland, sending him a number of drafts of poems that Garland critiqued; Garland also advised Lindsay about prospective publishers. See Companions on the Trail, 462–71. Eldon Hill, Journal Notes: “1931 Journal Jottings”; “Grey ledge Visit, Volume I”; “Grey Ledge Visit, Volume II”; Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

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[Garland in California, 1931–1933] Isa bel Ga r l a nd Lor d

X In 1927 Garland’s daughter Constance married Joseph Wesley Harper (1903– 1963), a grandson of one of the founders of Harper and Brothers. They moved to Hollywood to live in a house next door to Joe’s mother in the 2000 block of DeMille Drive, a gated community in Hollywood in the shadow of the mansion of film director Cecil B. DeMille. Isabel and Hardesty followed in 1929 and, in January 1930, Garland began construction of a house for Isabel, conveniently located next door to the Harpers, with the idea that he and Zulime would spend winters in Hollywood. But when Zulime developed Parkinson’s disease in August 1931, the seventy-one-year-old author soon realized he needed help with her care. In November he moved permanently into the house he had built for Isabel. The proximity proved to be more troublesome than father or daughter had envisioned, as Lord remembers.

that fall there was a big change in our lives. Father’s letters from Onteora, where Mother and he had been spending the summer in Grey Ledge, grew more and more forlorn. Mother was not improving; she was getting worse and was, in fact, nearly helpless. It was impossible for her to live in the big house with inadequate care. There was only one solution. “Mother needs her daughters,” Father wrote in bitter surrender. “I have taken her away for the last time. I’ll continue to come East when I can, but from now on your mother will make her home with you and Jimmie.” What were we to say? The original agreement was that they would be three or four months’ visitors. Fond as we were of them and grateful for their generosity, it was impossible to lead any life of our own while they were there. Guests had to be carefully screened to please our parents, early hours observed, menus adjusted to their needs and likes. Perhaps the hardest thing of all was their unhappiness every time we went out. They wanted us there all the time, and I was quite sick with sympathy, mixed, I am afraid, with a little resentment at the change in their faces when I said, “We’re not going to be here for dinner tonight.” Each time we drove away, [130]

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it was with the picture of two silent figures on each side of the fireplace, and the wistful appeal on their eyes haunted me through the gayest evening. Our first impulse was to cut and run, but how could we do that? How could you walk out on a frail, sick darling, whose love was twined around and around you like a vine? Father had built the house for me, for my happiness. What kind of ungrateful children would we be who could walk out on responsibility like that? Jimmie was quite desperate, but the more we talked it over, the more we realized where our path lay. We must never let them know that we felt anything but joy and satisfaction in their company. Having no children, they became, in a curious roundabout way, our children, and the future was gray with duty and self-sacrifice. We met them with open arms at the train, and on the surface life resumed itself smoothly and pleasantly, but underneath was real tragedy. Mother was now in the ugly grip of Parkinson’s disease. Her hands and feet shook constantly, and she was in morbid dread that in time her head would shake, too. Thank God, it never did, and strangely, after Father died, the shaking all but disappeared; she was once more able to hold a cup and a fork and her beautifully modeled face took on an unearthly beauty. At this time, she refused to see anyone and would stay in her room when we had anyone to tea or dinner. Father was bewildered, miserable. He haunted her bedroom, sitting by her hour after hour, sometimes reading aloud or listening with her to symphonic music on her bedside radio that was never turned off, day or night. Often he would lean forward and take her poor, quivering hand in his big paw, holding it for as long as she would permit him. In her own wretchedness Mother was cool, almost unkind to Father. In the car, when Jimmie and I took them on long drives up and down and across California, Father always sought Mother’s hand, humbly, almost pleadingly, as if in shame for some past injustice, yet I knew that Father — stubborn, unreasonable, emotionally mercurial — was at the core all warmth and tenderness. Oh, but the poor man was lonely! Separated by three thousand miles from his familiar world of the Century Club, the Academy of Arts and Letters, and his literary and editorial friends, he tried gallantly to find comfort on our quiet, olive-treed hillside. Unable to drive a car, with no bus or other transportation available, he was marooned, unless Connie or Jimmie or I drove him somewhere. Then where was he to go? Los Angeles was [ 131 ]

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not a literary town, with congenial groups of literary craftsmen to draw on. The University people were life-savers. Once or twice a month, Dr. Baxter or Dr. Cooke or Dr. Greever would make the long trip out to have coffee and cakes on our back patio or in front of the drawing room fire.1 Often they would bring a group of students with them, and for an hour or two Father would expand and become his old glowing self again, only to drop back into gloom after the guests were gone. Yet he loved our fine new home, the trees, the birds, the flowers, the warmth. One of his favorite expeditions was to Armstrong Nurseries, where he would buy blooming potted plants with prodigal abandon. “I’m too old to wait for them to grow,” he said. “I want color and bloom around me now.” He always maintained, however, that California should not be for young people. “They haven’t earned it. It should come as the reward of a long, hard life spent somewhere else.” By his faraway look, I could tell that he was momentarily back on the Dakota plains, or fighting his way along Chicago’s bitter, winter streets. Now and then a brief lecture tour, winding up in New York, would be arranged, and off he would go, alone. Each time I saw him off my heart ached, for I knew he would find fewer familiar faces at the Century Club and the Academy because so many of his closest friends had been laid low by disabilities or death. Each trip grew shorter and he came back to us in a sort of desperation, fleeing from painful memories, trying to lose himself in the stimulation of his children and the peace and beauty of his last home. Daddy still kept his writing habits, rising at dawn to brew his powerful coffee, taking his place at his desk, but the work went slowly and he was glad to “knock off ” and come out and sit in the sun and wait for his morning’s mail. That, too, had tapered off, but most days there would be a letter or two from a reader who had discovered — or rediscovered — Hamlin Garland. It was touching the pleasure they gave him. “There! You see I’m not forgotten after all. There’s life in the old gentleman yet.” Indeed there was. Up to almost the very end, Father was as vital as an April wind. The trick was to keep him amused. “For your mother’s sake — ” he explained, as they went several times a week to the motion pictures, and Jimmie and I were with them the night Father saw Greta Garbo for the first time. [ 132 ]

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Up to then, he had become virulent at the very name, seeing “that woman” as a female fiend, dedicated to corrupting men’s souls, but this time, with malice aforethought, Jimmie and I took Mother and Father to a fi lm called Victory, the story of Marie Waleska, Napoleon’s Polish love.2 Within ten minutes, to Mother’s and our delighted amusement, Daddy capitulated. In short, he fell in love. “That is the most magnificent actress I have ever seen!” he announced on the way home, recalling the countless actresses he had seen: Duse, Bernhardt, Ellen Terry, the best of the American and British stage. “This girl has it all over them. She is — I hate the overworked word but there is no other adequate — she is glorious!” Thereafter, Father saw every picture Garbo ever made, some of them over and over. It’s fun to see a man in his seventies so stirred, so enraptured. Father had always preferred the company of good looking women — he and Lorado Taft were together in that. I remember Father once saying to Mother, “Zulime, don’t ask any more plain women to this house. I do not care for plain women.” This applied to housekeepers as well; the competent but unattractive were passed over for a comely face and a soft lilting voice. Our Astrid was a young Swedish beauty who pleased everybody. She had a soul as endearing as her face and figure and a quick skillful hand with pastry, pots, and pans. In fact, she was a jewel without peer, as all too soon some fortunate young man found out. Her successor was a darling but incontestably plain, and for several days Daddy almost sulked until Anna, in her own way, succeeded in insinuating herself in his regard. It was due to the kitten we were given by Mother’s Chicago friend, Dora Drane.3 It was a tiny orange Persian, and it was ailing and alive with pet shop fleas. Anna fell upon it with cries of pity, took it into her room, bathed and brushed it, and within a few weeks had transformed it into a healthy, gloriously-coated show cat. Father named it “Ectoplasm,” after his interest in psychic research, but its nickname was “Hector,” and it was the only cat I have ever seen who would retrieve, just as a dog does. You threw a walnut shell and Hector would bring it back to you time after time, one evening choosing to place it deliberately in the outstretched hand of my big doll, Rosalie, who had been brought down from the attic to sit nostalgically under our Christmas tree. We were all caught up in psychic investigation at this time, and to this [ 133]

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day I marvel at the evenings in Father’s study. Mrs. Drane was an extraordinary medium. With the best of humor, she would sit for us night after night, go promptly into a trance in the small armchair Daddy set for her, and around her slumped figure would stir and move and sound incredible, inexplicable things. The room was darkened but not so dark that we could not see each other against the drawn window shades, and there was not one of us — including Mrs. Drane — who could be discerned taking a hand in anything that happened. The cone out of which the voices came had been made by my husband out of a big sheet of drawing paper. Mrs. Drane had not even seen it until the first night, yet it floated around Daddy’s study on an even keel like a zeppelin, and the phosphorescent paint Jimmie had applied to both ends made the small end remarkably like an open mouth as it came slowly but unhesitatingly to our ears. Many personalities “came through”: friends of Daddy’s, Henry B. Fuller repeatedly, as well as voices claiming to be long-dead relatives. It was all absorbing and breathtaking but inconclusive. Mrs. Drane, who was a spiritualist, would have liked us to believe, but we could not, any of us. Father maintained that psychic manifestation was “unexplored biology” and that one day, along with the rest of the scientific marvels, its secrets would be probed. Nearing the end himself, he said he would like to be convinced, but nothing he had experienced in his forty years of psychic research had given him the slightest conviction of life after death. He was to have one more exciting psychic experience before the book closed. Notes 1. Frank C. Baxter, John D. Cooke, and Garland Greever were members of the English Department at the University of Southern California. 2. Isabel refers to the movie Conquest (1937), which starred Greta Garbo as Marie Waleska. 3. Dora Drane was a psychic. Beginning in January 1933, Garland recorded many séances with Drane in his diary. He describes the sittings — with Drane renamed “Delia Drake” — in Forty Years of Psychic Research (1936), 333–61. From Isabel Garland Lord, A Summer to Be: A Memoir by the Daughter of Hamlin Garland, ed. Keith Newlin, foreword by Victoria Doyle-Jones (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2010), 207–12.

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[Garland’s Work Habits, 1932] Lee Shippey

X Journalist Lee Shippey (1884–1969) wrote a column for the Los Angeles Times called “The Lee Side o’ L.A.” in which he frequently noted Garland’s activities.

of all the writers I met, I owe most to Hamlin Garland. He had just won the Pulitzer Prize when I met him, and he told me he had rewritten the book which won it ten times. All my life I had been hurried by deadlines or economic pressures. I could not imagine a life in which one had time to rewrite ten times. But most of us would have twice as much time if we systematized our efforts. Garland told me he got up at half past five, brewed a pot of coffee and made toast on an electric gadget in his study and was at work by six. At nine o’clock he was through with work for the day. Then he breakfasted, read the morning paper and attended to his personal mail. That occupied him until luncheon. After luncheon he and Mrs. Garland would take a long drive, with some destination in mind. Sometimes they would drop in on Will Rogers, Will Durant, Robert Benchley or even on me, for their range of friends was very wide. Such drives and visits would fi ll the afternoon, and they would be home in plenty of time to rest before dinner. After dinner they would go to a show if an exceptionally good one were in town, otherwise one of their two daughters would read aloud. Thus Mr. Garland had time for his work, his personal correspondence and his friends, and kept up with both the world of books and the world of men — and he was the only distinguished person I knew who had time for all those things. Once I realized that, an important fact began to dawn on me. After awakened pondering, I announced to Madeleine: If that dear old gentleman can get up at half past five I should be able to get up at six. I’m going to set the alarm clock tonight. I’ll get up at six, take a walk to

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garland in his own time compose my mind and get to work in my den by seven. I’ll write from seven until eight. You’ll call me to breakfast at eight, and that will end literature for the day. We’ll have breakfast and the morning paper and I’ll go to work for The Times at nine. We have a steady salary, so I won’t be under financial pressure. We won’t have to sell whatever I write in order to live, so I won’t have to slant anything nor write a line I do not feel is absolutely honest. I’ve put off starting for years, but that is going to be our program for the year beginning tomorrow at six.

From Lee Shippey, Luckiest Man Alive: Being the Author’s Own Story, with Certain Omissions, but Including Hitherto Unpublished Sidelights on Some Famous Persons and Incidents (Los Angeles: Westernlore Press, 1959), 178–79.

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[Letter Commenting on Garland in California in 1933] Pau l Jor da n-Smi th

X Paul Jordan-Smith (1885–1971) was the book review editor for the Los Angeles Times from 1933 to 1957.

Paul Jordan-Smith to Eldon Hill, 6 July 1950 Hamlin Garland was a pleasant and friendly neighbor, and he liked to help young men in their writing careers. John Hodgdon Bradley was a favorite of his, and he is mentioned in the letters [that Jordan-Smith received from Garland]. Bradley was teaching at the Univ. of Southern California at the time, and wrote several books that interested Garland.1 At first it was interesting to visit at Mr. Garland’s lovely home. [H]e was full of talk about Stephen Crane, Howells, Clemens and the writers he knew in Boston, Chicago and New York. One of the very few occasions I remember was a birthday party for Julian Hawthorne, held at Julian’s beach cottage, at Balboa Beach, California. It was during the summer of 1933, just about a year before Julian’s death. The two grand old men gossiped a lot about early days and mutual friends, but Julian seemed stiffer than usual. Then, when Garland left, Julian (then 87) stretched like a cat and said, “Now let’s relax and have some wine and a smoke. The idea of Garland trying to fi x his hair to look like my father!”2 Towards the last many of us were embarrassed about going to Garland’s, much as we liked and admired him. For he always had a medium around and held nightly séances with Whitman, Howells and some Indian. That was amusing for one evening, but most of us were skeptics and did not want to offend the dear old man. Then there were the lead (or zinc) crosses which he exhibited in good faith when they were obvious fakes. We looked at them in a silence that hurt us and must have hurt his family. So it came [137]

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about that younger men stayed away even though our consciences burned. [M]ine still burns, for I know how lonely he was. Once he said to me, — “In other days when I went to a club scores of eager young men rushed up to greet me, even men I did not recognize: now when I go to my New York club I hear men say, ‘Who is that old fellow?’” I have several of H. G.’s later books, inscribed to me. The only early one is Jason Edwards (1892). Most of the people who went with me to his home have now joined him in the shades, so I begin to feel like he did! If I can be of any assistance, please let me know. Paul Jordan-Smith Notes 1. John Hodgdon Bradley (1898–1962) was a professor of geology at the University of Southern California and the author of Parade of the Living (1930) and Patterns of Survival: An Anatomy of Life (1938), both of which Garland admired. 2. The son of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Julian Hawthorne (1846–1934) published novels and memoirs of his family, including Nathaniel Hawthorne and His Wife (1884), Hawthorne and His Circle (1903), Shapes that Pass: Memories of Old Days (1928), and The Memoirs of Julian Hawthorne (1938). Following his attendance at Hawthorne’s birthday party on 28 August 1933, Garland recorded in his diary of the man he had first met forty years earlier, “He has failed in mental strength and vigor since I saw him last. He has shrunk in size and has in the face the shadow of approaching death” (Hamlin Garland’s Diaries, 144). Paul Jordan-Smith to Eldon Hill, 6 July 1950, Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

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[Garland’s Seventy-third Birthday, 1933] Isa bel Ga r l a nd Lor d

X Garland’s sense of isolation found momentary relief when he was feted on his seventy-third birthday, thanks to the efforts of Alexander Gaylord Beaman (1889–1943), a Los Angeles businessman and Garland’s financial adviser and close friend.

father had one social occasion in Los Angeles that was completely satisfactory. A loyal longtime friend, Gaylord Beaman, conceived a seventythird birthday dinner for Hamlin Garland and worked like a demon to make it a success.1 Over Father’s worried protests, he wrote friends and fellow writers in England and America, and a flood of letters and wires from those who could not be present came pouring in. They were eventually all collected in a large volume which my sister still has today. The dinner was splendid. The pity was that mother could not go, but she would have hated it anyway. All the rest of us were there, the family, the University people, and other admirers rallied round, and Father was feted and toasted within an inch of his life. Dr. Robert Millikan was the chairman and Will Rogers the principal speaker.2 Father had a few misgivings lest Mr. Rogers might become too funny, but there was no need to worry. Will Rogers was exactly right. We have such a happy photograph of Father taken at the dinner: handsome, modest, but radiant with pleasure. He had not had such accolades since he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and though he often spoke sadly about being forgotten, here was a man who was obviously not forgotten. As the warm, heartfelt tributes were read out from Shaw, Barrie, Kipling, Edith Wharton, Gifford Pinchot, Hoover, and a myriad of others, including a large group of the younger men expressing their gratitude for his help and encouragement in the early days of their climb, I could see that Father was deeply moved. [139]

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Notes 1. Garland describes the celebratory dinner in Afternoon Neighbors, 554–57. The birthday tributes are now part of the Hamlin Garland Papers at the University of Southern California (Item 711d). 2. Robert A. Millikan (1869–1953) was president of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and the winner of the 1923 Nobel Prize for physics. Will Rogers (1879–1935) was an immensely popular comedian, political wit, and movie star. In his column describing the dinner, Lee Shippey marveled that “Hamlin Garland is the only man we ever heard get the best of Will Rogers at a dinner” and then proceeded to describe the mutual oneupmanship (“The Lee Side o’ L.A.,” Los Angeles Times, 2 October 1933, A4). From Isabel Garland Lord, A Summer to Be: A Memoir by the Daughter of Hamlin Garland, ed. Keith Newlin, foreword by Victoria Doyle-Jones (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2010), 216–17.

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[Diary Impressions of Garland in 1933] Gl a dys H a st y Ca r roll

X Gladys Hasty Carroll (1904–1999) was a novelist from South Berwick, Maine, who had published As the Earth Turns (1933), a regional novel of Maine that became a best seller. She had arrived in Hollywood for the film adaptation of her novel (Warner Brothers, 1934).

Gladys Hasty Carroll to Eldon Hill, 15 July 1947 At the time that I met Mr. Garland I was keeping a journal and wrote in it my very personal impression of him, his family, and his home. I am having this copied for you, and you must forgive me if there is too little about him and too much about how I felt when I was with him. I was quite young, in all ways, and the literary world was a brand-new world to me, and this was not written for any other eye than my own, and perhaps my family’s. But it is obviously honest and spontaneous. November 1933 I was in Hollywood, Calif., to watch part of fi lming of the moving-picture being made of my book As the Earth Turns, and had spent a week or two at the studios, increasingly confused as to just what actually was now or ever had been in the way of nature, human beings, truth, or beauty, when Lee Shippey, partially blind and very gentle columnist on the Los Angeles Times, came out to interview me on the Warner lot. We sat on boxes in a doorway on New York Street and he said, among other things, “I am on my way out to see Hamlin Garland.” I am afraid I all but plucked his coat sleeve. “Oh, would he,” I began, “I mean, could you do anything to persuade him to see me before I leave Los Angeles?” Mr. Shippey said, “I’ll be glad to inquire for you.” A few days later, at a Writers’ Club tea, I did pluck at his sleeve, feeling him now a friend of mine, and he said, “Oh, yes. Mr. Garland will be happy to see you. He liked your book, and his daugh[141]

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ters were very enthusiastic about it. This is his number. Just telephone him any morning when you have a free afternoon.” I went out later in the week and found his place on one of the hills where the streets go round and round on top and you peer down over the curb to find the houses. His was a Monterey colonial, perfect for its setting; broad, low, pale; simple and frail but with a sound dignity. I went down steep stone steps across the drenched grass, and Mr. Garland and his daughter, Mary Isabel, opened the door to me before I had reached it. It is difficult to say how much I had looked forward to this meeting or exactly why it meant so much to me. Certainly the fact that he is a celebrity meant less than nothing. I have never felt any interest in meeting the people behind books, pictures, or characters in dramas, however much I enjoyed what they had produced. To me Hamlin Garland stood for three things: (1) A name familiar from courses in American literature and once associated with a Pulitzer prize; (2) Author of Son and Daughter (of the Middle Border) the only two of his books which I had read and both of which I had admired so profoundly it was a sign of something queer in the times or in the habits of American youth that I had not gone into his work more thoroughly; (3) a man who had come from simple, humble people and a rural environment and been able to prepare himself to give his understanding of both to the world, to earn the precious tools of art and then to use them, without ever losing touch with his beginnings. It was the third which mattered very much to me. It was not the author, but the man, Hamlin Garland, whom I wanted to meet. And here he was standing in his wide, dim hall just a little behind his pleasant, friendly daughter who said, “Won’t you send your taxi away, and let us drive you home?” The cab went and I was led inside to sit across the hearth from Mr. Garland. The maid was out and Mary Isabel (I can think of her by no other name) brought tea; her husband, professor of voice in the U. of So. Calif. came, and her sister Constance who draws and has two babies. I did not see Mrs. Garland, nor was she mentioned, and I was disappointed. As I looked at Mary Isabel I thought of her mother, before this child’s birth, going into the midst of her husband’s family and taking her place with ease and grace, and of her rides through the country with her husband when neither of them knew it might not be the last of such rides. After tea Mr. Garland led the way upstairs to his study, a beautiful room, high and rich and comfortable, but in no way ostentatious. He wanted me to look from each of his [142]

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windows, which I did, and we hurried downstairs again for one glance at the drenched garden (I keep repeating “drenched”; it was that kind of day) which Mr. Garland said he tended himself. He was very eager to show me something more of Hollywood than the little I had already seen, and we set out as soon as we could for a roundabout drive back to my hotel, through the streaming rain. The next morning he and Mrs. Garland and Mary Isabel called for me and we rode for an hour or two among the Hollywood hills, seeing with the rest that on which an art museum, product of the zeal, gift, and vision of Lorado Taft, Mrs. Garland’s brother, is soon to be built.1 This venture is plainly in the nature of a personal romance, long uncertain and now working out happily, to all the Garlands as well as to Mr. Taft. They speak of “our museum,” and choosing its location had been an absorbing and wholly welcome task; its hill stands just back of Mr. Garland’s study and as he writes his further reminiscences he will look at it, white (I hope white) against the California sky. These are the facts. Now we come to the impressions which hang back and seem to want to hide in me as my baby does when a stranger looks too closely at him. I have had no experience in setting down my true feelings about real people. But the truth seems to be that on both occasions I was associated more closely with Mary Isabel than was good for me and saw too little of Hamlin and Zulime Garland un-overshadowed. They, Mr. Garland in particular, thought of themselves as old, which is a mistake; since coming home I have read his My Friendly Contemporaries and find him making it there also; he felt at somewhere-in-the-fifties that his race was nearly run, and at that time both the Son and the Daughter were unwritten; he now thinks of himself as very old, and he is scarcely over seventy. I think this is something cities have done to him, one of the few things. My grandfather, a woodsman and a farmer, looked upon seventy as a signal for renewed, increased activity and felt that the achievement of this age was accompanied by a key which admitted him wherever he chose to go and made him the central figure there. Mary Isabel being my contemporary it was perhaps assumed she could best entertain me, but chronological age is of little importance. I am quite sure I was a disappointment to her, for she convinced me she had liked my book. And while I admired her, her grave, intelligent eyes and sensitive mouth and easy manner of wearing gray with brown, I felt very far away from her, as from most of my contemporaries in the world in which I now live. My [ 1 4 3]

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father is much more like Richard than like Hamlin Garland. I did not go to Mrs. Cosgrave’s in New York but to a district school, as rude a “little box of pine boards” as any in Iowa, and my first long journey as a young girl was not abroad but the 90 miles from my home town to Boston. I did not understand her when she said, “My husband is a professor, too, you know. We never get over being amused about it.” To me there is nothing amusing about having a professor-husband; in my present life it is an important and serious fact. It was Mrs. Garland who said, “I grew up in college circles and, though we had little money, we never doubted that we were the most fortunate people in the world.” I saw through and appreciated her kindness in saying this, but, better than that, could feel with her what that little Zulime had felt, her high, sweet pride; and this was the sort of spiritual sympathy I had come to the Garlands hoping to find and to give, though I realized I could at best catch only glimpses of it in so short a time. What a pleasure if I might instantly have become an old acquaintance of Mr. and Mrs. Garland, someone to be nodded at but not paid much personal attention, and if I might have sat quietly all morning in the study, sharing what took place there, and helped with the gardening in the afternoon, and brought the tea, and sat with them by the fire after dinner. I wish I might have heard some of her memories of his mother and of her children as babies the age of mine, and heard him sing some of his store of New England songs. I am increasingly aware of a need in me for a few hours of such a fellowship as, for me, that would be, and I hope some time to earn the privilege of claiming it before Mr. Garland actually does become an old man. I should like to describe him, though personal appearance is surely a minor matter. Not tall, but broad; dark-eyed with round face and fine nose and silver hair and moustache; a grave and gentle bearing; a leonine elegance, — the lion’s grace and strength, his smooth rumble, his mild manner which deceives no one. The effect of his personality on me was wonderfully stabilizing. After many days of lonely bewilderment and confusion, I felt greatly reassured by my contact with him, though nothing was said of all that was in my mind. Standards were still standards. I had only to look at him to realize that here was a figure, one of the permanent pieces, and I knew in general what philosophy lay behind him and his career. I came away from him with what I hope is a fi xed conviction that life is beautiful and important and that whatever is written about it should be equally so. [144]

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Note 1. Lorado Taft had long dreamed of building a museum to exhibit reproductions of the world’s greatest sculptures. A site had been selected in Griffith Park, but the project eventually died for lack of funding. See “Art Dream Brought Nearer Reality,” Los Angeles Times, 10 February 1934, A1. Gladys Hasty Carroll to Eldon Hill, 15 July 1947, and typed transcript of “Diary Impressions of Hamlin Garland,” Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

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[Letter about Garland in Wisconsin, 1935] Willi a m Ellery Leona r d

X William Ellery Leonard (1876–1944) was a professor of English at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He published a number of scholarly works and volumes of poetry, the most important of which is Two Lives (1923), a sonnet sequence about his first marriage. His letter to Hill describes, among other events, his role in the awarding of an honorary degree to Garland on 21 June 1926 and the Wisconsin premiere of Garland’s only produced play, Miller of Boscobel, on 29 January 1909.

18 march 1935 My Dear Mr. Hill: I’ve known Hamlin Garland for nearly thirty years, tho’ scarcely intimately, however friendly our relations. I remember calling upon him at his apartment in Chicago sometime in the winter of 96–7 when he gave me the first of many delighted chats on people and books, reminiscent in spirit even then. That was during the period when Main-Travelled Roads was behind him and A Son of the Middle Border many years ahead, and people were saying Garland was written out. One vivid picture remains in my mind from my young man’s visit. I had referred to the incurable fluency of a certain handsome and cultured purveyor of Dante-thought, Goethethought and especially New thought, who was touring the Women’s Clubs of the nation, whereupon Garland jumped up from his chair, threw back his head, and said with excited mock-admiration, “Yes, he just relaxes his throat and it gurgles forth, it gurgles forth.” He was often in Madison in the years thereafter. I think he was friendly to me partly because his friend Herbert Quick,1 for some years a Madison resident, was my friend, friendly partly too perhaps because he was in his kindly way interested in younger men with literary urges — tho I, to be sure was no longer an adolescent. But I got into the bad habit of sending him my books — and he into the very generous and fine habit of sending me his (with inscription). Once [146]

William Ellery Leonard

he forgot and sent me the same book twice — but I gave the second copy to The Arden House, Centre of students in English, where it is among their American treasures. He has lectured at the University several times, always charming and holding the audience by his humor, funds of vivid reminiscence, narrative grace, easy delivery and musical voice, by his own unaffected pleasure in pleasing and I may add, by his handsome figure and set-up, growing more distinguished with the years — till now, I guess, he is with Markham what Bryant and Whitman were of old. (I hope he’s getting photographed.) I had the privilege some years ago of presenting his name for an honorary degree before the faculty of the University of Wisconsin: I made a nifty little speech which brought results. It was through him, I’ve conjectured, that I was proposed for membership (after the publication of Two Lives) in the American Academy. There’s one memory that goes back to the earlier Madison visits that he may not thank me for recording. He had written a play, Miller of Boscobel (and he was much intrigued by the soft syllables of this river town, birthplace of a governor too — tho’ he didn’t know that then). Arrangements had been made for a premiere in Madison. Or rather not been made: the publicity had been bungled and advance sales were meager. He wrote me in distress, and the company — distinguished actors among them — were on the ground, with Garland, a little ahead of time to insure a successful evening. At the last minute I myself distributed some tickets among the fraternity houses. A few distinguished guests were to occupy boxes. But late that afternoon there set in a fierce blizzard and not even a snow-plough could scarcely make its way to the theatre. The play was about the love-affair of a young labor leader and the daughter of the factory owner, both from Boscobel and sweet on each other as schoolmates. There was a strike and an explosion, and the solution was the return of Miller the agitator and the girl back to Bos-co-bel. Garland, as far as I know, has never referred to the play or its performance in his autobiographical writings. But I say every eminent man of letters is entitled to at least one fiasco. And Garland might be thankful for his and let the world in on it. Shortly after the war a public letter of mine on reconstruction of intelligence had, if I recall, something in it that seemed to align him with my group (I’ve forgotten just what); but he didn’t like it a bit and said so in a letter to the press.2 But his kindly character got the better of his 100% Americanism and he wrote a mutual friend here, quite troubled lest he had wounded me. I imagine he thinks today more or less as I do about the war [ 1 47 ]

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and America’s part in it. Tho maybe not. We have gone down different roads since our youth — both Main Travelled Roads: I began as a 100%’er and a believer in the ultimate wisdom of white collars and top-hats and have become what Garland once called me in sport “a besotted democrat” and perhaps something worse. Garland started in bare feet and seems to have ended at the feasts of the aristocrats and plutocrats, himself on occasion in top-hat and for all I know in spats. Yet we meet as warm-hearted human beings and as lovers of good books and as students of man’s struggle for higher values of the inner life. Garland has grown richer in soul and mellower — and my only real fear is that he’ll grow garrulous: for old age may be dangerous when one has lived and seen and known so much and is so long practiced with voice and pen. Sincerely, William Ellery Leonard Notes 1. Novelist Herbert Quick (1861–1921) published a trilogy set on the Iowa prairie: Vandemark’s Folly (1922), The Hawkeye (1923), The Invisible Woman (1924). 2. Leonard had sent Garland a circular calling for intellectuals to unite and stand against war and jingoism. See Garland, “Intellectuals’ Appeal,” New York Times, 28 June 1919, 8; and Leonard, “An Intellectual Misunderstanding,” New York Times, 5 July 1919, 16. William Ellery Leonard to Eldon Hill, 18 March 1935, typed transcript, Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

[ 1 48 ]

[Journal Comments on Garland in 1936] Eldon Hill

X In July 1936 Eldon Hill, accompanied by his wife, Mary, arrived in Hollywood for a month-long visit with Garland, and during his visit he examined Garland’s extensive correspondence and conducted several interviews, all with the aim of gathering material for his dissertation. While Garland was initially pleased with the attention, he soon became weary of Hill’s questions. “I began to feel the burden of Hills observation,” he confided to his diary on 18 July 1936. “He is so ceaselessly alert to catch something important falling from my lips that I dislike his eagerness.” Worn out by the Hills’ visit, Garland complained the next day, “He eyed me so closely and asked so many questions that I grew restless under it. It bored me. The longer he stayed, the harder it was to talk with him. I felt that I was being perpetually interviewed, and worst of all I lost confidence in the little man. I doubt if he ever does anything worth while with the material” (qtd. in Keith Newlin, Hamlin Garland, A Life, 385).

Hollywood California, 16 July 1936 We are visiting the Hamlin Garlands. After having heard many times of what a rare hostess Mrs. Garland is, we are now enjoying it. She is a most gracious lady, thoughtful of her guests’ happiness without ceasing. Mr. Garland too is generous and considerate beyond measure. Especially is he absorbed in kindly acts towards his wife who is suffering from paralysis agitans. She is his main concern at all times. As she is compelled to spend much of her time in her room, he saw to it that this was built with an eye to her utmost comfort and convenience. It is a charming and restful room. Mrs. Garland is particularly pleased at what he calls an “accidental beauty” in this room. The metal trellis surrounding the windows on the outside forms a perfect frame for a lovely picture on moonlit nights. The house as a whole is of surpassing attractiveness. Of Monterey architecture it fits admirably into its setting high in the hills of western Holly[149]

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wood. The exterior is white, with grass-green shutters at the windows. A portico runs from the second story rooms the entire length of the front side of the house. This is glass enclosed and framed with metal work in the form of a grape arbor. Our host was much pleased to show it to us. 17 July 1936 The “Son of the Middle Border” is feeling the blight of old age. “There isn’t much left for a man of 76,” he laments. “It is hard for a man of my age to realize that one of these fine mornings things will go on as they are and I won’t be here.” When I assured him that many persons live to be eighty or more, he demurred, “Yes, but they are the exception. I am living on ‘borrowed time.’” Our talk turned to religion. He said his mother and her people were Second [sic] Day Adventists and his Grandfather Garland a Methodist deacon. Hamlin Garland himself disclaimed any religion at all, a fact for which I tried to worm out the reason. “My Grandfather Garland who was with us a number of years during my boyhood (even going to Dakota with us) was a devout man. He frequently read the Bible to us and offered most eloquent prayers by our fireside. My mother read the Bible too & was religious in her quiet way.” Here Mr. G. spoke of his admiration for the King James version of the Scriptures. “It is incomparable,” he said. “I was for a time a regular attendant at Sunday School and Church. I went because the other young people were there and because I enjoyed singing in the choir. “Religion itself,” he averred, “never touched me. I listened to the preachers, but never took their words seriously as a way to truth. “When I got to Boston, I had access to the world’s literature much of which I had been unable to find in the West. I read all the great evolutionists — Darwin, Huxley, Herbert Spencer, Haeckel — with great eagerness. They opened for me a new world of thought.” “Before leaving for the East,” he interpolated, “I had discovered in 1881 a copy of Henry George’s Progress and Poverty.” Garland Study — 23 July 1936 It is not difficult to engage Hamlin Garland in a diatribe against the age. “We live in a shameless time of sheer animalism,” he said. “Modesty has [ 150]

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completely gone out of our life. Every issue of the papers is full of nudity. If someone wishes to advertise a variety of sweet corn, they picture a hill of it with a half-naked woman standing beside it. This spirit has entered into our literature and art. I have no patience with it, and I do not read it or study it. I have no time for the books of Faulkner, Caldwell, Sherwood Anderson, D. H. Lawrence, Aldous Huxley or any of that crowd. There is a ‘yellow streak’ in all their work. I am not a religious man and I do not object to pornography on puritanical grounds; I despise it as an evolutionist. We should have advanced beyond the morals of barnyard fowl.” 30 July 1936 Last night Mr. Garland read to us (Mary, Mrs. G., and me) from William Dean Howells’ Experiences and Impressions, “Tribulations of a Cheerful Giver” and “The Closing of the Hotel.”1 The first is as good and as pertinent today as when written, while the second is somewhat “dated” by references to gas-lamps and such gadgets of the nineties, so that this piece finds its chief value as social history. Hamlin Garland is a masterful interpreter of literature; he brought out the subtle shades of meaning in the essay so that “e’en a child might understand.” And he read without glasses! Yesterday afternoon we visited the Henry E. Huntington Library in San Marino. Saw the Shakespeare folios, letters of Doctor Johnson and Charles Dickens, Ms. of Burns, Poe, and of Franklin’s autobiography, Kipling’s “Retrocession,” later called “The Recessional,” and many other literary and artistic treasures, chief of which were Blake’s water-color illustrations for Paradise Lost. The original of Joseph Severn’s painting of Shelley thrilled me deeply. What a pure, loving face! 4 August 1936 This afternoon a group of professors came to have coffee on Mr. Garland’s patio. In the party were Professors Cook[e] and Greever of U.S.C.; Professor Jack Crawford of Yale (teaching this summer at U.S.C.), Professor McKinley, of U.C.L.A. and Professor Thompson of Indiana University, a visiting teacher at the University of Southern California, L.A. Mr. Garland talked of literary composition. “Mary E. Wilkins thought her stories out before putting them on paper; so that the actual writing was a laborious process. Stephen Crane planned his stories out even to the commas and the quotation marks; then he would write them in a neat [ 151 ]

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copper-plate hand. I work otherwise; I think as I write, and then I revise and revise. This I actually enjoy; and as I grew older my sense of elation increased with my ripening judgment. “Some of my historical writings and essays I dictated; but my fiction and verse — those things requiring a greater deal of creativity — I have written in long-hand, sometimes dictating from this manuscript the second draft of the writing. I like the feel of a pen with a broad point, and I prefer black ink.” Turning to Professor Thompson, the Indiana man, Mr. Garland mentioned his visits to the Brown County studio of his artist friend, T. S. Steele. He praised Steele’s landscape paintings for their native-ness. H. G. mentioned a series of lectures (his, Lorado Taft’s, and Brown’s) which Stone & Kimball published in pamphlet form.2 These lectures lauded Steele, Forsyth and two other Indiana artists for their celebration of local scenes. Mr. Garland is very much broken up today over the departure for the East of Dr. John H. Bradley, his young friend and protégé, author of Parade of the Living, The Autobiography of Earth, and a forthcoming work, A Journey Through Time. For the past year or so, these two writers have been on terms of intimate friendship, a relation which is indeed much like that of father to son. H. G. predicts for Bradley (“the biggest mind on the Coast”) a great success as a writer. 5 August 1936 The author of Rose of Dutcher’s Coolly has become a detective story enthusiast. Every night he reads some thriller — Poison for One or The Mystery of Desert Moon Ranch, or “Murder After Dark” — as a nightcap. Edgar Wallace is just now a reigning favorite with him.3 “Dreiser, Faulkner and their crowd have driven me to it,” he said, partly in apology for his “weakness.” He reads a great amount of biography and other non-fiction, too. His contact with current fiction is scant. 1936 Mr. Garland is fond of walking, and it is his habit to stroll through beautiful Griffith Park, a city block from his Hollywood home. One day a few years ago he sat down on a bench to watch the people pass. Nearby was a vending machine in which was a mirror. Soon a lovely young woman stepped up to [ 15 2 ]

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it and made ready to use the mirror. Suddenly she turned to the kind-faced elderly man and asked him to hold her purse for a moment. Standing up when addressed by her, he readily consented. Picture then, a man rich in the highest literary honors which his country could bestow, a man of unmistakable celebrity, docilely burdened with the responsibility of holding a young woman’s purse while she powdered her nose! Verily that is a symbol of something significant in American life. Notes on Talks with Hamlin Garland, 1936 He spoke next of Thoreau, expressing his admiration for the great naturalist and his belief that Thoreau’s fame, which had been increasing, would continue to grow. “Thoreau’s outlook was cosmic,” he added. Emerson, he said, was great, but Garland objected to the sage’s religious prejudices. “After all, Emerson was a clergyman, and this fact affects all that he wrote. Thoreau, on the contrary, was almost entirely free from churchly influences.” At the luncheon table we spoke of the date of his birthday. I mentioned the fact that Who’s Who in America, and nine out of every ten encyclopedias give Mr. Garland’s birthdate as 16 September 1860, whereas the correct date is 14 September 1860. He admitted that he himself was guilty of giving the wrong information. Once when asked when he was born, he thought of the fact that his father’s birthday was the 14th of April, and his wife’s the 14th of October, and he could not believe that his own birthday was also on the 14th day of the month, so he replied that it must be the 16th. He said that he consulted the old family Bible and found that his actual birthday was September 14. One morning he said, “I would take you down to the Author’s Club, but I understand that Rupert Hughes is to preside, and I never go when he is in charge. He is the most foul-mouthed individual I ever heard, and I have nothing to do [with] him. He constantly tells dirty stories and I don’t intend to listen to him. It embarrasses me that Hughes praises me and my work in public, for I cannot return the compliment. I have told several of the other members of my disapproval of him, and I hope he hears about it. If Irvin Cobb were going to preside we would go down, but I can’t stand Hughes.4 After all it isn’t much of an author’s club — made up mostly of newspaper men or others who aren’t authors at all. “We go to all the movies that are worth attending. My favorite actor is [ 15 3]

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Spencer Tracy. He’s always good. We also like Gary Cooper very much. We went to see Mr. Deeds Goes to Town six or eight times. The Livingstone and Stanley picture was really a great one.5 I once talked with Stanley and I felt that the picture did not very accurately represent him physically, but the movie certainly caught the spirit of that great episode. “We go to the little newsreel theatre every Wednesday and every Saturday when the program changes. We never miss.” He spoke of this admiration for Robert Frost as a man. “I don’t think, however, that Frost is a great poet. None of these present day fellows like Frost and Robinson and Masters are poets in the sense that Whitman and Lanier were poets. Frost’s verse lacks music. ‘The Death of the Hired Man’ is a short story, interesting and significant in its way, but it is not a poem. ‘Out of the cradle endlessly rocking.’ None of our present day poets can write lines like that. None of them can write like Whitman or Joaquin Miller. Frost and Robinson are thinkers, but they are not singers.” He deplored the fact that his one good eye is beginning to weaken so that he can not read as constantly as he used to do. He makes no attempt to keep up with the current literary out-put, altho he does occasionally read a new book. He has high admiration for the work of Donald Culross Peattie and also for John Bradley, two young writers on scientific subjects. Peattie he ranks along with Burroughs and Thoreau and John Muir and he tries to keep up with the writings of this young author.6 He has read and reread Alexis Carrel’s Man the Unknown.7 Another new book which he found of interest recently is called The American Saga, written by a Mrs. [typescript ends] Notes 1. The correct title is Impressions and Experiences (1896). 2. Five Hoosier Painters: Being a Discussion of the Holiday Exhibit of the Indianapolis Group, in Chicago, by the Critical Triumvirate (Chicago: Central Art Association, 1894), a sixteen-page pamphlet; the third of the “triumvirate” is Charles Francis Browne. 3. Poison for One (1934), by John Rhode; The Desert Moon Mystery (1927), by Kay Cleaver Strahan; “Murder After Dark” (1934), by John Bruner. The prolific Edgar Wallace (1875–1932) wrote more than 175 novels. 4. Of Rupert Hughes (1872–1956), historian and novelist, Garland confided to his diary on 12 November 1919 after attending a book show in New York: “Rupert Hughes made a special plea for erotic literature, a speech which was coldly received. It was essentially base. . . . It left a bad taste in my mouth, for I have always thought well of Hughes, although

[ 15 4 ]

Eldon Hill I don’t like his books” (Hamlin Garland’s Diaries, 33). Irvin S. Cobb (1875–1944), journalist and author of local color stories set in Kentucky. 5. David Livingstone (Fitzpatrick Pictures, 1936), a fi lm about the famed African explorer Henry M. Stanley. 6. The son of the journalist Elia Peattie, Garland’s friend from his Chicago days, Donald Culross Peattie (1898–1964) was a naturalist whose works include An Almanac for Moderns (1935), Singing in the Wilderness (1935), and The Lives and Achievements of the Great Naturalists (1937), among many others. 7. Alexis Carrel (1873–1944) was a French surgeon and the winner of the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1912. The best seller Man, the Unknown (1935) explained to lay readers how science would improve human life and enable people to attain a higher spiritual level. Eldon Hill, Diary Notes of a Visit with Hamlin Garland in Hollywood in 1936 (holograph and typescript), Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

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[The Hamlin Garland Memorial, 1936] M. Lisle R eese

X Montana Lisle Reese (1910–?) was the South Dakota state director of the Federal Writers’ Project when he arrived in Hollywood to interview Garland for material for a pamphlet to commemorate the Garland homestead at Ordway. The dedication ceremony took place on 12 July 1936.

scholars concerned with, or interested in, American literature may find the Hamlin Garland Memorial of special interest. In 1936, the Aberdeen unit of the South Dakota FWP published a mimeographed pamphlet of that title as a favor to the Ordway Community Club and Brown County Commission. Luther Falk, who supervised the writers’ group in Aberdeen, also served as an occasional commentator for radio station KABR. As he reported his research into Hamlin Garland’s books about homesteading in that area, a movement had developed to recognize the author with a granite boulder and bronze plaque near Ordway. Garland did not attend the 1936 ceremony for which the project prepared the original edition of the Hamlin Garland Memorial. During the next few months, the project received requests for a more comprehensive publication to identify the settings of his noted Middle Border books and short stories. Falk and Aberdeen staff found considerable material, but they did not receive much enthusiasm from Garland, who lived in Hollywood. Wife Hepzi and I, joined by Harriet Dowdell, had planned a short vacation trip to California, so I carried the Garland address along just in case he would be willing to see me. When I called the Garland residence to ask if I could visit the author, I was told to come the next morning at ten. I found a place to park in a lane off De Mille Drive, found the gated entrance, and was welcomed by Garland in his library. In our discussion (he did most of the talking), he expressed some reservations about being [156]

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“memorialized” while he was very much alive. Seventy-seven, he said. He showed me a small flyer for a motion picture titled Hamlin Garland, Dean of American Letters.1 With the passing of William Dean Howells as “Dean of American Literature,” Garland obliquely suggested that he was now entitled to that role. He kept launching into long descriptions of his current experiments in spiritualism, and I had difficulty keeping him grounded. Finally, he asked me to come back the next day to pick up a letter that he would write for the new edition of Hamlin Garland Memorial. When I reached my car, a burly uniformed man halted me. “Is this your car?” he demanded. “Do you know you are parked in Cecil B. DeMille’s private entrance driveway?” When I started to get into the car, he stopped me again. “South Dakota, eh?” as he pointed to my car license. Then, more friendly, he continued, “I lived in Kimball until the drought drove me out.” When I told him that Garland was also from South Dakota, the guard nearly fainted. The next day Garland had his letter and a photograph ready. The letter became the Foreword in the 1939 American Guide Series edition of the Hamlin Garland Memorial.2 When I wrote the Preface for this new edition, the Washington office deleted all reference to the personal interview “as it might appear the trip was made at a government expense.” The information gleaned from the interview, however, appears on pages 32 and 33. Falk and the Aberdeen staff were denied credit for their writing, but I did manage to slip in his name as part of the Preface. Please note, too, that Lawrence K. Fox, state librarian, was the cooperating sponsor. The deckle-edged pages of the memorial were achieved by tearing twenty-fourpound mimeograph sheets. All the type was handset by the South Dakota Writers’ League print shop. Notes 1. In September 1936 independent fi lmmaker Guy D. Haselton made an eighteenminute, sixteen-millimeter silent fi lm of Garland, opening with a montage of stills showcasing Garland’s life and works and concluding with the elderly writer in action about his Hollywood home. 2. Reese means the 1938 first edition. In his letter Garland lauded the pamphlet as “the most authentic brief account of my career yet made. . . . Its dates are correct, its citations are exact and well chosen” (Foreword to an enlarged reprint of the pamphlet entitled Ham-

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garland in his own time lin Garland, Dakota Homesteader, compiled by Lora Crouch [Sioux Falls: Dakota Territory Centennial Commission, 1961], 9). From M. Lisle Reese, “The South Dakota Federal Writers’ Project: Memoirs of a State Director,” South Dakota History 23 (1993): 230–31.

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[Garland and Psychic Investigation, 1937] Isa bel Ga r l a nd Lor d

X In the last years of his life, Garland devoted much of his energy to psychic investigation. His final book, The Mystery of the Buried Crosses (1939), records his efforts to verify the survival of personality. Aided by the nonprofessional psychic Sophia Williams, Garland was directed by spirits to uncover buried crosses; these crosses, he believed, offered “proof” that spirits exist. In this excerpt from her memoir, Lord reveals the family’s concern that Garland was being deceived and their efforts to demonstrate that deceit. “Jon” is Mindret Lord, Isabel’s second husband.

that night, Father embarked on the psychic business. He was at this point, he admitted frankly, troubled in his mind, and he gave us the whole story from the beginning. In condensed form, it seemed that in 1904 a woman named Violet Parent, a resident of Southern California, claiming to have clairvoyant powers, announced that she had established communication with the founding California padres and that they had told her there were, lying buried in various natural spots in California, small crosses and other metal artifacts made by the early Indians and hidden by them for safekeeping. So convincing was her tale and the evidence she had to substantiate it that a large group of friends — and skeptics — formed into search parties, and under the direction of Mrs. Parent’s “voices” went out into the field and began digging up the crosses she had described. They also located various caches of money in widely separated places. Many of the crosses and artifacts were concealed in balls of hard dried mud that could only be opened with a hammer and often were deep under several feet of packed earth and rock that had plainly not been disturbed for many years. In 1932, Gregory Parent, the husband — Violet had died some time previously — came to Father with some of the crosses and his extraordinary tale and asked him to write it as proof of the spirit hypothesis. As a psychic investigator, Father was intrigued and spent much time mulling over the [159]

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story, the careful journals that reported all the circumstances of the finds, and the mysterious little objects themselves, but it wasn’t until Father himself happened on a medium who claimed that she, too, could tune in on the padres that he became actively involved. Father’s medium was, apparently, telling the truth. On various expeditions, with the small, faint “psychic voices” of the padres speaking in the car or out on the hillsides, giving detailed directions, Father himself dug up metal crosses and curious little artifacts that he was assured had been hidden there by the Indians many years before. Naturally, he became highly excited and, as he wrote us in the East, told himself that here might be the actual, physical proof of the survival of personality. The Parent story was fascinating, and Jon and I were enthralled with it. It was so full of “whys.” One could assume that the Parents made the crosses themselves and planted them in an area covering many hundreds of miles — their only transportation in those days was a horse and buggy — but why wait for them to be dug up by someone else many years later? Where did the caches of money come from? Mr. Parent was a thirty-dollar-amonth grocery clerk. What about the signed statements of witnesses attesting to the authenticity of the finds and the fact that before each mud ball was opened, the “voices” would give a detailed and accurate description of what it contained? And how to explain the mysterious, paper-doll-like photographs that reliable citizens maintain Violet took with her Brownie camera of a living room table covered with a sheet and set about with nothing but bits of greenery and rocks? Constance had told us of the advent of the new medium in Daddy’s life and the further interest that she provided. My sister had been on some of the expeditions and had herself unearthed a cross out of the solid earth at the base of an old tree. She was deeply impressed at first, she admitted, but gradually doubt crept in. Father had set up a sort of intercom system between his study and his bedroom, and while the medium sat in one room, Father addressed questions to the voices from another. Presumably, the medium could not hear the questions, but Connie inadvertently found out that by standing close to the door, everything said in the study was perfectly audible. By this time she was convinced that the medium was “having Daddy on,” as she expressed it, but there was still the matter of the crosses to be explained. Retelling the story that night to Jon and me, Daddy produced a half a [ 160]

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dozen or so of the artifacts, and I saw my husband examining them carefully. The questions he asked were shrewd and, from Father’s point of view, disturbing. And there was the great disappointment. Jon and I had been eager to be in on some of the sittings, and Jon had worked out a series of clever tests, but unfortunately, just two or three days before our arrival, the medium’s powers failed. No voices came through. She was ill, she claimed, weak and dizzy and unable to “project.” To Jon and me, it was all a bit too coincidental. There were, however, Father said, some previously indicated locations where there were still crosses to be discovered, and we set a date for an expedition. Over cocktails at Connie’s house the next afternoon — just the three of us — Jon expressed himself firmly. “Anyone could make those things,” he maintained. “I could — you could. All you need is the right alloy, an iron pan, a hot fire, a tray of sand, and a number of small figures or bas-reliefs. I have a hunch your medium has been taking advantage of Mr. Garland’s interest in the Parent story and has been manufacturing and planting a few crosses on her own. Or she could have pinched some of the Parent ones, though your father maintains she has never had access to them.” Connie was sitting up straight. “You mean that we — the three of us — could go to work and turn out an actual cross?” “As easy as cake. Lend me your kitchen some afternoon and I’ll prove it to you.” “We’ll try it this weekend.” A day or two later, we went out on a cross-hunting field trip. There is a round, picturesque mountain looming up out of the earth at Chatsworth, and it is quite a struggle to the top, but the “voices” had insisted that there were buried artifacts there, so up we went, Jon, Connie, and I. It was rough going and hot and exhausting — and a complete failure. With no psychic to direct us, we poked about aimlessly among the rocks and bushes, ate our picnic lunch, and were glad to give up. Connie told us a delightfully humorous story of being on one of these expeditions with Daddy and seeing him lose his footing and start sliding down a steep hillside. As he passed her in a cloud of dirt, rocks, and uprooted shrubbery, he grinned and called out cheerfully, “Some old gentlemen play golf!” The truth was that this had been an engrossing experience for Father. [ 161 ]

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Coming toward the close of his life, when the days had begun to seem long and empty, the Parent puzzle fired his imagination. He was talking less and less of the spiritualistic angle, so perhaps it was not quite the shock we anticipated when Connie went over to his study one afternoon with a completely authentic-looking cross on a pie tin. Jon had rubbed it with dirt and charcoal to darken it, and we had used tiny doll heads and the raised fruit and flower border of a piece of Italian pottery to make the designs. To almost any eye, it was interchangeable with the Parent finds. Connie had wanted us to go with her to confront Daddy, but I was reluctant and Jon refused flatly. “I’ve done enough damage already by making the damn thing. I don’t want to be around when the bubble bursts.” Connie, dauntless girl, went on her mission alone. When she came back, she was flushed and triumphant but curiously subdued at the same time. We were wild with excitement to hear her report. “What did he say? How did he act? Tell us everything that happened!” She had gone into his study and said, “Daddy, I want to show you something — ” and held out the tin with its contents. He glanced at it absently, then at her. “What is it?” She summoned all her courage and got it out. “Do you see this cross?” “Yes, certainly, but I don’t — ” “This . . . isn’t a Parent cross. We made it — Jon and Isabel and I.” “You made it?” “Yes. Jon got the alloy and we poured it into wet sand that we had already marked with the design. It’s as easy as — anything. Jon maintained that it was possible for anyone to make these things and now we — proved it.” “Then what happened?” I demanded. My sister shook her head. “I don’t know what I expected. All Father did was to pick up the cross and examine it minutely. Then he laid it back in the pan and brushed some sand off his hands. “In that case,” he said thoughtfully, “I guess I’ll just have to call it ‘The Mystery of the Buried Crosses’ and let it go at that.” From Isabel Garland Lord, A Summer to Be: A Memoir by the Daughter of Hamlin Garland, ed. Keith Newlin, foreword by Victoria Doyle-Jones (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2010), 374–78.

[ 162 ]

“Hamlin Garland, Active at 77, Enjoys Life in California Home” (1938) Floy d Loga n

X Floyd Logan (1904–1987) was a reporter for the Fort Wayne, Indiana, NewsSentinel and an avid fan who had an extensive correspondence with Garland during the last seven years of his life.

“leave the snowy, cold Midwest and visit us in green and glorious California” was the invitation Hamlin Garland sent as a suggestion for spending a five-day holiday with him this month in his Los Angeles home. The invitation would have been accepted just as quickly had the Dean of American Letters urged me to come to torrid Africa or the frozen North. Whatever the locale, the honor would have been the same. Obviously, undeniable though the pleasure of motoring and railroading may be, they do not offer the speed needed in order to spend a five-day week end in California and so the facilities of Transcontinental & Western Air, Inc., were used. TWA maintains its schedules remarkably well in the rugged West considering the terrain over which the swift ships fly, and the cantankerous weather conditions sometimes encountered over the deserts. The plane which took us to the West left Chicago Municipal Airport at 9:05 p.m. and was due in Los Angeles (Burbank Air Terminal) at 8:06 a.m. the following day. The ship arrived a matter of an hour late, but no complaints were heard inasmuch as most of the passengers were still a-twit about seeing the Grand Canyon sprawling its colorful and yawning depths under the rising sun. In less than half an hour, Mr. Garland’s car was buzzing me out to the Garland home on De Mille Drive in Laughlin Park, a semi-private por[163]

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tion of Hollywood in which also reside a number of personages known in “pictures.” My quarters in the Garland home were on the upper floor of the east wing; spacious, airy and with the dazzling California light streaming in on three sides. Luncheon was served shortly after I had made myself comfortable. Mr. and Mrs. Garland and their elder daughter, Mary Isabel, with her husband, Mindret Lord, were my hosts. Whirlwind Sightseeing Then followed three days of whirlwind sightseeing; a series of pleasant lunches and dinners; a great deal of entertaining conversation and much observation, on my part, of the life of the Garlands in California. Garland at 77, feels that he has withstood enough buffeting from the storms and cold of his native Mid-West and of the East; that he and Mrs. Garland deserve to spend their last years in the clean warmth of Southern California. “The Fortunate Exiles,” title of the fifth volume of Garland’s memoirs, expresses rather eloquently how he feels about it. “Just look at that sun!” he exclaims in almost pagan adoration of the gleaming beams as they slant down across his sloping hillside gardens. “Where else can you find such weather? — such perfection of foliage? . . . such air?” From these questions, to which he expects a fervent and sincere “Nowhere!” it can be gleaned that Garland is slightly that way about California. Work Schedule Maintained In robust health, despite his nearly 80 years, Garland rises early, makes his own coffee, and then works for three hours in his study which looks out to Mt. Hollywood on the north and west and the shimmering whiteness of Mt. San Antonio on the east. A walk with Mrs. Garland is a routine to which both adhere, stringently. At 10:30 he awaits the postman, who brings him news of his old cronies in Chicago, New York, London and the European continent — cronies from whom he is exiled by his residence on the Pacific Coast. A 20-minute nap after lunch is one of the liberties for which he will fight as quickly as the Yankee farmers assembled on Lexington green in 1775. The afternoon is [ 164 ]

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devoted to motoring about the purple hills, along the soothing sea or high in some hidden, delightful, lush upland valley. In the evening, like as not, if dinner is not being served in the Garlands’ own beamed dining room, they will be guests at the home of Constance Garland Harper, his younger daughter, whose great house is immediately next door. In Mrs. Harper’s drawing room hangs one of the incomparable Hoosier landscapes painted by the late master, T. C. Steele. Its Autumn colors are in direct contrast to the verdant lawns and garden surrounding the Harper home. Often Reads Aloud The Garland day often ends with his reading aloud from the works of some of his myriad of literary friends. Mrs. Garland may be the only auditor, but sometimes the fortunate circle includes both daughters and whoever happens to be a guest. Conversation in the Garland circles is not confined to purely literary or artistic subjects, although it turns on these axes more often than not. Mrs. Garland, a sister of the late great sculptor, Lorado Taft, was an artist in her own right; Mrs. Harper, who still works in her studio at the foot of the garden of her home, did the illustrations for some of her father’s works; while Mrs. Lord is “writing furiously” as she descriptively puts it, on “stuff for the radio and the movies.” Mr. Garland is not a “New Dealer.” At one time, he devoted several weeks each year to lecturing. The tours kept him away from home; he found himself tiring, and so, following a three weeks engagement in Hawaii, some four years ago, he has made no long trips. He enjoyed “getting at it again” when, a few weeks ago, the pupils at Jefferson High School in Los Angeles, asked the old master to spin them a few yarns. They rushed him after the lecture, snapping him with candid cameras and shouting for autographs — “I know how a movie star feels now,” he observed. Home Set among Trees The Garland home, Monterey Colonial in design, is situated on a hillside. Olive, eucalyptus, pepper and other of the exotic (to midwestern eyes) trees which flourish in California surround its stuccoed walls and wave their [ 165 ]

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branches over the tiled roof. Flowering vines, shrubs in profusion and the well-kept turf all add to the color symphony of the home. The Garlands live in a sort of simple luxury. A housekeeper looks after household details and doubles as driver on the long motor trips the author and his wife enjoy. Gardeners aid in keeping the lawn and gardens in order, but Garland usually mows the lawn himself and trims the trees. (“Hollywood as Seen by a Man Who Mows His Own Lawn” was one of his most humorous articles and was published a few years ago in a widely circulated weekly.)1 Mrs. Harper’s two children, John and little Connie, who is usually addressed as “Sister,” provide their grandparents with many golden moments. A picture of a man with whom at the present the Garlands are unhappy recently appeared in the Los Angeles Times. Mrs. Harper saw her young son, shears in hand attacking the paper. “Must you cut out that picture?” she asked. “No — I’m cutting out Napoleon’s picture,” answered the sturdy lad. His grandfather was impressed. “Well, now Connie,” said Garland speaking to his daughter, “that’s just fine — I’m glad to see John taking an interest in such a great character.” “Yes, Father — but this Napoleon is a dog!” Subject of Film A two-reel fi lm available for college and high school projection has been made of the author’s life and is said to be the first cine-biography ever produced. A showing of the fi lm was held, at which the two daughters and their guests swelled the audience. Mr. Garland appears in a number of costume changes and is twitted about it as the fi lm is shown by his offspring. “Yes — I suppose some of my old friends, when they see this picture, will say Garland definitely has gone Hollywood,” smiled the genial litterateur. At another point in the fi lm, he is shown preparing his own breakfast coffee. A cup of water is carefully measured, but is never seen to be used. “What did you do with that extra cup of water?” Mary Isabel inquires. “Gosh!” exclaims her parent with Will Rogers candor, “I wonder what did become of that!” Some of his publicity-loving contemporaries irk the novelist. [ 166]

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His Eccentricities “But Tarkington and Van Wyck Brooks, to name only two of the really good literary workmen of which we can boast in this country, have not found it necessary to drum up interest in themselves through some silly eccentricity,” he exclaimed. “Were I to appear in public with a ten-gallon hat, or wearing a purple coat and smoking a cigar 10 inches long, doubtless there would be a great furor as the people would crowd about me to peek and shout: ‘There’s Garland the writer!’ But because I go about my work calmly and behave like a good citizen, no one knows of my work. It will be up to posterity to decide between those of us who try to achieve a literary permanency and those who have written for effect, achieving their following through pandering to and dealing in questionable subjects.” The wholesomeness of the Garland philosophy is never more pronounced than when he is driving through the Los Angeles hills and high country, or beside the Pacific sands. He adores the purple, hazy hills; the luxuriant orange groves, green and hung with golden fruit; the washing of colorful mountain cliffs by the waters of the blue ocean; and the gleam of snow on far-off upland peaks. It was with much regret that the TWA Chicago-bound plane was boarded at the Burbank Terminal, leaving behind the lovely land in which the novelist has chosen to spend his last years. Flight Climaxes Visit The homeward flight over the Grand Canyon, the Painted Desert and the far, colorful and lonely reaches of the Western lands was in a sense a fixative climax to the pilgrimage to America’s Dean of Letters. It was good to reflect that the aged author is able to luxuriate in the balmy California climate after his trail-blazing years in the literary world — years in which he fought to establish himself as a representative American writer and to assert a new style in the best traditions of his fellow craftsmen. A homey touch was added on the return flight during the trip from Kansas City to Chicago because the plane carried Miss Marjorie Gallmeier as hostess. Miss Gallmeier, a Fort Wayne girl, who has been with TWA nearly a year, is typical of the attractive, capable, wholesome girls who make ev[ 167 ]

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ery effort to make flight pleasant and comfortable in their capacity as air hostesses. Note 1. In “The Fortunate Coast,” Saturday Evening Post, 5 April 1930, Garland described his impressions of Hollywood from “the standpoint of a citizen who waters his own lawn and drives his own car” (31). From Floyd Logan, “Hamlin Garland, Active at 77, Enjoys Life in California Home,” News-Sentinel [Fort Wayne, IN], 1938, clipping, Item 725, Hamlin Garland Papers, Collection no. 0200, Special Collections, USC Libraries, University of Southern California.

[ 168 ]

[Letter about a Visit with Garland in 1938] W. D. A ddison

X W. D. Addison (?–?) was the principal of the Osage, Iowa, high school.

2 december 1939 My dear Mr. Hill: I received your request for information concerning Hamlin Garland and am only too glad to cooperate with you in your worthy task. A few years ago when I first came to Osage, I naturally was interested in Hamlin Garland who spent his youth here. I began to read his works which depict the pioneer days of the middle border as well as the many other travels he has pursued. In looking around us to-day, one realizes that time has erased most of the characters of his book. Very few people are alive now who were here then. Unfortunately some of [the] things that are recalled are the oddities of the Garland family which would perhaps be best unsaid in a biography. Mrs. Garland was much beloved but her husband was more eccentric; the report is that he was stingy. When Hamlin Garland returned after a long absence as recalled in his book, A Son of the Middle Border, he didn’t recognize some former friends who took offense at the omission. It is of course understandable why a person might forget some people after a long absence. Others took offense at his reference to Osage and how small it looked to him when he returned. (I must confess that the first time I returned to my home town after much absence that it seemed a great deal smaller.) Mr. Garland remembered a Mrs. Hope Loomis when I saw him in Los Angeles who is still living here. Other persons who would know a great deal about the Garlands are Mrs. Wm. Markham of Osage, and Rev. John Gammond of Cresco, Iowa. Rev. Gammond is an ex–Methodist minister and a former classmate of Hamlin Garland and should be able to give you much information. [169]

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About a year and a half ago, while taking graduate work at the University of Southern California, I had the desire to meet Mr. Garland. I called him by the telephone and made an appointment. He was most gracious in receiving me and I was much impressed by his surroundings. I spent an hour with him. I am inserting here notes from my diary following the visit — July 17. Los Angeles. 1938. I called on Hamlin Garland at 2045 De Mille Dr at 5 p.m. I was received by Mrs. Garland who introduced me to their daughter and son-in-law. Mr. Garland and I were left alone on their front patio. He has a beautiful home overlooking a wooded ravine covered with ivy. One may see the mountains in the distance. It was an ideal setting for a writer. I know he must receive much inspiration. Mr. Garland was in a very reflective mood as I told him I was from Osage. His mind seemed to turn back to the memories of old. So many years have passed that I know it was with difficulty he recalled names and places. He recalled the many hard maples which had been planted and which I informed him had come to maturity and made Osage a town of beauty. He recalled his days in the Seminary and particularly Professor Bush.1 He expressed a wish that the old Seminary building be preserved and thought it would be fine if the upper floor could be restored as a chapel with pictures of such people as Professor Bush. He mentioned “batching” it and living in what we call the “Traveler’s Inn.” He thought of the Seminary and high school as at the edge of town. I assured him that the town had grown past these now. He showed me his studio on the second floor of his home. It has a beautiful view also. He has books by friends autographed. His original manuscripts were stacked on a table. He said “I have to put my house in order.” He told of his plans to dispose of the manuscripts to colleges and the Congressional Library. He served a refreshing drink of ginger ale. He urged me to return any day after four to have coffee with him and to bring my family.

Mr. Garland is a man of wonderful poise and sincerity. He shows the fine cultural background he has had through the years. He doesn’t have much sympathy for the type of writing that flourishes to-day. I was reminded distinctly of other writers I had pictured in my mind’s eye such as Emerson and Longfellow. The University had a fine exhibit of his work at the University Library [ 170]

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one week. I was interested in the many autographs and letters from celebrities which he had received. There is a bronze tablet on the Seminary in his memory and there has been talk of placing a marker on his farm which hasn’t been done as yet.2 Much recent interest has been created when a Future Teacher’s Club organized in our high school adopted the name of Hamlin Garland. This normal training club received a letter from Mr. Garland. We plan later in the year to have a public showing of a fi lm from the Extension Division of the University of Wisconsin on Hamlin Garland’s Holly wood home. I am enclosing a clipping from the local paper. I will also enclose a copy of the letter I received from Mr. Garland after my visit. The second floor of the Seminary is used as our high school commercial department and the first floor as our agriculture dept. The Campus Inn is still called that but is used as an inexpensive boarding house. Mr. Garland had a room at one time on the third floor. I am enclosing a map with the Garland farm marked. I am not sure but I believe the building is a different one. There is a country school building near by at which I believe Hamlin Garland attended school. Some one at Charles City tried to get it moved down there as a pioneer relic but they were unsuccessful in getting people in that neighborhood to release it. I trust I have helped you in a small way. Yours very sincerely, W. D. Addison High School Principal Osage, Iowa Notes 1. Baptist preacher Alva Bush (1830–1881) helped found the Cedar Valley Seminary in 1862. Garland remembered him in A Son of the Middle Border as “a friend, and an almost infallible guide” (197). 2. Garland’s boyhood home still stands outside of Osage, marked with a bronze plate set in stone. W. D. Addison to Eldon Hill, 2 December 1939, Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

[ 17 1 ]

[Garland’s Final Days in 1940] Isa bel Ga r l a nd Lor d

X In the concluding pages of her memoir, Garland’s elder daughter describes his final days, which show her father undiminished in his appreciation for life while also resigned to the inevitable. Indeed, in his final letter, written to Eldon Hill and left unmailed, he had noted about his own approaching death: “I am neither awed nor rebellious — I am curious, just as I used to be when crossing a range into an unknown valley. Each year lessens my regret at leaving the third dimension behind for my friends and relatives are now mainly in the unknown valley — and my work is less and less valuable to the public” (c. March 1940; Selected Letters, 434).

reading the last years of Daddy’s diaries is almost unbearably poignant. He was so brave, so gallant. The things he would not worry us with he set down honestly for himself: the acceptance of age and decay, the evernearer approach of “the dark river.” The philosopher in him recognized it all as reasonable and inevitable, but his still-youthful spirit struggled and rebelled. He who had battled so valiantly for so long in the thick of things found it hard to become “a tired, little old man puttering in a garden.” Always there was his concern for my mother. It must have been a shattering and terrible thing to sit by and see the woman who had shared all those years turn into a listless, almost helpless invalid, but Father did not shirk his responsibility. In front of Mother, as indeed before Connie and me, he dwelt cheerfully on the doings of the day and the plans for tomorrow. Maintaining it was to please Mother, he bought his yearly new car and this year gloried in the sleek blackness of a 1940 Pontiac. Often, when I arrived in the morning, I would find him out in the road with a chamois cloth, removing the last trace of dust from the glittering splendor. Both he and Mother still found their greatest relaxation in motoring, and Connie, Jon, and I drove them far and wide. A group of midwestern universities had written Father asking for a [172]

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“Hamlin Garland Exhibit” to be circulated among them, and Father asked my help in assembling it.1 It was an absorbing job. There were to be manuscripts, letters, longhand poems, family and personal photographs, with pictures of the various places that had had a part in his life: the Wisconsin birthplace, the Iowa homestead, the Seminary, the cabin on the Dakota plains, West Salem, Chicago, New York, Onteora, all the spots that had roots for this born and bred American. I sorted hundreds of old photographs. Here were the McClintocks, the glorious aunts and uncles of my father’s boyhood, appearing, even in the dim stiffness of old daguerreotypes, a handsome, swashbuckling crew. There was Isabelle McClintock Garland as a girl, plump, wide-eyed, romantic; and Richard Garland, a slim, eye-fi lling young adventurer; the majestic old patriarch, Hugh McClintock, with his blazing eyes; and Father’s two pretty sisters who had died at fifteen and twenty-one from cold and exposure on the sleet-sheathed Western prairies.2 There were countless pictures of Hamlin Garland himself, the first of a solemn, round-eyed, sturdy little boy of six or seven, to whom Christmas was only a candy stick or an orange tossed from a passing sleigh. He was strikingly good-looking as he moved into manhood, with a wide, intellectual forehead, luxuriant dark hair, and a mouth of great sweetness. Then came the young bearded professor, the highly successful author in the late nineteen hundreds who married Zulime Taft, my own beloved father, with a smooth chin again and the warm, round eyes that observed and recorded so much, and lastly the white-haired, distinguished personage, the Academician, still with the flashing, youthful smile that illuminated his whole face. For days I pored over these links to my past, knowing the story so well through the “Middle Border” books, remembering, matching. In the end, we put together a fascinating exhibit, and though Father insisted no young person would take an interest in it, the universities wrote that its appeal was instant and that they intended to keep it circulating. It is sad that in his later years Father was obsessed by the idea that he was forgotten, laid away on the shelf. It is true that the book sales grew smaller and smaller, but he had an assured place in American literature and is required reading in most of the high schools and colleges. Requests for reprint rights were constantly on his desk and lecture offers continued to [ 17 3]

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come in. Depressed as he was by growing old and the failure of his physical powers, Father recognized that he had much to be grateful for and expressed it one day to me. “Your mother and I are together, we have money enough, we have our daughters, who prove their love and loyalty every day, we have two beautiful, intelligent grandchildren with a good inheritance. I tell myself this time after time but . . .” He smiled wryly. “Where is the reputed ‘serenity of old age’?” There was a poem I used to read on the platform, one that had always had an enormous appeal for me. It was John Burroughs’s “Waiting” and it began, “Serene I fold my hands and wait. . . .” I quoted this to Father, and he laughed. “Do you know how old John Burroughs was when he wrote that? Thirty! It is easy to be serene and philosophical in a literary way at thirty. It is not quite so easy when you are nearing eighty.” There was no constraint between my father and me in those last years. The disappointment I had been to him was never mentioned. He seemed to take an almost equal satisfaction in his daughters and his son-in-law, of whom he wrote in his journal that he was “intelligent, gifted and most congenial.” From my present viewpoint, I wish that I had been of more comfort to my father, but on the other hand, what he really wanted from us was our youth, our enthusiasm, our victories. Feeling out of the race himself, it revitalized him to hear that Jon had sold a radio script, that I was to collaborate on the next one with him, that left out and neglected, as he thought himself, the torch was still being handed on. It is another of life’s ironies that Father never saw a published book of mine. When Uncle Tom Patten read some chapters of my first mystery and pronounced them good, 3 Father wrote in his diary, “I shall now treat Mary Isabel as an author,” but though I wrote and published six novels, the first one was accepted about six months after his death. Still, he knew it was coming and believed in me. He often said that it was only a matter of time. He was always keenly interested in the radio, and when Jon and I began writing scripts together, Father was frankly delighted. It was good to feel that we were beginning to justify his faith in us. Despite the looming menace of war — we had all heard Hitler screaming and ranting on the air one night and it was a moment to chill the soul — Father was a comparatively happy man that night he came up to our house [ 174 ]

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on the hill for dinner. The architect’s plans were tucked under his arm, and after dinner we had to go all over them again and approve everything.4 Again we protested. “Father, it’s too much!” “Nonsense.” The creative light was shining in his eyes, and it was evident that he was going to supervise every nail that went into the structure. We were all standing at the door, and Father flung one arm around my shoulders and the other around Jon’s. “Well, children,” he said exultantly, “it’s ‘full steam ahead!’” These were the last words I ever heard my father say. Notes 1. Here as elsewhere Isabel conflates chronology. The exhibit “Hamlin Garland and His Literary Friends” opened at the Doheny Library of the University of Southern California on 2 April 1936, lasted through the summer, and then went on tour to a number of public and university libraries as “The Makers of American Literature.” 2. Harriet Edith Garland (1858–1875) is buried in the City Cemetery in Osage, Iowa; Jessie Viola Garland Knapp (1869–1890) died shortly after her marriage and is buried in the Parkview Cemetery, Columbia, South Dakota. 3. Thomas Patten (1862–?), former postmaster for New York City, was a family friend. 4. Shortly before he died, Garland offered to build a house for Isabel and Mindret, in part to compensate for having taken over the house he built for them on De Mille Drive. From Isabel Garland Lord, A Summer to Be: A Memoir by the Daughter of Hamlin Garland, ed. Keith Newlin, foreword by Victoria Doyle-Jones (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2010), 401–3.

[ 17 5 ]

[Letters about the Death of Garland, 1940] Edga r Lee M a sters a nd Theodor e Dr eiser

X Garland met the poet Edgar Lee Masters (1868–1950) in 1919 and disliked his acerbic temperament, confiding to his diary that “he is a poet in feeling but a poet very nearly soured by adverse influences. He has no enthusiasms so far as I can discover, and his hatreds are many. He naturally sees the yellow streak in his neighbors and it is due, partly, to his practice as a lawyer but more to his temperament” (Hamlin Garland’s Diaries, 173). Garland first met Theodore Dreiser (1871–1945) in 1904, when Dreiser was recovering from depression after Doubleday, Page failed to promote Sister Carrie. Later he hosted a reception for him at the Cliff Dwellers and nominated him for membership in the National Institute of Arts and Letters in January 1913 but withdrew his nomination after learning of the risqué content of A Traveler at Forty. And when Garland refused to sign a protest against the suppression of The “Genius,” the two became enemies. .

Edgar Lee Masters to Theodore Dreiser, 5 March 1940 I see by the paper that Hamlin Garland, the cultured farmer, died in your city yesterday. He had what I call the Cinderella complex, that is sitting in the ashes he dreamed of a gilded coach, and by much striving got into the American Academy, and before that into the learned circles of Boston. The complex in question troubled Abe Linkern, who raised himself socially by marrying the daughter of a slave owning banker of Kentucky. Howells had a touch of this disease, too. When it affects literary expression it is very bad. One thing that you are to be praised for is that you have always been low, you have always loved low company, as Hawthorne and Emerson did and Whitman and before them as Goethe did. This passion conduces to honesty. . . . The cultured farmer did not like me. He got displeased with me when he was a literary scout for Collier’s Weekly, one of the best publications in America. He came to me to get me to write pieces for a year or so for that paper. He wanted me to write Spoon River stuff in prose. I explained to [176]

Edgar Lee Masters and Theodore Dreiser

him that I didn’t want to use my material that way. He couldn’t understand why I would resist the lure of the money that was commandable for this work. Then his dislike took on a moral phase. He didn’t like my divorce, so that at last he wouldn’t speak to me. If I had cultivated him he would have given me honors; for he had much to do with the American Academy. You can easily see that I was foolish to let him get away from me. Now he is gone for good. I hope to hear from you in terms of grief. Theodore Dreiser to Edgar Lee Masters, 7 March 1940 Just as I had laid aside your Emerson book1 your letter concerning Garland arrived. What a meaningless person! He was so socially correct and cautious. I met him several times, dined at his home in Chicago and each time came away with a feeling of futility — wasted minutes or hours. He was careful of his words — almost fearful of what he might say or think. And in this great tumultuous world! Once he recited to me the “dreadful” social goings on of a group of people in Eau Claire[,] Wisconsin and when I said why don’t you make a book of that he said “Oh, no. That wouldn’t do for me. It seems to me something that should interest you.” (!) I think I said, “yes, it would.” Certainly I thought so. Note 1. The Living Thoughts of Emerson (1940). Edgar Lee Masters to Theodore Dreiser, 5 March 1940; Theodore Dreiser to Edgar Lee Masters, 7 March 1940; in Letters of Theodore Dreiser: A Selection, ed. Robert H. Elias (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1959), 3:872–74.

[ 17 7 ]

“Hamlin Garland as I Knew Him” (1940) Ba iley Mill a r d

X Journalist Bailey Millard (1859–1941) served as editor of a number of San Francisco newspapers. He was editor of Cosmopolitan from 1905 to 1907 and of Munsey’s from 1913 to 1914. From 1924 to his death he was a columnist for the Los Angeles Times.

full of years and honors, Hamlin Garland, often referred to as the dean of American letters, has gone to his eternal rest. It is strange for one who knew him so long as a strong, high-spirited and essentially alive man to be writing of him in the past tense; but so it must be. Although I had made his reading acquaintance in 1891, when his first book, “Main-Travelled Roads,” made its appearance, I did not meet him until 1904 while I was editing a New York magazine for which I solicited his aid as a contributor. That initial volume of his, a collection of poignantly realistic short stories of Middle Western life in the raw, created something of a sensation and at once made him a literary celebrity. The book came as a shock to people accustomed only to idyllic interpretations of rural life in this country. It was written in a spirit of resentment against the conditions faced by the farmer forced to live in a rough cabin, to work long, hard and unprofitably in the field, as the author worked in his early years, and in the end to have little or nothing to show for a lifetime of labor. It was in young Garland’s pages that American readers obtained a true picture of what pioneering on the prairies at Wisconsin and Dakota meant in those days, and that picture was a haunting one in which was seen incipient rebellion. “And yet through it all,” as he afterward told me, “I loved the prairie country and I felt the lure of the land in Dakota, where people lived in sod huts to gain possession of homesteads swept by fierce blizzards in winter and by tornadoes and intolerable heat waves in summer.” [178]

Bailey Millard

When called east by the publishers, he set up literary shop in Boston, where the product of his pen was in lively demand. In New York I became well acquainted with him, meeting him often at the old Hoff man Cafe, the hangout of the literati of Manhattan. At that time he was a robust, radiant man of medium height, with piercingly bright eyes and with a noble head, touched by the first frost. Garland owed something of his early fame to William Dean Howells and he was free to confess it, though he did not fancy Eugene Field’s printed assertion that “Howells is responsible for Garland. Having created him, it is his duty to protect him.” Once Garland told me about his meetings with Joaquin Miller in World Fair days in Chicago. He said that the California poet had broken upon the Windy City in a long overcoat all the buttons of which were gold nuggets. “I asked him,” said Garland in relating the story, “if he intended to go about town with those nuggets on his coat.” “‘Oh, yes,’ he replied. ‘Nobody will try to steal them. No one believes they are real.’” In 1896, during one of his visits to Europe with his wife, the former Zulime Taft of the Lorado Taft family, he met Kipling, Hardy, Barrie, Shaw, Zangwill and others.1 He told me of a dinner with Shaw, who, though a strict vegetarian, had his guests served with plenty of meat, while he ate only lettuce and nuts. It had struck me that Garland, who had a large acquaintance in Washington, would be just the man to write a series of articles about certain personalities there, but he declined. “It would involve me in politics,” he explained, “and I might lose some of the friends I have down there.” Coming to Los Angeles about 10 years ago, he at once fell in love with the city and settled down in Hollywood, where he built a spacious home and wrote several of his books, among them “Forty Years of Psychic Research,” regarded as one of the outstanding works on that esoteric subject. But while he studied what is called psychic phenomena, his interest in such matters was always purely academic. He never really became convinced of the validity of the claims made by even the most famous mediums. [ 17 9]

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Note 1. Garland and his family traveled to England in 1922, not 1896. From Bailey Millard, “Hamlin Garland as I Knew Him,” Los Angeles Times, 6 March 1940, A4.

[ 180]

“My Friend Hamlin Garland” (1940) Lee Mer i w ether

X Lee Meriwether (1862–1966) was a St. Louis attorney who in his early years wrote A Tramp’s Trip: How to See Europe on Fifty Cents a Day (1887), The Tramp at Home (1889), Afloat and Ashore on the Mediterranean (1892), and other books.

my acquaintance and friendship with Hamlin Garland began when we both were in our twenties. He lived then, as he did half a century later, on a road that was winding and quiet and shady — a retreat that seems far from the madding crowd, yet which was only around the corner from the hum and traffic and noise of a great city. He wanted to be among men, yet he liked the stillness and the beauty of a rustic lane, and he managed to find that unusual combination in the home of his youth, and later of his old age. I can see Hamlin Garland now as I saw him when I crossed the threshold of his quarters in that rustic lane just off one of Boston’s busy, noisy streets — grave, handsome youth with large eyes that seemed to search mine. Fame was not yet his, but I knew at that first meeting he was a man I would like and admire. Despite his youth he was very grave, very serious, for his had been a life of hard labor. It was that first hand knowledge of life’s stern realities which enabled him later to give the world those fine pictures of Americans at work. Our paths lay far apart, yet occasionally they crossed and then there were joyous meetings during which we “reminissed” until far in the night. I was fortunate that Fate took me to California in May, 1939. I had not seen my old friend for some years, so [I] lost no time in tracking him to his retreat — a charming house in a garden on top of one of the many high hills which rise in and around Los Angeles. I found my old friend mellowed by Time, the picture of Old Age at its best, kindly, courteous, his face framed above by a shock of hair that, while graying, was not yet wholly white. His eyes were as keen, as bright as they were when I first saw him in Boston fifty [181]

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years before — as handsome an old man as any artist ever imagined. When we arose from his dinner table we repaired to his library and there for a moment he was busy at his desk. Then he turned and handed me a book. “A slight token of our old friendship” he said. The book was a copy of one of his recent works, My Friendly Contemporaries. And on the fly leaf Hamlin had written these words: For my old friend Lee Meriwether of St. Louis, from the writer, Hamlin Garland of Wisconsin. Los Angeles, May 2, 1939.

Despite his age, far beyond seventy, Garland looked so well, so vigorous that evening of May 2, 1939, I fancied many more years of life lay ahead of him. But it was not to be. Before another year was added to the vast ocean of yesteryears Hamlin Garland passed on into Eternity. With his passing I lost a dear and valued friend, and the world lost one of Nature’s real noblemen. From Lee Meriwether, “My Friend Hamlin Garland,” Mark Twain Quarterly 4.1 (1940): 9, 20.

[ 182 ]

“A Little Story of a Friendship” (1940) Irv ing Bacheller

X Irving Bacheller (1859–1950) founded the Bacheller Newspaper Syndicate in 1884 and was responsible for drawing attention to Stephen Crane through the serialization of The Red Badge of Courage in 1894. In 1898 he became the Sunday editor of the New York World and later a full-time novelist with the publication of the best seller Eben Holden in 1900. From 1894 to 1896, Garland published at least fifteen stories through the Bacheller Syndicate, including “Old Mosinee Tom,” referred to below, on 1 November 1894.

it was in the late 80’s that I got my first look at Hamlin Garland — a stalwart, full bearded young man from the middle west. I was then the editor and manager of the first newspaper syndicate in the United States. If I remember rightly, he had written a short story entitled “Mosinee Tom” and I bought it from him. We liked each other and talked of our early days. They were much alike, although his had been spent in Wisconsin and on a prairie farm in Iowa, mine in the St. Lawrence valley. In the early nineties he came often to see me and I bought a number of his sketches of country life in the west. He told me a little story that amused me. It was about the first bananas he had ever seen. They were hanging in front of a little store on a prairie road. A number of young men were looking at them. One brave spirit bought a banana, shoving an end of it into his mouth and chewing thoughtfully as the others looked at him. In a moment one of the spectators asked: “Well, Bill, how does it taste?” Bill bit off the banana about half way down and took a minute to clear his mouth and give an honest opinion. Then he said: “The rind ain’t much but the peth is purty good.” His work was coming along in the best magazines, and people were talking about it. “Main-Travelled Roads” came out and Garland was soon a [183]

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famous man. He told me that he aimed to present the exact truth about the people he had known — their pleasures, their troubles and their motives. I sold my business and moved to Tarrytown, where I began my first literary enterprise of any importance. The task was interrupted by Mr. Joseph Pulitzer, who wanted me on the editorial staff of “The World.” I went there and loved the job. For a time I did not see Garland. I got a leave of absence and finished my book and never returned to newspaper work. The book was immediately in great demand and going out to the people by hundreds of thousands. I was amazed by its success. There were no sensational adventures in the story. It was a quiet chronicle of country life among the transplanted New Englanders in northern New York — sturdy, honest folk, many of whom had an engaging humor. Garland and I met again. He liked my book. He was one who loved the undistorted truth about things and he thought it was because the truth of the book was so easily and quickly recognized that it became popular. Garland was a realist like Howells. An intimate friendship between us had begun. It lasted forty years. He had married Zulime Taft — a beautiful girl — in 1899. His beard had come to the dead line when he met her. It may be true that the girls of her generation were largely responsible for the doom of whiskers. Hamlin and I were familiar with a time when the church and the theatre seemed to be in a kind of partnership. The aim of both was the improvement of the spirit of man. The theatre was no doubt the greater force among men and women. Who could ever forget the lessons in Irving’s “Bells,” in Booth’s “Macbeth,” in Salvini’s “Conrad and Othello”? Barrett, McCullough, Jefferson, Modjeska were doing a like type of thing. A great civilization had been built up, and it came to its climax in the eighties. One may question if our world had seen the like of it. Garland and I saw and felt much of its coming and all of its going. We were often together in New York, Riverside, Florida, and Chicago. We talked much of our literary plans. We took long tramps together. We hurled baseballs at each other, curving them as we had done in our youth. He was a jolly playmate. We saw the theatre going down the long slope of degeneration with flashes of brilliancy from Mansfield and Forbes-Robertson on the way. We saw literature descending to the realism of the gutter, the drunken dance hall and the houses of a new freedom and of ill fame. We fought against it with articles and speeches. People were enjoying the music, the dancing, [ 184 ]

Irving Bacheller

the gestures that provoked the lowest passion of the jungle. The sheik was invented — a beautiful creature with a powerful sex appeal, to engage the interest and sympathy of young women. I have seen many sheiks, but I am sure that nobody ever saw the like of this ideal of the stage. These were downward steps. Garland and I saw them with dismay. The theatre as a power for good was flickering out. Walter Hampden was trying to revive it but had to give it up. The church had ceased to be a fighting machine. Enfeebled by motor cars, I supposed it had problems of its own. We appealed to rich men with no result. Well, a time has come when we often read of young women dragged into thickets and murdered; when our homes are no longer safe, when, indeed, we sleep in the fear of bandits and when a murderer can be hired for five dollars. We are in trouble up to our necks. Garland was a great, good man. He might have been a distinguished poet. Much of his prose was of classic importance — notably “A Son of the Middle Border.” He knew America and especially its middle west as few have known it. There was in his work a note of authority. From Irving Bacheller, “A Little Story of a Friendship,” Mark Twain Quarterly 4.1 (1940): 14, 16.

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“Hamlin Garland: Delightful Host” (1940) Ca rroll Sibley

X (Edward) Carroll Sibley (1906–1949), assistant professor of commerce and finance at Washington University in St. Louis, was the associate editor of the Mark Twain Quarterly and the author of Barrie and His Contemporaries: Cameo Portraits of Ten Living Authors (1936) and, with Cyril Clemens, Uncle Dan, The Life Story of Dan Beard (1942), to which Garland contributed an introduction.

for many of us, life can never be quite the same again. Strong though they may be, and imperishable, the memory of Hamlin Garland’s personality and the legacy of his literary creations are at best only vivid shadows of the substance, which was the man himself. And that substance is something that can never be replaced in the lives of those who knew and loved him. Even now, several months after his passing, I find it difficult to accept the fact of his death. It was so sudden, so indescribably precipitous. Why, that very week he had consented to be the guest of honor and principal speaker at two literary dinners over which I was to preside. Vigorous and richly lustful for life to the very end, mind you. In another six months he would have rounded out three score years and twenty. And what years! Years every day of which began at five a.m., when he would customarily rise, dress, and spend a few moments in the garden before sitting down at his desk to write continually until almost noon. Years which were fi lled with a love of the soil, of books, of people, of life; and a love which was always reciprocated. During the last decade he had made his home in southern California, in a beautiful and spacious residence at 2045 De Mille Drive, Los Angeles. Well do I remember the pleasant hours we spent together in his library and on the terrace overlooking his garden. It was the kind of home you and I might dream of sometime owning — embodying every talent of the architect, the builder, and the interior decorator, whose combined resources can after all produce only a house — but endowed additionally with the warmth [186]

Carroll Sibley

and the glow of the “dean of American letters” himself, whose charm and hospitality made of it an apotheosis of all homes. Finding the essence of a man possessed of as many intellectual and spiritual facets as were Hamlin Garland’s is no easy task; but it is a chore that no honest biographer or portrait painter can ignore. Many accolades, endeavoring to capture the root of his strength, have been visited upon him, all of them superlative, and most of them appropriate. It is interesting to note too, that all his life, Garland seemed to inspire metaphorical descriptions of himself. “Apostolic” is one adjective that seems to have affi xed itself to him, and more than one artist has observed that he would have made an excellent model for a portrait of John, the beloved disciple. In my own case, I well recollect that the first time I met him I immediately thought of the resemblance he bore to both Nathaniel Hawthorne and Mark Twain. Certain it is there was a Jovian quality in his physical magnificence, which the quiet authority and restrained strength of his personality helped to make Olympic. It was this characteristic of Garland, almost uniquely so, that he could live simultaneously in the past, present, and future. This was clearly brought out one afternoon that we spent with Carrie Jacobs-Bond in her Hollywood garden.1 One minute the two of them would be reminiscing about their early years in Wisconsin, the state of their birth, (although it was years afterwards before the two of them met). Then, from the West Salem of 1860, Garland could promptly turn his mind to the present world of 1940, and to the days of the future when he could complete “The Fortunate Exile,” the autobiography on which he was working. Nor did his confidence ebb that this would be far from his last book. Even then, at an age twenty years past the age at which most men would like to retire, he was projecting several additional volumes in his own mind. But the idyllic flavor of Hamlin Garland’s life did not stop with his professional career. Destiny smiled on his marriage no less than on his “making many books,” and his life-long romance with Zulime Taft (sister of Lorado Taft, the noted sculptor), is something that the poets could write about. And it was always a source of satisfaction to the father that their two daughters, Mrs. Constance Harper and Mrs. Mary Lord, were able and anxious to help him in his work, both in an editing and an artistic capacity. As the chronicler of the “Middle Border,” of the great midwest, its soil, its people, and their problems, Garland has taken his place with the immortals of literature. He was at his best in recording the efforts of families (from [ 187 ]

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some of which he stemmed) to overcome privation and isolation and, by drudging toil, to transmute raw prairie into secure homesteads. Throughout his life, Garland was torn between his love of land and his devotion to letters. In his youth he had staked a claim in what is now North Dakota [sic], and in maturity returned intermittently to the soil, only to find that manual labor and the work of his pen did not go hand in hand. Thus it was that his masterpieces, though inspired by the prairie, were written in the great metropolitan centers — in Boston, Chicago, New York and Hollywood. During the years that I knew him best, from 1936 until his death, spiritualism had taken a strong hold on his imagination. The result of his interest was “The Mystery of the Buried Crosses,” a challenging narrative of psychic exploration. And who had started him on this line of investigation? An humble grocer’s boy!2 Simplicity was in fact the keynote of his life. I recall my last Christmas card from him, a letter written in his own hand, dated December 23, 1939. The honors that came to him by the score — honorary degrees, his elevation to the American Academy of Arts and Letters, his winning of the Pulitzer Prize in 1921, 3 and the tributes of the great learned societies to his genius might have engendered pomp in a lesser man, but in the case of Garland they served only to promote an ever increasing self-effacement. He stemmed from the soil, this titan of thought, Like a Jove of stout heart he waxed strong. With the might of his pen for the midlands he fought To the end of art’s glorious song.

Notes 1. Carrie Jacobs-Bond (1862–1946) was a singer, songwriter, and publisher of popular sheet music. 2. Gregory Parent had contacted Garland in 1932 to reveal his wife’s communications with spirits. 3. Garland received the 1922 Pulitzer Prize for Biography for A Daughter of the Middle Border, which had been published in November 1921. From Carroll Sibley, “Hamlin Garland: Delightful Host,” Mark Twain Quarterly 4.1 (1940): 3–4.

[ 188 ]

“Hamlin Garland” (1942) Booth Ta r k ington

X Booth Tarkington (1869–1946) received the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for The Magnificent Ambersons (1918) and Alice Adams (1921). Garland met Tarkington shortly after he read the manuscript of The Gentleman from Indiana (1899) for McClure’s Magazine and recommended its serial publication in the magazine. Garland describes the circumstances in Roadside Meetings, 392–93, 403–4.

a bit of autobiography, offered with apologies, may serve as a slight indication of the size and scope of Hamlin Garland’s kindness of heart. After college I’d been writing industriously for years but to no effect whatever except to produce an interminable drizzle of printed rejection slips; and then, one day, suddenly out of the seeming nowhere, came a letter from a stranger, though I’d heard much of him. A magazine editor had handed him a long manuscript of mine, and the letter began with four dumbfounding words that changed everything for me: “You are a novelist.” I couldn’t imagine anybody’s saying such a thing, and last of all could I have believed that an accredited novelist would ever say it; but after I came to know Hamlin Garland I found that nothing was more typical of him than his stopping work to write such a letter to a groping, unknown youth dismally mystified about himself and the art of writing. Hamlin Garland was as indefatigable for people unknown to him as he was for his acquaintances, and he was as warmly in the service of an acquaintance as most of us are in the cause of a close friend. It is impossible to think of Garland without thinking of his kindness, the greatness of heart that was in all of his work and in all of his life; and I believe that next one thinks of his integrity, his almost incorrigible intellectual probity. Moreover, his eye was ever as clear as his heart was kind and as his mind was honest, and this clarity is in all that he wrote; it is in his selection of words, the words that he used as author and the words that he heard from the mouths of his fictitious people. It’s a truism to say that he [189]

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was a realist. It would have been impossible for him to be anything else. To him realism didn’t mean either the “candid camera” or a detective’s dictaphone; he practised it as an art, and could write of the soil without using fertilizer for ink. Hamlin Garland was a middle-westerner who was at home in Boston, New York, Chicago, Louisiana, the Dakotas and anywhere in California. Born in Wisconsin, he lived all over the United States and was every good kind of American. He was an outdoor man and an indoor man; he was a hand on a Wisconsin farm and he was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He was a novelist, a biographer, a historian, a playwright and a serious investigator in psychic research. As a novelist he now may be known most generally, I suppose, because of A Son of the Middle Border, Rose of Dutcher’s Coolly and The Captain of the Gray Horse Troop, and I hope that as a biographer he will be remembered as the author of the life he wrote of General Grant, that touchingly true portrait of a great soldier. Yet it could not be more truly and sympathetically the picture of a human being than are the portraits of people in his novels and stories; all his days he was a friendly searcher for the truth about people, about life and about death. I think it’s possible that as a realistic novelist, as well as an inquiring human being, he sought the truth about death because he knew that without at least some inkling of it the truth about life could never be comprehended. The title of one of his books is significant of the time during which this quest was a preoccupation of his — Forty Years of Psychic Research. He was not a credulous man, not a wishful thinker; he was always a realist. After all those years his conclusion was that the “case for survival” had to be marked “not proven.” Then when he was well into his seventies, he came almost accidentally upon new evidence, and it was of the kind he’d long sought. The “case for survival” depends of course upon the exclusion from observed psychic phenomena of the possibility that these are produced by manifestation of clairvoyance projected by a living mind. That is, the dead person must prove himself to be dead by communicating to the living investigator a fact known to the dead only. I think it was in 1937 that Garland wrote to me of his new discoveries; he rather more than suspected that he was turning up the requisite type of evidence, not in a single instance but in quantity. Later I learned what great physical activity his new research required of him and how thoroughly and indomitably he pursued the [ 190]

Booth Tarkington

priceless bit of knowledge that was his objective. I think that for himself at least he at last obtained it, although in his published account he carefully avoided the air of triumphant statement. This account is called The Mystery of the Buried Crosses, and at the end of the book he wrote that he merely presented “the problems involved in the discovery of these barbaric buried amulets.” Then he added, “Unlike the true frontiersman, few of us who seek the borderlands of human life are able to overtake the forms which flee, or touch the hands which beckon.” The Mystery of the Buried Crosses is possibly one of the most important books ever written. A year ago, in ’Thirty-nine, he wrote of it to me, “I fear Duttons have given it up as a failure. I played fair with my readers. I quoted arguments from opposing experts and I left the verdict to my readers. This, probably, counts against its acceptance. . . . As Howells once said to me, ‘What have we old fellows to do but work?’ I keep well and (as my book witnesses) able to climb hills and wallow through cactus — but I am getting old — almost seventy-nine.” I doubt that until then he had often felt his age. He always seemed to be among the most living and imperishable of men. His body, happily, had always been as lively as his mind. True himself, he sought the truth in everything, sought it with unmitigated zeal, dug for it ardently, reached for it earnestly and yet never over-reached for it. When he found it he did not mourn over it, didn’t exult over it — he presented it. His interest in death was his interest in life. From Booth Tarkington, “Hamlin Garland,” in Commemorative Tributes of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1905–1941 (New York: American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1942), 399–402.

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[Letter about Garland and His Brother, 1950] A lice Field Ga r l a nd

X Alice Field Garland (1882–?) was the second wife of Franklin Garland. I have retained her idiosyncrasies in grammar and punctuation but have replaced her affinity for the dash with commas and periods.

Alice Field Garland to Eldon Hill, 11 May 1950 . . . I wish I could tell you something you have not already been told of Hamlin, the most outstanding thing I seen in him was his great love for his own. I think it would be hard to find two brothers so bound together with the bonds of love as these two men. And in some ways they are quite alike. They both detested all things common — all things coarse. They hated to see women smoke, drink, or swear. Slacks, shorts were most disgusting. They always spoke of girls wearing shorts as “diapers” to the amusement of my sister-in-law and myself. I suppose my husband wrote you of their child-hood and of the time they kept the house in New York. My husband was “Cook.” They entertained Eugene Field (who was my distant cousin), Stephen Crane and many others who later became famous. I think they were very happy. Hamlin was a different type to my husband. There was times when he was moody and unhappy — he didn’t talk of certain things that was close to his heart. It was hard to get him to say anything about “Alice” his boyhood sweetheart — and after he was gone we could never find out her last name. She was a bankers daughter and that is all we could find. He said very little about her to his wife, but I think he loved this girl very tenderly, and her death affected his life.1 There was another thing we tried to find out but failed — we found a copy of a letter he wrote one of the Howells, in which he said that he was getting his final business in shape — that he had his warning. Just what this warn[192]

Alice Field Garland

ing was no one knew — he did not tell his wife, but what ever it was it was quite correct for he only lived a short time after that — he seemed well — but he often spoke of passing on, and he said he was ready.2 The last time I saw him we were over there for lunch. After we had eaten he said we would go see the news reel. When it was over he told his Sec. to drive us to the Park (he could never drive) which she did. At a certain point he told her to stop. It was a most beautiful afternoon, the grass looked like green velvet, the birds were singing in the trees, flowers were everywhere. He looked over this scene like he was looking at a strange place he had never seen before, then he said “it’s very beautiful,” it looks like England. He sighed deeply and said drive home. When we got there it was rather late so we told him we would not go in, as there were lots of steps and we were rather tired [so] we thanked him. He said come again soon. As he went through the gate he looked back and waved us a salute. The breeze lifted his heavy white hair. I never saw him again [for] he had a stroke the next night. I remembered his upraised hand, his lovely smile — I wanted to keep that memory. My husband looked in on him once after he was stricken, but that is all. My husband was a different type. He was more McClintock, he was more like his Mother who laughed and sang her way through life. He didn’t write, but he built character [and] he was sent for when there was trouble. He talked to wayward children, he joined broken homes. While he never had money like H. he helped all who called on him regardless of creed or color. When I was a bride he told me to feed who ever came to the door. He gave freely of his talent for benefits. He had staged pageants and plays to help Churches of [all] kinds and the American Legion. He sang nicely and enjoyed singing — he was the most graceful dancer — he could entertain anyone anywhere, any length of time without the least effort. However he never seemed to care for praise or honor — he wanted it all on Hamlin — never in my life did I ever see the slightest sign of jealousy, for the homage that was paid his brother. Many times he supplied data, dates for Hamlin’s writings, but H. was always generous with gifts. He was born in West Salem on March 11th 1863. I don’t know just when he left there but I am sure he was quite young, as he disliked farming and as you no doubt know Father Garland worked his boys pretty hard. He lived a while in Boston, later he joined H. in N. York and took up Drama. He lived there for [ 193]

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many years. He grew rather tired of the stage, so he and Hamlin thought Okla (then T[erritory]) was a good place to invest money, so he went to Muskogee Okla just before Statehood. He was in Real Estate and Oil leases. I was a Nurse there, and going with a Doctor. One day he phoned me to go to a certain Hotel and take charge of a sick lady. I went. There I met my husband. I never went with the Doctor again, but we had a long courtship. We were married in Muskogee May 8th 1912. I was a Miss Field from KY and I am the only Southern woman in the Garland family. In 1919 we came to Hollywood. He was in the Movies a while but didn’t like it very well (he never took a drink in a Saloon in his life). In 1924 he read in the paper where they had found Oil in New Mexico so he said “let’s go.” We did and lived there until 34. We were fairly successful in N. Mex, and we were getting on in years. In meantime Hamlin had moved out here. We still had our home so we moved back. So the two boys were again united in the last of their lives, which they fully enjoyed. I don’t think my husband ever got over Hamlin’s death, but he tried to be cheerful. We visited his wife often, who was an invalid. When she went in 42, he took it very calmly. Notes 1. Alice Garland refers to the girl “Alice” in A Son of the Middle Border (241–43). 2. In a 16 January 1940 letter to Irving Bacheller, Garland described his appreciation of the poem “The Three Warnings,” by Hester Lynch Thrale, noting that “I have had my three sufficient warnings. I too possess gray hair, wrinkles, and stiffened knees. I too admit failing eye-sight and recognize several other superfluous warnings — so many indeed that Death can not take me by surprise” (Selected Letters, 428). Alice Field Garland to Eldon Hill, 11 May 1950, Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

[ 194 ]

From Dome of Many-Coloured Glass (1955) Post Wheeler a nd H a llie Er minie R i v es

X (George) Post Wheeler (1869–1956), former editor of the New York Press, became a career diplomat in 1906 and held posts in the U.S. embassies in Tokyo, St. Petersburg, Rome, Stockholm, London, and Rio de Janeiro. Garland first met Wheeler and his wife, the novelist Hallie Erminie Rives (1874– 1956), during his Chicago years and later at New York’s Lantern Club (also spelled Lanthorn), where writers read their work at weekly Saturday banquets. In 1923, during the Garlands’ second summer in England, Wheeler had invited them to attend the annual garden party at Buckingham Palace. In Back-Trailers, Garland notes, “I, too, began to consider clothes. I decided, however, that an old plainsman such as I was, could ill afford to buy or hire a long-tailed coat and silk hat even to see the King and Queen eat raspberries and Devonshire cream, and as my wife would not permit me to wear a sack suit and a soft hat, there was nothing for me to do but to gain a place at the gate and see them sweep grandly in” (314). Ironically, in 1899 Garland had astonished his friends by purchasing a formal coat and hat during his first visit to England.

one incident connected with the garden party we regretted. Hamlin Garland, ever since the old days of the Sign o’ the Lanthorn Club, had been a close friend of Wheeler’s. He had come to London, with his wife and their two daughters, for a stay of some weeks and Wheeler had put the quartet on the list. With his near-white wide-brimmed Western sombrero, Hamlin was a striking figure. When Wheeler broke it to him that the affair demanded a top hat, he rebelled. He and Wheeler wore the same size and Wheeler had an extra one, but Garland’s objection went deep. He was a frontiersman, and a sombrero belonged to the border. The wearing of the badge of Eastern servility to fashion was to him disloyalty to his principles. To the chagrin of his wife and daughters, who went and enjoyed themselves, he remained adamant. In his later years we saw much of the Garlands in Hollywood, where they elected to live. He had spent much time studying the “talk-signs” of our [195]

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Indians on the Western plains, in which his nearest friend, the late Gaylord Beaman, was an adept. The stroke from which he died paralyzed his right side. He could not speak, but he was able in his last hours of consciousness to communicate his final wishes to his wife through Beaman in this sign language, many of whose signs could be made with one hand.1 Note 1. In a letter to Eldon Hill, Beaman described Garland’s fi nal hours after his cerebral hemorrhage: “The doctor came promptly; but he very shortly lost the ability to talk. He could, however, write quite legibly although his left side was paralyzed. When it became too difficult to write, he talked to me in Indian sign talk. I little thought that I would have to act as an interpreter” (5 March 1940, Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio).

From Post Wheeler and Hallie Erminie Rives, Dome of Many-Coloured Glass (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1955), 685.

[ 196]

[A Literary Tribute, 1960] August Der leth

X In August and September 1960, Lloyd Arvidson, the curator of the American Literature collection at the University of Southern California Library, placed an advertisement in the New York Times and other periodicals requesting “tributes and reminiscences on Hamlin Garland” for a memorial volume from “anyone influenced by his life or writings.” The prolific Wisconsin novelist August Derleth (1909–1971) was one of the first to respond. Derleth had first written to Garland on 27 April 1936 to request permission to include some of Garland’s poetry in Poetry Out of Wisconsin (1937) (see Selected Letters, 382–83). Later, in April 1938, Derleth outlined his ambitious plan for his Sac Prairie Saga, which would eventually comprise some twenty-three volumes of novels, short stories, and journals. Garland had cautioned him that “it does not do to lay out too big a program. Frank Norris never quite realized his dream” (Selected Letters, 404–5).

Sauk City, Wisconsin, 17 August 1960 It is a long time since Hamlin Garland and I corresponded — but less long since last I looked into A Son of the Middle Border. That, I think, is the book of Garland’s which had the greatest impact on me, living as I do less than a hundred miles as the crow flies from its setting, in part at least. I dedicated my novel Bright Journey to him; it was published before his death in 1940, I believe. As I remember it now — my letters from him are not at hand but in the Derleth Collection of the State Historical Society at Madison — we corresponded about my Sac Prairie Saga. I wrote him my plans for it, and though he felt I would tire of it before I had completed the work (I am still writing at it, 25 years later), he encouraged me to continue writing about my native milieu, seconding Zona Gale in this encouragement, which was so important to a writer like myself, isolated in provincial mid-America in the 1930’s with very few contacts — other than magazines and literary papers — with the world outside. I could not say that Garland was a major influence — he [197]

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did not rank with Emerson and Thoreau and Sherwood Anderson and Edgar Lee Masters — but I should say that I looked up to him as I did to Zona Gale, and I prized what he had to write in the way of advice, though even at that time I felt that in some ways he seemed to be a Puritan — not prim or prudish, no, but a trifle puritanical. I should like to think that many of us here in the Midwest who were writing in the late 1920’s and 1930’s looked to Garland with admiration; I know I did. I admired the Middle Border books very much, though there is little trace of Garland in my own writing, and for those of us who were writing here in Wisconsin, certainly, Garland and Gale occupied the literary stage. August Derleth, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 18–19.

[ 198 ]

[A Tribute from a McClure’s Apprentice, 1960] Wi t ter By nner

X Witter Bynner (1881–1968) began a career in journalism before publishing a number of volumes of poetry, as well as translations of Chinese poetry. In 1922 he moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico, where his home became a center for visiting artists and literary figures.

Santa Fe, New Mexico, 22 August 1960 Your letter about Hamlin Garland brings back to me quick warm flashes of my first years in New York after graduation from Harvard. In 1902, I went directly to S. S. McClure, beginning as a ten-dollar-a-week office-boy for both McClure’s Magazine and the McClure, Phillips Publishing Company. Since the “Boss” soon made me his secretary, poetry editor of the magazine, and general assistant editor, I met a great many figures then active in the literary world. Although Garland was only in his early forties, I at twenty-one was somewhat in awe of his years as well as of his distinction, and though I never came to know him well, regarded him the three or four times I met him as almost an elder like Mark Twain, for instance, whom I came to know well. Then, because of his territory, I had a feeling that he belonged to my “Boss,” S. S. McClure, and the Midwest group I came to know: George Ade, William Marion Reedy, John and George McCutcheon, and even the Southerner, O. Henry. My sense remains of a sturdy, impressive, quiet man who, with history in one pocket and fiction in another, was very modest about it and had a hearty smile and encouraging word for a publisher’s apprentice. Witter Bynner, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 16.

[199]

[A Tribute from Garland’s Macmillan Editor, 1960] H a rold S. L ath a m

X Harold S. Latham (1887–1969) was vice-president in charge of trade at Macmillan and became Garland’s editor, beginning with A Daughter of the Middle Border and continuing for the seven other books he published with the firm. He soon became a close friend and purchased a summer home near Grey Ledge in Onteora. Latham’s interest in Garland and more especially his faith that Garland’s wide acquaintance with literary celebrities would be of interest to readers are the principal reasons Garland produced his four volumes of literary memoirs.

Kearny (Arlington), New Jersey, 18 August 1960 I have many memories of Hamlin Garland, ranging from relaxing hours at his home in the Catskills to serious literary conferences about his work, either in his New York City study or in my Macmillan office. I remember, in particular, a moonlight stroll with him on the wooded trail that wound around the top of Onteora Mountain, the site of his summer home. It was a beautiful evening, and Garland would stop now and then as an opening in the trees brought into view the moonlit valley below, and exclaim over the beauties of the world and voice the satisfaction and inspiration he said he always received from his contemplation of nature. Garland, bundled up in heavy coat and muffler, for it was late autumn, silhouetted against the night sky, pointing with his cane at something far below us: that is a picture that is indelibly etched on my mind. And Garland concentrating on some literary problem, with that puzzled, quizzical expression we all knew so well, this, too, I remember with equal vividness. Sensitive to a high degree, easily hurt, overgenerous toward others, firm in his convictions, he was a man deeply admired and respected by the editors who worked with him; and these editors recognized, too, his moods of “up and down.” He was easily discouraged, and his publishing friends tried ever to stress the recognition which his work had aroused [200]

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throughout the world and to minimize those trivia in the fields of criticism which sometimes assumed undue proportions in his mind. How well I remember the day he received the Pulitzer Prize for A Daughter of the Middle Border. His delight in that was unconcealed, and yet there was a modest, almost boyish charm and excitement about it. And we at Macmillan’s were as happy as he was. It was ever a great satisfaction to me to know Hamlin Garland and to work with him: a most rewarding association. Harold S. Latham, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 12–13.

[ 2 01 ]

[On Garland and His Fans, 1960] Vilhja l mu r Stefa nsson

X Vilhjalmur Stefansson (1879–1962), an arctic explorer noted for his travels among the Inuit, began doing anthropological field work in Iceland and in 1906 became a member of the Anglo-American Polar Expedition. He made repeated expeditions to the Canadian and Alaskan arctic regions and published a number of accounts, including My Life With the Eskimo (1913), The Friendly Arctic (1921), and The Northward Course of Empire (1922).

Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, 23 August 1960 As background for my Hamlin Garland anecdote, I chose the Catskills neighborhood where the Garlands and the Lathams had their summer homes in the early 1920’s. He and I had the same publisher, the Macmillan Company, whose chief editor, Harold Latham, was one of his best friends, and mine. Spending a week-end with the Lathams, I remember particularly a luncheon where Zulime Garland was holding forth on Hamlin’s relation to his fan mail. According to her version of that afternoon, a crest of appreciative letters was around five a week. If there were more, Hamlin started complaining that readers of books they liked did not commonly realize that showering an author with letters would decrease both the quality and quantity of his future output, for it took time and was distracting to have to compose responsive replies to the kindliest eff usions. But, said Zulime, if Hamlin’s mail dropped below five complimentary letters a week, he began to worry that his popularity was correspondingly dropping. So she had a scheme. In times of appreciative flood, she would prevent his seeing a few of the best letters, especially ones with some such vague date as “Tuesday,” and feed these to Hamlin discreetly when gloom threatened to set in through a dearth of fan mail. You might also tell that Hamlin and I used to put on an act about being fellow Iowans, though neither of us was born there: he in Wisconsin [202]

Vilhjalmur Stefansson

and I in Manitoba. And, to hear us tell it, we were also fellow Dakotans, each having been there before his part of the Territory changed its name to South and mine to North Dakota. From Iowa, we had both “gone East” to Boston. However, that we saw so much of each other for some years was for other reasons. Zulime was a Taft, and Lorado Taft, sculptor, was among the best friends of my best friend, Carl Akeley, sculptor. Carl and I, with Joe (Herbert J.) Spinden, had what were for us very large rooms on Central Park West in New York, and we had a housekeeper.1 So the Garlands were in and out of our house; we less so with them, for in that period, at least, Hamlin was a steadier worker than most of the rest of us. Both in New York and the Catskills, we had many other friends in common. Among them was Frank Chapman, curator of birds at the American Museum of Natural History, on the staff of which Akeley, Spinden, and I also were. I remember vividly Frank’s laughter at lunch when Zulime was explaining to us that five-a-week was the ideal for Hamlin’s fan mail. Note 1. Carl Akeley (1864–1926) was a noted taxidermist who specialized in African mammals; Herbert Joseph Spinden (1879–1967) was an art historian who specialized in the Maya; Frank Chapman (1864–1945) was an ornithologist and noted writer of field guides to birds. Vilhjalmur Stefansson, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 9–10.

[ 2 03]

“Hamlin Garland and the University of Southern California” (1960) Ga r l a nd Gr eev er

X Garland Greever (1883–1967) was a professor in the English department at the University of Southern California and coauthor of The Century Handbook of Writing (1918) and The Century Vocabulary Builder (1922), among other titles.

Los Angeles, August 1960 When I joined the English department of this University, I already knew Hamlin Garland. At that time, he was spending his winters in Los Angeles and his summers in the East. After a few years, he made his permanent residence here. Epsilon Phi, the English honor society, was then bringing one or two noted writers to the campus each year for public lectures. I suggested Mr. Garland for such an occasion, and the arrangement was promptly made. Later, as program chairman for the Faculty Club, I asked him to address one of our noonday meetings. His pleasure in communing with the teachers of youth, and ours in listening to a distinguished author of impressive presence and forceful speech, led to his being invited back at intervals through the years. Also, the staff of the University Library, manifesting early interest, secured him for a number of public lectures, gave teas in his honor, and put on exhibitions of his books and manuscripts. Happily, to this day, his two daughters — Mrs. Isabel Garland Lord and Mrs. Constance Garland Doyle — can still represent him at University gatherings. In his relations with the University, Mr. Garland engaged in a variety of collateral activities. Among them was playing host in his home to both regular and visiting members of our English and history staffs. I drafted him annually for talks to my classes in creative writing and American lit[204]

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erature. For the latter, I selected a time when we were considering writers he had known firsthand — Whitman, Mark Twain, Bret Harte, Howells, Stephen Crane. As he spoke, the students saw these eminent but somewhat shadowy writers emerge out of books and become living figures. During his accounts of struggle and privations on the Middle Border, his vigorous personality made him appear a later embodiment of the indomitable pioneer. He often asked who among the students showed promise of creative achievement in writing. He asked that such students be brought to his home; he discussed with them the problems of authorship; he exhorted them to revise what they wrote and then revise again and again until they had captured the exact meaning, the precise emotional nuance. Nothing pleased him better than to confer face to face with talented and eager young writers. Aware that his literary papers and correspondence were of importance to scholarship, he broached with me the problem of their ultimate disposal. His first idea was to disperse them rather widely, but I emphasized the value to scholars of having them in one place, and expressed the fervent hope that this place would be the University of Southern California Library. Subsequent conferences were held with other members of the English faculty, especially Dr. John D. Cooke, and with the Library staff. After Mr. Garland’s death, at his express wish, the Garland Papers did come to the Library, where they became the core of our newly formed American Literature Collection and a rich resource for research, both for our own scholars and for Eastern and transatlantic scholars, who have made extended visits to the Library especially to study them. Mr. Garland’s relations to the University were always extremely cordial. It is pleasant to remember that in 1935 we awarded him the honorary degree of Doctor of Literature. He is therefore to be remembered not only as a benefactor, but as a Trojan. Garland Greever, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 20–21.

[ 2 05 ]

[On Garland’s Early Praise, 1960] K athleen Nor r is

X Kathleen Norris (1880–1966) was a prolific writer of sentimental novels, with more than eighty titles, and was married to the novelist Charles Norris, the brother of Frank Norris.

San Francisco, August 1960 The first letter of heartening encouragement and commendation I ever received from a “real live” writer came from Hamlin Garland with a comment on a story in the Atlantic in November, 1910. The story was called “What Happened to Judy.” It was my first published story; nobody had ever heard my name. I was stunned with ecstasy. There is no second ecstasy like that. He wrote three lines. “You have something precious. Dickens had it. Keep on.” At that time I was in a hospital with a baby who is one of San Francisco’s good doctors now. And in all the long years I have never seen the name of Hamlin Garland without the sort of thought that is a prayer. I met him only once, stammered out some incoherencies — was cut off by a waiter with canapés. But the gratitude, the love, and the prayers go on. Thanks for this chance to express them! Kathleen Norris, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 7–8.

[206]

“Like the Postman, Fame Rang His Doorbell Twice” (1960) Her m a nn H agedor n

X Hermann Hagedorn (1882–1964) was a biographer, poet, novelist, editor, and secretary of the Roosevelt Memorial Committee. He was an authority on Theodore Roosevelt, and his works include The Boy’s Life of Theodore Roosevelt (1918), Roosevelt in the Bad Lands (1921), The Americanism of Theodore Roosevelt (1923), and, as editor, The Works of Theodore Roosevelt (1923–1926). Garland first met Hagedorn in 1917 through the activities of the Vigilantes, “A Non-Partisan Organization of Authors, Artists and Others for Patriotic Purposes,” which contributed syndicated articles promoting the U.S. war effort.

Santa Barbara, California, 9 October 1960 When I first knew Hamlin Garland, he was in his middle fifties, in frail health, living precariously by lecturing. The fame of his Main-Travelled Roads and other early books, written in revolt against the sentimental idealization of farm life, had largely faded. Though he worked with us younger writers during the first World War, and worked effectively, we were inclined to look on him as an attractive and lovable but no longer significant has-been. He was entertaining when he and Theodore Roosevelt swapped stories of the Western frontier, but, to us, in our early thirties, only as a literary relic. Then, around 1917, something happened. Two things, in fact, happened. Garland fell into the hands of a brilliant New York physician, Dr. Turck; and Macmillan’s published A Son of the Middle Border. The Doctor put Hamlin through a vigorous and, I suspect, painful discipline that gave him twenty-five or more years of vigorous life; and A Son of the Middle Border received the accolade of the critics and became, overnight, a best seller. To what extent the book rode a wave of new interest in the American [207]

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past, or the book itself helped to create that interest, I have no way of knowing. But Garland’s realistic memories of his boyhood in Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa caught on. He was old enough to remember his father’s return from the Civil War and young enough to speak the language of the second decade of the following century. Everybody and his wife read the book, and before he knew it, Garland was wreathed in a new aura of fame, brighter and more permanent than the first. Being the person that he was — simple, unself-conscious, and unpretentious; honest to the bone, and warm in his relations with people — Hamlin carried his fame lightly. He continued lecturing — to larger audiences now — and brought out a second book, A Daughter of the Middle Border, his wife’s story this time. Now, in quick succession, followed other books of reminiscence, recalling the literary figures of the Eastern seaboard in the nineties and early nineteen-hundreds. He had kept a detailed journal for, God knows how long, and it proved a treasure-trove. By the middle nineteen-twenties, Garland was comfortably well off, and he moved to California and in 1930 built himself a charming Monterey-type house in Hollywood. A lifetime’s interest in psychic phenomena prompted him to write a volume or two of reminiscence on another frontier. I was living in Pasadena the year that he died. There was for him, happily, no period of gradual eclipse, painful to him, his family, and his friends. What I remember of those final months is the undiminished vigor of his mind and body, the robust heartiness of his welcome when I went to see him, his keen interest in life, and in all that was important to his friends, and the impression he gave, unconsciously, that he was going to be around for another decade, anyway. The news of his death when it came, with no warning, would not register at first. It seemed unbelievable that a man so definitely still standing in the fullness of life could thus go, between one day and the next. And, in this year, 1960, if he had lived, he would be a hundred! Even at that age, Hamlin Garland, I am persuaded, might still have the robust delight in life that, at eighty, he so obviously retained. His second fame, like his first, has faded; his name is no longer familiar to any large segment of the public. But A Son of the Middle Border goes on, perennially true, perennially interesting, because the vanished way of life that it records echoes the heart-beat of the American story. That way of life was harsh and stern in many of its aspects, but it made for reality in the people who lived it. [ 2 08 ]

Hermann Hagedorn

Readers loved the book and generations of other readers will, in turn, love it because that reality is in the story itself, as it was in that son of the Middle Border who wrote it so simply and so unforgettably. Hermann Hagedorn, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 13–15.

[ 2 09]

[A Tribute from the Editor of Rotarian, 1960] Lel a nd D. Case

X Leland D. Case (1900–1986) was a journalist and the editor of Rotarian Magazine from 1930 to 1950 and of Together Magazine from 1956 to 1963. He first met Garland in 1939 when he solicited an article for his magazine (“Let the Sunshine In,” Rotarian 55 (October 1939): 8–11). In 1939 he helped found the Friends of the Middle Border Museum in Mitchell, South Dakota, and then in 1944 Westerners International, an organization devoted to promoting the study of the American West.

Chicago, 10 October 1960 I first saw Hamlin Garland at the railroad station of Lamy, New Mexico, one fall day in 1939. His sturdy frame was buttoned in a black topcoat and his handsome face, with its generously shaped moustache, glowed under a dark slouch hat. We had had correspondence about an article for a magazine I was editing, and he had stopped off enroute from the East to California for a visit to our temporary adobe home on then dusty Camino del Monte Sol in Santa Fe. Rapport was immediate. Though we were of different generations, each had spent youthful years in Iowa and South Dakota, and we were quickly drawn together in the freemasonry of a mood only to be understood by those who have seen and felt and smelled freshly turned prairie sod. Out of our conversations that day came an idea for an organization to articulate and lift up the indigenous culture of the then depressed Upper Missouri Valley. It materialized as Friends of the Middle Border, seated at Mitchell, South Dakota, where it has a museum and has stimulated creative research. But from the ashes of a short-lived branch in Chicago sprang a movement possessing remarkable vitality. “The Westerners,” it is called. It consists of groups of business and professional men with unfeigned interest in Western lore and history. They are loosely linked, chiefly through the Western Foundation of the College [210]

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of the Pacific in Stockton. They flourish in a dozen American cities and in England, France, Germany, and Sweden. Hamlin Garland would be surprised — and pleased. For, as did few literary men before him, he recognized the texture and sensed the vitality of the West. So it is in the spirit of paying tribute where it is over-due that I am wishing that in front of all Westerners assembled, I could rise and nominate him as our Chief Grand Exalted Lobo! Leland D. Case, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 17–18.

[211]

[Garland as a Father, 1960] Consta nce Ga r l a nd Doy le

X Constance Garland Doyle (1907–1988), Garland’s second child, displayed artistic talent early and, with the publication of Trail-Makers of the Middle Border in 1926, contributed illustrations to his books, including The Westward March of American Settlement (1927), Prairie Song and Western Story (1928), BackTrailers from the Middle Border (1928), Roadside Meetings (1930), Companions on the Trail (1931), My Friendly Contemporaries (1932), Afternoon Neighbors (1934), and the enlarged reissue of Main-Travelled Roads (1930).

Van Nuys, California, October 1960 I know, of course, of the whole-hearted help and encouragement that my father gave to young writers and artists. But what I think is most notable is that it was given so ungrudgingly. There are not too many of us, I suspect, who do not secretly envy the achievements of others. My father seemed to be completely free of this envy. His admiration for ability and accomplishment was genuine and fearless. The help and encouragement he gave to us, his daughters, was given in the same free, enthusiastic spirit. I can hear his voice now, “Just keep at it, Daughtie. You’ll make out.” Or, “Of course, you can do it.” And, with a chuckle, “You should! After all, a great deal of time, trouble, AND expense has been put into you.” No venture we made into the arts was ever thoughtlessly dismissed. When I finished an unskilled but devoted piano performance of one of the MacDowell “Woodland Sketches,”1 his comment, “Do you know, I think it’s quite remarkable the way you get the feel of that,” was both heartening and rewarding. His was not simply fatuous praise. No one knew better than he the value of work, of training, of application. Nor was it the urging of a frustrated parent, bound that his child should succeed where he had failed. His was the quiet assurance that ability and work are an unbeatable team. A roaring subway is scarcely the ideal place to impart confidence to a frightened school girl. But Daddy did exactly that. My sister, thoroughly trained for the stage and lecture platform, had been accompanying him on [212]

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a series of “Middle Border” programs. However, on this occasion, she was unable to leave the “Cyrano” Company, and I was summoned from school to take her place.2 Daddy sat beside me, entirely calm, as I studied the program material while the grim station lights flashed past. At our destination, he arose and said cheerfully, “Here we are, daughter. Now it’s up to you.” Not once had he shown the slightest doubt of my ability, nor questioned my method of approach, and when we walked out into the vast, darkened auditorium, his quiet confidence was so reassuring that I had no difficulty in carrying out my part. At the end, when we bowed together, he whispered jubilantly, “We made it. We wowed ’em.” I cannot say truthfully that we walked in side by side to the interview with Mr. Latham at the Macmillan Company. Frankly, Father usually marched a bit ahead, propelled, I suspect, by his own enthusiastic anticipation. But when we emerged with a commission for me to illustrate TrailMakers of the Middle Border, I can say truthfully that he grasped me firmly by the arm and hustled me toward the bus, saying, “We’ll have to hump it, Daughtie. We have a job to do!” And so we did. Sitting together at the dining room table in the chill New York dawn, braced by his superb coffee, my sketches began to emerge. Any doubts I had were swept away by his gleeful, “You’re getting it! That’s the ticket. Just keep going!” The phrase “Just keep at it!” has brought me back to my easel many times when a difficult problem almost had me down. “You’ll make it!” These heartening words from one who knew the problems of creative effort have been invaluable to me, as well as to many others. Notes 1. Composer Edward MacDowell (1860–1908) was a close family friend. His Woodland Sketches (1896) was a popular composition. 2. Isabel had a small part in Walter Hampden’s production of Cyrano de Bergerac from November 1923 to June 1924. She had been accompanying Garland on a lecture tour entitled “Memories of the Middle Border.” Constance Garland Doyle, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 8–9.

[ 2 13]

[On Garland’s Later Years, 1960] Va n Wyck Brook s

X Van Wyck Brooks (1886–1963), critic and literary historian, published a number of influential books, including The Wine of the Puritans (1909) and America’s Coming of Age (1915), which developed the thesis that America’s Puritan past stifled its creativity. Garland began corresponding with Brooks after he read The Pilgrimage of Henry James (1925). He relayed his impressions of Mary Wilkins Freeman, Sarah Orne Jewett, and others, loaned his collection of Howells letters and essays while Brooks was composing The Flowering of New England (1936), the first of a five-volume series of the “history of the writer in America,” and turned to Brooks for advice about disposing of his papers.

Bridgewater, Connecticut, 8 September 1960 My association with Hamlin Garland dates from his later years, when he was living in or near New York, spending much of his time at Onteora in the Catskills in “a roomy old house on a mountain top.” I am quoting from one of his letters to me, inviting me to stay with him, which, unfortunately, I was unable to do. His apartment in uptown New York was occupied during his absence there by his old friend Henry Blake Fuller. I often saw Fuller, too, on visits from Chicago. He was a frequent contributor to The Freeman of which I was literary editor during those years. Fuller was a shy little man with a great gift, a persistent writer with a charming style, who was still at work at the time of his lonely death at seventy-two. In former days, he had subtly satirized his old friend Hamlin Garland as Abner Joyce in Under the Skylights. Abner Joyce, the author of This Weary World, in whose work “the soil spoke, the intimate humble ground,” was contrasted there with Adrian Bond, who stood for Fuller himself and who was all for “European atmosphere” and “historical perspective.” Those were the former days when Hamlin Garland was at his best, in the collection of stories called Main-Travelled Roads; and when I knew him he [214]

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felt he had gone beyond any illusions about his career. “Few are interested in me now, and nobody will be interested in me tomorrow.” But this must be an all but universal feeling that authors have in their old age. I was one of the three younger men whom he cherished as good writers, the others being Donald Culross Peattie and John Bradley, and I think he was mainly interested in me for my books about New England, the old home that his family had left for the West in 1848. He had a nostalgic feeling about New England and especially about those whom he called the “Concord group.” But he had found that the age of seventy-five brought “a keener interest in the ‘Fourth Dimension.’” He was involved in a story about some buried crosses in the desert, a theme that was “essentially a psychoarchaeological one.” It made use of clairvoyance and greatly amused him at a time when he needed distraction. He felt he was writing, as he said, “with increasing regard to the relationship of my words,” and he poured out year by year a stream of autobiographical books that had begun with his “Middle Border” series. Over that series he had worked with great care, revising for the sixth time the Middle Border book that he had published in 1917. These books were indispensable, historically speaking, and quite on a level with his early stories, “Up the Coolly,” “Among the Corn-Rows,” “A Branch Road,” and “Mrs. Ripley’s Trip,” in which he had delivered his “message of acrid accusation.” In those days he had been a friend and disciple of Henry George, encouraging at the same time Stephen Crane and reviewing Maggie. He had left a fine, permanent record of the farm life of the eighteen-eighties, and he had conveyed a feeling of the great beauty of the Dakota prairies and the Wisconsin coulees. He may perhaps have been disappointed in his old age at Hollywood, as virtually every veteran author is, but he was certainly a cheery, hearty patriarch who had no complaints whatever on the human level. In one of his last letters to me, he wrote I wish you could see our desert flowers this week — miles and miles of lupine, sand-verbenas, poppies and the like. Seas of purple and gold! When California sets out to do a thing, she does it on the grand scale.

He had followed many of his old neighbours from Iowa and Dakota who had moved on to the Far West, and, delighting in the scene there himself, he died, I believe, quite serenely. [ 2 15 ]

garland in his own time Van Wyck Brooks, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 4–5.

[ 2 16]

[A Tribute from the Editor of Bookman, 1960] John Fa r r a r

X John Chipman Farrar (1896–1974) was the editor of the Bookman from 1918 to 1926 and then founded Farrar and Rinehart in 1929 and Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 1946.

New York City, 1 November 1960 Memory is tricky, of course, and mine cannot be aided by early correspondence and fi les, for most of them are lost. As I do remember, however, I was first introduced to Hamlin Garland by that amazing woman, Mary Austin,1 or, perhaps, I just met him at a party. We soon became staunch friends. I realized quickly that he was actually an ally of the young realistic writers, unlike Booth Tarkington, for example, who tried to understand them but never did. The young writers, on the other hand, were suspicious of Hamlin. He was interested in too many worthy causes; he seemed ponderous to them. It has taken the years to show that he was one of the barrier-breakers. As was the case with Howells, the young of his time could not accept his hand with eagerness. The fact that I did does not lead me to boast, but only to be thankful for having had in him a warm and loyal friend. I have taken from The Bookman the few quotations which follow. I find myself saying in December, 1921, in reviewing A Daughter of the Middle Border Mr. Garland, it seems, was once a literary radical: more than that, some of his views of life would now be considered by some as far from conservative. Nice tags. Convenient to fasten thoughts loosely.2

In December, 1923, he wrote for the magazine a piece called “Pioneers and City Dwellers.”3 It was a confession after a sort of the feeling of guilt felt by the pioneer living in the city who was yet unwilling to go back to the farm. He wrote [217]

garland in his own time There are people, there must be people, who still love to farm, to milk cows, to pick fruit, and to dig potatoes — how else can we go on eating? — but such doings are not for me. I have had my share of all such activities. I am content to feed my goldfish and exercise my dog on the roof. I do not intend to play the hypocrite in this matter, urging the other fellow to go West as Horace Greeley did while enjoying Union Square and Broadway himself.

And later, in the same article Because pioneering was a lonely business in the past is no bar against its being a different process in the future. When need of altering the gregarious tendencies of youth is keen enough, all the resources of art, literature, and invention will be turned in the direction of making the farm attractive, just as these wonderworking forces are at play making the city the romantic, dangerous, and inspiring place which the sons and daughters of our pioneers have found it to be.

At a Boy Scout luncheon for Douglas Fairbanks in April, 1924, Mr. Garland and I were in attendance, with Dan Beard, John Finley, Norman Hapgood, Carl Van Doren, W. T. Hornaday, and many others.4 Mr. Garland was in a fine mood, impressed that Mr. Fairbanks quoted Herbert Spencer and that the crowds jamming the streets to hail the great movie star were so large that Mr. Garland, built somewhat like a fullback, had to shoulder his way through and enter by a side door. Later in the same year, having met him on Forty-Third Street, I find myself writing Mr. Garland is exactly our idea of what a literary man should look like. . . . If we were as sturdily made as he, we should wear our hair just as long. He is always dignified, interesting, and kindly — a most unusual combination. 5

I find myself chuckling over that last sentence. Ah, well! I was young. In December, 1925, I met him again in the Forties, and wrote of him There walked Hamlin Garland, white-haired and dignified. He is still much interested in the progress and development of the Town Hall Club. He is still a calm figure in the midst of hurrying Fifth Avenue or the bellowing of literary cliques.6

By November, 1926, I was making overwhelming use of my ebullient style to voice my great admiration and recommend his new novel TrailMakers of the Middle Border, in that unreserved fashion that so annoyed [ 2 18 ]

John Farrar

many of my contemporaries. I read my review with a blush now, but I have not changed my high opinion of Mr. Garland and his works. Mr. Garland is secondarily the novelist, and first the historian. His publishers are announcing his book as a novel. Certain it is that his former Middle Border stories were definitely autobiographical. In the new book, which is far and away better than the others, he proves himself one of the few realistic chroniclers of pioneer days who maintain verisimilitude and refrain from sentimentality. This story of New Englanders moving to the West, in its essence the story of a boy’s adventures, is fi lled with incident, humor, pathos, and romance. It should be read as widely as any of the books of Herbert Quick or Emerson Hough, and it has, of course, an artistry which neither of these robust authors displayed. Mr. Garland’s treatment of the Civil War is masterly. Here is a book of great importance to men and boys, and for their wives and sisters and mothers, too. Hamlin Garland can show aces to any of the youngsters of the day. It is a great book!7

Notes 1. The novelist Mary Austin (1868–1934) was the author of The Land of Little Rain (1903) and other works. 2. “A Radical of Other Days,” Bookman 54 (December 1921): 576. 3. Bookman 58 (December 1923): 369–72. 4. Douglas Fairbanks (1883–1939), swashbuckling actor; Dan Beard (1850–1941), illustrator; John Huston Finley (1863–1940), associate editor and then editor of the New York Times; Norman Hapgood (1868–1937), editor of Collier’s (1903–1912) and then Hearst’s International (1923–1925); Carl Van Doren (1885–1950), critic and biographer; William Temple Hornaday (1854–1937), zoologist and founder of the National Zoo in Washington, D.C. 5. “The Gossip Shop,” Bookman 62 (October 1925): 233. 6. “The Gossip Shop,” Bookman 62 (December 1925): 522. 7. “The Editor Recommends,” Bookman 64 (November 1926): 349–53. John Farrar, from Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library, ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962), 10–12.

[ 2 19]

From My Life in Publishing (1965) H a rold S. L ath a m

X Latham later expanded his earlier tribute as the first portrait in a gallery of reminiscences about his editorial career.

Hamlin Garland Hamlin Garland is first, perhaps because, as I look out of my New Jersey study window, I see green trees, a garden, and distant hills, and I am reminded of the Catskills and Onteora, where I spent several summers in close association with him. Hamlin Garland was striking in appearance, with a deliberate effort on his part — I always felt — to make himself look like Mark Twain. Nature contributed to this end by giving him features that resembled those of Samuel Clemens, and Garland assisted nature by the way he combed his hair and groomed his moustache. He made a fine appearance, looking every inch the way a distinguished author should look. Garland had several books published before he came to Macmillan and had had some moderate success with them. The first Macmillan book was A Son of the Middle Border which became his best known, partly, perhaps, because it won the Pulitzer Prize the year of its issue.1 This book and its successor, A Daughter of the Middle Border, together tell the story of Garland’s life and that of his father and mother in days of Spartan living on the farm in Iowa (“Ioway” H. G. always called it). The narrations describe the rugged sort of life that is a part of our growth as a nation. Garland caught its qualities: its warmth, its hardships, its satisfactions, its tragedies. The volumes, especially A Son, are considered important contributions to our national literature and are often found on school reading lists. Although Garland published a good many books after A Son of the Middle Border, he never again enjoyed the popularity that came with this work. This fact embittered him. He felt that some of his later writings were just as significant as their well-known predecessors, and he tended to resent the [220]

Harold S. Latham

indifference with which the younger critics treated him. Many a time he said to me sadly: “It’s a new and different crowd now running the show, and to these critics I have outlived my time.” I loved the old gentleman and spent many happy hours in his company. In particular, I remember one weekend in Onteora, a club community, two miles out of Tannersville, N.Y., in the heart of the Catskills. Here, on top of Onteora Mountain, at an elevation of 2,500 feet, the Garlands had a large rambling house painted red. It was October, and the view from the porch was breathtaking with its wild profusion of autumn colors in the valley below. In the evening we left the study where a log fire was burning in an enormous fireplace, to walk the trail around Onteora Mountain, a distance of some two or three miles. I hesitated to leave the comfort of that cozy room, but I have never been sorry that I did. One of the most vivid memories I have of Garland is this one of him as he led the way over the narrow trail, now through moonlit patches, now into dark, overgrown stretches, pausing from time to time to point out some spot of special interest or beauty in the valley below. The evening was clear and crisp. Garland was inspired by the glories of the night and talked of many things, from literature to local oddities. Bundled in a great coat and leaning on a six-foot staff he had fashioned for himself from a curiously shaped tree limb, he made an impressive figure silhouetted sharply against the moon. I fell so in love with Onteora on this brilliant Columbus Day that I decided, at Mr. Garland’s suggestion, to buy a home in the community. He sponsored me for membership in the club, and soon I had a cottage within a stone’s throw of his. Years of happy association followed. The charming Mrs. Garland, sister of Lorado Taft, the sculptor, and the two Garland daughters would informally drop in on my mother, and Hamlin was always showing up with a bit of manuscript or literary gossip. It was a delightful and rewarding period, the only cloud being Garland’s growing dissatisfaction with the recognition (or lack of it) which he was receiving. Somehow he felt betrayed. I think perhaps it was this disappointment that led him to concentrate on psychical research in which he had always been more or less interested. At an earlier date he had written at least one book in this field, Forty Years of Psychic Research, which had found wide acceptance. In later years he devoted more and more time to this study. His position was always that of the researcher. He wanted to find out all he could about the next world and [221]

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communication with its beings, but he never accepted what he discovered as final proof of anything. He remained a skeptic to the end, but a skeptic with an open mind. One of Garland’s more extensive and elaborate investigations into the spirit world is described in a full-length volume entitled The Mystery of the Buried Crosses. It tells of his experiences in trying to get at the truth of the origin and significance of a large number of metal crosses and other religious symbols that had been dug from the earth at the direction of “spirit voices.” According to the stories told Mr. Garland, a medium, now dead, had been subject to visions at night in which she was ordered by voices from some unknown source to go to indicated places and dig in the ground for the purpose of uncovering long-hidden religious relics. At first the medium resisted these dream instructions, but they became more and more insistent, and ultimately she gave in. The first trip was followed by many others. Over a period of years she had collected more than one thousand crosses varying in size and in metal composition. No two were exactly alike: some were plain, others elaborately decorated. They all looked as though they had been buried for centuries. This material was right up Garland’s street. He tackled its study eagerly and then made extensive investigations of his own. The story as he told it in his book is strangely fascinating and exciting. He employed a medium, and, under the spirit guidance that came through her, he went in search of crosses himself. And he found them, too, a dozen or more. The tale is a complicated one, introducing all sorts of proof of the authenticity of this and that. In spite of these corroborating data, the author offered no solution — unless one is willing to accept as genuine the voice appearances of Father Serra and others from the next world — and this Garland indicated he could not do. I know from talks with him that he was honestly puzzled. He could not believe and yet, as he put it, he couldn’t “not believe.” Hamlin Garland was, as I saw him, a remarkable man, a man of many facets. In his youth he had been a radical in his political and social thinking; he frequently struck out against the conventional; he hated pretense. But with the passing of time, some of his “wild ideas,” as he himself termed them, were tamed. “I am a conservative now,” he once said to me, “but with an un-conservative background — and I am sure that influences much of my thinking.” [222]

Harold S. Latham

Garland had a sly humor; he loved a good joke and liked to play one on his friends, too — as witness the time he induced unsuspecting me to pick a ripe olive from a tree in his California grove and eat it. Many’s the time I saw him chuckle over some harmless stunts he had pulled off at the expense of a friend. Garland was also a highly sensitive man. He could be — and often was — deeply hurt by criticism. Along with this, his later years were colored by that sense of bitterness to which I have referred. He would forget the great successes that had been his, successes greater than those which come to most authors, and worry about the fact that his later work did not have wide popularity. This brooding on the growing indifference of the public saddened his final years. I like to remember him as he was that brisk October night when we hit the Onteora trail — a rugged Son of the Middle Border as yet untroubled by problems of recognition and appreciation which were to cloud his later days and looking ahead to the future with confidence. Note 1. Latham misremembers: Garland received the Pulitzer for A Daughter of the Middle Border. From Harold S. Latham, “Hamlin Garland,” in My Life in Publishing, intro. Sterling North (New York: Dutton, 1965), 38–42.

[ 2 2 3]

From An Autobiography (1965) Va n Wyck Brook s

X Brooks later condensed his tribute to form one paragraph of his autobiography.

in those days visiting was possible still with servants and roomy old houses like Hamlin Garland’s house at Onteora, to which he also invited me, though I could not go there. I think he was mainly interested in me for my books about New England, the old home that his family had left for the West about 1848. He had a feeling of homesickness for New England. This hearty old “son of the Middle Border,” about which he had written his best books, said he had not read my Mark Twain, but he had been told it was “a brief for the suppressed obscenity” that was “a negligible side of Clemens’s genius.”1 Garland hated what he called “this age of nudity and jazz”2 and he found even in Thomas Hardy’s novels “a growing dependence upon fornication,” but, vigorous, cheerful and busy himself, he had lost interest in fiction and was more concerned now with the fourth dimension. He was living in Hollywood, writing about our continuing memory after death and about the strange crosses of which a clairvoyant had revealed the burial places in the desert. “I have gone beyond any illusions about my career,” he wrote. “Few are interested in me now and no one will be interested in me tomorrow.”3 But he was happy in Hollywood wither he had followed many of his old neighbors of the Middle Border, and he wrote, “I wish you could see our desert flowers this week — miles and miles of lupin, sand-verbena, poppies and the like. Seas of purple and gold! When California sets out to do a thing she does it on a grand scale.” Notes 1. See Garland to Brooks, 28 May [1925], Selected Letters, 323–24. 2. See Garland to Brooks, 27 December 1938, Selected Letters, 412–13. 3. See Garland to Brooks, 31 August 1939, Selected Letters, 421–22. From Van Wyck Brooks, An Autobiography (New York: Dutton, 1965), 500–501.

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From “A Memoir: Hamlin Garland” (1968) Floy d Loga n

X The following reminiscence was delivered as an address on the twenty-eighth anniversary of Garland’s death, 4 March 1968, at a meeting of the James Whitcomb Riley Memorial Association. Logan, who had retired as a journalist for the Fort Wayne, Indiana, News-Sentinel, was the field secretary for the association, an organization dedicated to raising funds for the Riley Children’s Hospital and to maintaining Riley’s home in Indianapolis, a National Historic Landmark.

garland was a superlative lecturer. He cultivated accents, inflections, idioms, timing, delivery, tones, pauses, rhythms of speech and such vocal nuances with the same loving care and aura of perfection as a dedicated rose grower exhibits for the blooms in his garden. He loved Mark Twain, and J. W. Riley; he had great admiration for Shaw, Kipling and Barrie. But he could “do” any of these, complete with gestures and facial mugging, so effectively as to make his mimicry sound like a recording of the original. It was all done in good taste, with wonderful humor and a kind of expressive joy wherein he showed how much, really, he derived from such friendships. But he was not a wit in the usual sense, for he did not like to be so devastating as to attempt to destroy or expose to public ridicule any of the mannerisms of his friends or otherwise exhibit them in a bad light. And I think he rather liked to be mistaken for Mark Twain. He was of heavier, more solid frame than Mr. Clemens. But he had the roached mane of hair, the mustache and he now and then wore white suits. I remember the first time I saw him, after years of schoolboy and college youth admiration of his work from my obscurity, that I was amazed at the size of his hands. Not for him were the long-fingered delicately veined hand of the dandy literary darling. His hands were solid fists. When he wrote, a pen or pencil seemed a thin, fragile sliver swallowed in the immensity of his grasp. Mr. Gross mentioned this “determined grip” in the editorial I quoted previously.1 [225]

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Even though he was far from heroic stature, he was notable in any crowd or in any group. His photographs show this characteristic. He had a direct and challenging look. He had not, at any time in his literary career, affected a bohemian or “arty” dress. Indeed, he dressed correctly whether for a formal dinner at the White House or in London with one or the other of his great contemporaries there, or for riding along a mountain trail or hiking through the desert. Like a Frank Lloyd Wright house, designed to fit into its scene and background, he always looked to be an authentic article in his surroundings. Garland was a complete family man. His love, friendship and affection for his wife, Zulime Taft Garland, are to be detected and observed in the eight volumes of his reminiscences, whether in the personal account as seen in the Middle Border books or in the less biographical narratives found in what he called his “Literary Log.” I would not want to say I envied his daughters, but I have looked with longing and wistful appreciation of the lives they had as they shared not only the literary associations of their father, but the gaiety and charm of the background of their mother, who had studied as an artist in this country and abroad. She had not been long home from Paris before she met Hamlin Garland. Their courtship was no whirlwind of hasty adolescence . . . he turned 40 before the wedding!2 . . . Both Garland daughters have been interested in my paper and both have responded to my invitation to prepare comment for me to include here in. Ecclesiastes, if he is looking over my shoulder, would agree, I think, that this is the “time for my purpose” in the use of their contributions. These comments, in themselves are touching. But I am particularly sensitive to what the daughters have written because I know they had that priceless relationship with both their parents: Of knowing them as friends, counselors and as individuals. These, as I see them, are intimate and privileged perspectives on a man, known in his time as the Dean of American Letters, who was their father. But they are also eloquent appraisals of a man they knew as a friend. Constance Garland Doyle, whom I have already identified as an artist, has this to say: In selecting, to write briefly, some memories of my father, two of his characteristics seem to me to be especially endearing and worthy of note. One was his

[ 2 2 6]

Floyd Logan enthusiasm. However somber his inner thoughts may have been, his outward joy of doing and living was a constant delight. The fact that the outer wall of our mountain house was removed to admit a view of the Catskills — long before the windows were available to shut out the mountain wind — still couldn’t chill his pleasure in the beauty he was about to frame. Again, when we were hunting buried crosses in the steep, dry, California hills and Father lost his footing and slid by me, clutching his Stetson hat, his comment was typical. With a chuckle he said, “well, Daughtie, Some old gentlemen Play Golf.” Perhaps some of the same gift was his capacity for encouragement. He was the most encouraging person I have ever known. I well remember when, on the roaring subway, where I was studying nervously to take the place of my skilled sister, (unable at this time to fi ll her usual role) beside him on the lecture platform, he fi xed me with a warm, intense gaze and said, “Of course you can do it, Daughtie. Of course you can.” Or when I sketched a proposed illustration for one of his books[,] his — “You know Daughter, I think it is remarkable what you can do. Go to it!” spurred me on. Of course this outgoing warmth did not apply only to me. Many were the writers and artists, young and old to whom his interest and thoughtful consideration were invaluable. My Auntie Marian (Mrs. Edward MacDowell) told me many times that she would never forget the encouragement which father gave her to go back to the piano and the concert stage, after the long, sad and shattering loss of her husband — a return which opened up for her, and many others, a new and dedicated life. To this day, when I am at my easel or drawing board, I can feel my father at my shoulder, and hear him say, in his inimitable way, “Go to it, Daughtie, You’ll make it — I know you can.”

Isabel Garland Lord had at first, as I have mentioned, thought she would be interested in the theatre as a career. (One of her uncles had been an actor and Garland himself enjoyed singing and attending good theatre.) But she soon abandoned the stage and has been a writer of charming and interesting narrative. Her letter, too, is revealing of the close association the daughters had with their father. She writes: “No one reads me anymore,” my father said to me sadly one afternoon in the later years of his life and even my “Remember you are required reading in the schools and colleges,” did not comfort him. A “best seller,” accepted as one of the first of the American realistic writers, it was hard to feel himself dated, passed by. Today, his daughters are delighted by the continuing interest in

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garland in his own time Hamlin Garland. Requests for reprints, editorial comment, biographies and references prove the enduring value of a conscientious craftsman. Father did not come easily by his trade. It was the result of high imagination, an historian’s eye, limitless reading and study and a mind that would not be satisfied with anything but the right word in the right place. “Polish — polish — ” he would caution me in the early years of my own endeavors. His Daughter of the Middle Border, which won the Pulitzer Prize, was completely rewritten four or more times. The simplest letter was the result of long, careful thought and his will, written in longhand, was so crossed out and amended that it was very nearly not admitted to probate. Yet the warmth, the observation, the basic spontaneity still shine through his clear, timeless prose. It is good to know that Hamlin Garland is holding his own.

The Garland daughters had advantages few among us here can equal. They were entertained in the homes of American and foreign literary greats. In salons and old-world drawing rooms, they met the great contemporaries of their parents. Sir James Barrie read to them; Shaw entertained them; Conan Doyle told them stories. British peers, Indian maharajahs and members of Parliament were their escorts. They were as much at home with John Burroughs, Irving Bacheller, Albert Bigelow Paine or William Dean Howells as with their Uncle Lorado Taft or any other member of the family. They were cosmopolites in the best sense. Indeed, Garland was pleased that his daughters were not a part of the “revolt” of the ’20s following World War I. I have mentioned earlier in this paper that he had himself been in the forefront of those who sought a more realistic touch in literature. But he was dismayed by suggestiveness, obscenity and crass vulgarism in writing. In his book Back-Trailers from the Middle Border he illustrates his position with vigor. He had gone to the Century Club. A discussion of “literary progressiveness” was going on between two of his friends. They were, he wrote, “advocates of the new times and the new forms. Their talk, while perfectly reasonable in some ways, left me weary and skeptical. They said, ‘It is the same sort of fight which you made in Crumbling Idols in 1894.’” “No,” I replied, “there was a difference. It is true I advocated new forms and new themes, but not the revival of old obscenities and vices and crimes. I ridiculed the soliloquy and the aside in the drama, but I argued for characteristic New World subjects — not the worn-out sexual themes of the past. The new literature you are talking about is concerned with the most hackneyed of all

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Floyd Logan themes, seduction, adultery, robbery and murder. I advocated a fiction which was representative of the decent average, not of the exceptionally bestial. My books are often drab and harsh, but they do not deal with perverts. . . . I was careful to predict that my fashion would grow old in its turn, giving place to other modes of rebellion, which would similarly die out along the sands of time. My chief criticism of the literature of rebellion lies against its failure to realize that its forms are not final but transitory — as transitory as those of the past.”

. . . While I was aware that Garland had still another side to his farranging nature: an interest in psychic phenomena, it was not until I visited him in California that I learned how intense his thinking in this field had become. I had read his novel about a medium Tyranny of the Dark and I knew he had conducted his own psychic investigations. I had a new camera on the California trip. It was of the 35 mm type which soon was to be identified as a “candid” camera. I explained to the old gentleman what a good lens it had, how much faster the film was than most contemporary cameras used and of the precision focusing it sported. His lively eyes took in everything. He stroked his moustache thoughtfully. Then he flung a good question at me: “Can you take a spook’s picture with that?” All the time I had been with him, I had tried to preserve an atmosphere of keeping quiet myself so that I could the better listen to him. But this was a question where speech was of no use to me. I did not have an answer. I had never tried to photograph a ghost. Garland was then busy with the manuscript of Forty Years of Psychic Research. What he would have liked for me to do was to be with him when he had a medium cornered who proposed to face him with an active spook and he wanted a photograph of the spirit, if any. I told him, rather dryly, as I look back at the conversation, that I doubted if an ectoplasmic substance would register on my fi lm; fast I knew it to be, but not quick enough to “stop” a spirit in transit. He looked disappointed. While the Forty Years had, I think, an honest validity of research into psychic phenomena, and still is being read, I had to hedge when I reviewed Mr. Garland’s last published book. (He had begun work on the manuscript of a fifth volume of the Literary Log, but died before it was finished.) From the incident of the possibility of photographing a spook and other references, I knew he was interested in a specific psychical problem. I could [ 2 2 9]

garland in his own time

not bring myself to say in a review that I felt Mr. Garland had fallen into association with people who sought to exploit themselves by reason of his stature in letters. The only real mystery in The Mystery of the Buried Crosses (which was his last published book) was why the people who led him to the supposedly ancient artifacts of a past California civilization could have had the callousness and cynicism sufficient to bring him into the fraud. His chief publishers tried to persuade him not to bring out the book. It was eventually published by another house. The side to Garland which made it possible for me to become (as he said) a “devoted young advocate,” was his deep interest in young writers and artists of whatever medium. His Literary Log emphasizes this trait. My letters from him reflect it. He was always looking for new talent. The various books of the memoir are full of references to young novelists, or poets, playwrights and even mention is made of those who wrote scenarios which he thought showed quality. He found it interesting, sometimes, to compare a note he had written in his diary about a “find” among new writers and then to review his judgment in the light of what had been produced by the subject a decade later; sometimes longer. Rarely did he need to revise his opinion. He had learned his craft the hard way. Literary pretentiousness or the exhibitionism of a dilettante rarely escaped his critical sense. Garland’s frankness was used as much on himself as on others. I have enjoyed his story of how he was able to finance a summer cottage of 12 rooms which stood on Onteora Mountain in the Catskills.3 Aside from his discovery he would be, at last, able to have a study for himself as well as a bedroom with a tremendous view of valley and mountain ranges, it provided room for his wife and daughters (who were then in their early 20s). It was at an elevation of about 3,000 feet. The whole family fled to it with joy when the hot sticky summers came to New York. This was, I must remind you, in the days before air conditioning. Electric fans weren’t any better for changing hot air to cool breezes in New York then than, say in Indianapolis. But it was cool, quiet and away from everything at Onteora. More will be said about this by another commentator later on in this paper.4 At any rate, Garland found himself moving into this cottage (which was a mansion compared to the little house they previously had occupied) at a time in his life when he felt his productivity and earning power were pinching out. [ 2 30]

Floyd Logan

But in his words: “On the second morning after our removal, I read in the New York Times the review of a motion picture whose story (and even the names of its characters) corresponded to my novel Cavanagh, Forest Ranger and I at once called the attention of Harper and Brothers to this unauthorized use of my material. They suggested that I come down and take the matter up with the producing firm. This I did, with the result that they paid me ten thousand dollars in royalty. This helped me to sustain the luxury of a twelve-room house in an exclusive colony” (From Afternoon Neighbors, [275]). Garland was at that time in his middle 60s. This motion picture royalty, coming in the manner in which it did, was highly ironic. Other fi lm producers had taken up with him at various times, earlier in the century, the use of two or three of his novels, particularly those of Colorado, for fi lm treatment. Notes 1. Earlier in the address, Logan had quoted from a school newspaper editorial about a Garland visit to Fort Wayne in 1933, written by Mark Gross. 2. Garland was thirty-nine when he married. 3. In August 1925 Garland bought Grey Ledge, a house in the Onteora community, by paying the four-thousand-dollar price — and the yearly association dues — from ten thousand dollars in royalties from the sale of rights to a pirated fi lm version of Cavanagh, Forest Ranger that was fi lmed as The Ranger of the Big Pines (1925). Vitagraph had fi lmed four of Garland’s novels in 1916 and 1917: Hesper, Money Magic, The Captain of the Gray-Horse Troop, and Cavanagh, Forest Ranger. 4. Logan refers to Harold Latham’s reminiscence in My Life in Publishing, which he later quotes in its entirety. From Floyd Logan, “A Memoir: Hamlin Garland,” Item 707, Hamlin Garland Papers, Collection no. 0200, Special Collections, USC Libraries, University of Southern California.

[ 2 31 ]

Works Cited

X Addison, W. D. Letter to Eldon Hill, 2 December 1939. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Bacheller, Irving. “A Little Story of a Friendship.” Mark Twain Quarterly 4.1 (1940): 14, 16. Brandon, C. Watt. “On the Trail with Hamlin Garland.” Pinedale Roundup, 11 September 1907, 1. Brooks, Van Wyck. An Autobiography. New York: Dutton, 1965. ———. [Tribute.] Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library. Ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson. Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962. 4–5. Bynner, Witter. [Tribute.] Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library. Ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson. Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962. 16. Cargill, Oscar. Letter to Eldon Hill, 9 May 1950. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Carroll, Gladys Hasty. Letter to Eldon Hill, 15 July 1947; and typed transcript of “Diary Impressions of Hamlin Garland.” Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Case, Leland. [Tribute.] Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library. Ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson. Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962. 17–18. Chamberlin, Joseph E. “Hamlin Garland—The Hardy of the West.” Boston Evening Transcript, 30 March 1926, part 6, 1. Derleth, August. [Tribute.] Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library. Ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson. Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962. 18–19. [233]

garland in his own time Doyle, Constance Garland. [Tribute.] Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library. Ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson. Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962. 8–9. Dreiser, Theodore. Letter to Edgar Lee Masters, 7 March 1940. Letters of Theodore Dreiser: A Selection. Ed. Robert H. Elias. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1959. 3:872–74. Ewing, Mary Jane. Letter to Eldon Hill, 23 February 1951. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. ———, ed. Hamlin Garland as West Salem Knew Him. 1951. West Salem, WI: West Salem Historical Society, 1977. Farrar, John. [Tribute.] Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library. Ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson. Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962. 10–12. Field, Eugene. “I State My Views on Taxation.” The House: An Episode in the Lives of Reuben Baker, Astronomer, and of His Wife, Alice. New York: Scribner, 1896. 185–89. ———. “Sharps and Flats.” Chicago Record, 27 July 1893, 4. Flower, B. O. “Leaders I Have Known: Hamlin Garland, Will Allen Dromgoole, W. D. McCracken, Bolton Hall, Ernest Howard Crosby.” Twentieth Century Magazine 6 (August 1906): 357–61. Garland, Alice Field. Letter to Eldon Hill, 11 May 1950. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Garland, Franklin. Letter to Eldon Hill, 19 July 1940. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Garland, Hamlin. Afternoon Neighbors. New York: Macmillan, 1934. ———. Back-Trailers from the Middle Border. New York: Macmillan, 1928. ———. Companions on the Trail. New York: Macmillan, 1931. ———. A Daughter of the Middle Border. New York: Macmillan, 1921. ———. Forty Years of Psychic Research. New York: Macmillan, 1936. ———. Hamlin Garland’s Diaries. Ed. Donald Pizer. San Marino, CA: Huntington Library Press, 1968. ———. Letter to Eugene Field. “Sharps and Flats.” Chicago Record, 28 July 1893, 4. ———. My Friendly Contemporaries. New York: Macmillan, 1932. [ 2 34 ]

Works Cited ———. Selected Letters of Hamlin Garland. Ed. Keith Newlin and Joseph B. McCullough. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998. ———. A Son of the Middle Border. New York: Macmillan, 1917. Goldstein, Jesse Sidney. “Two Literary Radicals: Garland and Markham in Chicago, 1893.” American Literature 17 (1945): 152–60. Greever, Garland. [Tribute.] Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library. Ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson. Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962. 20–21. Hagedorn, Hermann. [Tribute.] Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library. Ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson. Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962. 13–15. Herne, Julie. “James A. Herne, Actor and Dramatist.” Unpublished biography. James A. Herne Collection. University of Maine Library, Orono, Maine. Hill, Eldon. “1931 Journal Jottings”; “Grey ledge Visit, Volume I”; and “Grey Ledge Visit, Volume II.” Journal notes. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. ———. “Diary Notes of a Visit with Hamlin Garland in Hollywood in 1936.” Holograph and typescript. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. ———. “I go on a Pilgrimage to Garland’s Coulee Country.” Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Howells, William Dean. “Mr. Garland’s Books.” North American Review 196 (October 1912): 523–28. Hubbard, Elbert. “Side Talks with the Philistines; Being Sundry Bits of Wisdom Which Have Been Heretofore Secreted, and are Now Set Forth in Print.” The Philistine 1 (June 1895, 16; August 1895, 97–98, 103; September 1895, 133; November 1895, 196); 3 (October 1896, 154); 5 (July 1897, 47); 6 (December 1897, 19–20); 8 (November 1898, 183); 9 (August 1899, 95); 10 (December 1899, 4–5). Jordan-Smith, Paul. Letter to Eldon Hill, 6 July 1950. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Latham, Harold S. “Hamlin Garland.” My Life in Publishing. Intro. Sterling North. New York: Dutton, 1965. 38–42. ———. [Tribute.] Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library. [ 2 35 ]

garland in his own time Ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson. Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962. 12–13. Leonard, William Ellery. Letter to Eldon Hill, 18 March 1935. Typed transcript. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Lewis, Sinclair. “Text of Sinclair Lewis’s Nobel Prize Address at Stockholm.” New York Times, 13 December 1930, 12. Logan, Floyd. “Hamlin Garland, Active at 77, Enjoys Life in California Home.” News-Sentinel [Fort Wayne, IN], 1938. Clipping, Item 725. Hamlin Garland Papers. Collection no. 0200. Special Collections. USC Libraries, University of Southern California, Los Angeles. ———. “A Memoir: Hamlin Garland.” Item 707. Hamlin Garland Papers. Collection no. 0200. Special Collections. USC Libraries, University of Southern California, Los Angeles. Lord, Isabel Garland. A Summer to Be: A Memoir by the Daughter of Hamlin Garland. Ed. Keith Newlin. Foreword by Victoria Doyle-Jones. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2010. Lummis, Charles Fletcher. “In the Lion’s Den.” Land of Sunshine 5 (August 1896): 171–72. ———. “That Which is Written.” Land of Sunshine 5 (November 1896): 248–49. Masters, Edgar Lee. Letter to Theodore Dreiser, 5 March 1940. Letters of Theodore Dreiser: A Selection. Ed. Robert H. Elias. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1959. 3:872–74. Meriwether, Lee. “My Friend Hamlin Garland.” Mark Twain Quarterly 4.1 (1940): 9, 20. Millard, Bailey. “Hamlin Garland as I Knew Him.” Los Angeles Times, 6 March 1940, A4. Newlin, Keith. Hamlin Garland, A Life. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2008. Norris, Kathleen. [Tribute.] Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library. Ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson. Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962. 7–8. Pattee, Fred Lewis. Letter to Eldon Hill, 25 October 1947. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Peattie, Elia. “Star Wagon.” Transcript from unpublished manuscript. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. [ 2 36]

Works Cited Peattie, Robert Burns. “Story of Robert Burns Peattie, Written for his Sons, Edward, Roderick, and Donald.” Transcript from unpublished manuscript. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Reese, M. Lisle. “The South Dakota Federal Writers’ Project: Memoirs of a State Director.” South Dakota History 23 (1993): 197–243. Richards, Grant. “Looking Back.” Monitor (Boston), 1 July 1940, 8. Roosevelt, Theodore. “An Appreciation of Hamlin Garland.” They of the High Trails. By Hamlin Garland. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1916. viii. ———. Letters to Brander Matthews, 21 May 1894, 29 June 1894, 7 December 1894. The Letters of Theodore Roosevelt and Brander Matthews. Ed. Lawrence J. Oliver. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1995. 82–84, 88–89. Seymour, Ralph Fletcher. Some Went This Way: A Forty Year Pilgrimage Among Artists, Bookmen, and Printers. Chicago: Ralph Fletcher Seymour, 1945. Shippey, Lee. Luckiest Man Alive: Being the Author’s Own Story, with Certain Omissions, but Including Hitherto Unpublished Sidelights on Some Famous Persons and Incidents. Los Angeles: Westernlore Press, 1959. Sibley, Carroll. “Hamlin Garland: Delightful Host.” Mark Twain Quarterly 4.1 (1940): 3–4. Stefansson, Vilhjalmur. [Tribute.] Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library. Ed. and comp. Lloyd Arvidson. Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962. 9–10. Strout, Mary E. Letter to Eldon Hill, 1 January 1939. Eldon Hill Collection. Walter Havighurst Special Collections Library, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Students’ Round-Robin Letter of Appreciation of Garland’s Lectures at Boston School of Oratory. 1890. Item 711a. Hamlin Garland Papers. Collection no. 0200. Special Collections. USC Libraries, University of Southern California, Los Angeles. Tarkington, Booth. “Hamlin Garland.” Commemorative Tributes of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1905–1941. New York: American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1942. 399–402. Tilson, Ida E. “Old Timer.” West Salem Nonpareil-Journal, [22 January 1922]. Clipping. Item 725. Hamlin Garland Papers. Collection no. 0200. Special Collections. USC Libraries, University of Southern California, Los Angeles. Torrey, Edwin C. “Garland’s Dedicatory Lines.” Early Days in Dakota. Minneapolis: Farnham Printing and Stationery Co., 1925. 80–84. [ 2 37 ]

garland in his own time Traubel, Horace. With Walt Whitman in Camden. 9 volumes (1906–1996). Volumes 2 and 3: New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 1961. Volume 4, ed. Sculley Bradley: Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1953. Volume 5, ed. Gertrude Traubel: Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1964. Wheeler, Post, and Hallie Erminie Rives. Dome of Many-Coloured Glass. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1955. White, William Allen. The Autobiography of William Allen White. New York: Macmillan, 1946.

[ 2 38 ]

Permissions

X W. D. Addison to Eldon Hill, 2 December 1939. Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Lloyd Arvidson, ed. and comp., Hamlin Garland: Centennial Tributes and a Checklist of the Hamlin Garland Papers in the University of Southern California Library (Los Angeles: University of Southern California Library Bulletin no. 9, 1962) [tributes by Van Wyck Brooks, Witter Bynner, Leland Case, August Derleth, Constance Garland Doyle, John Farrar, Garland Greever, Hermann Hagedorn, Harold Latham, Kathleen Norris, Vilhjalmur Stefansson]. Courtesy of the University of Southern California, on behalf of USC Libraries Special Collections. Irving Bacheller, “A Little Story of a Friendship,” Mark Twain Quarterly 4.1 (1940): 14, 16. Reprinted by permission of the editor. Van Wyck Brooks, An Autobiography (New York: Dutton, 1965). Copyright © 1965 Estate of Van Wyck Brooks. Used by permission of Dutton, a division of the Penguin Group (USA) Inc. Oscar Cargill to Eldon Hill, 9 May 1950. Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Gladys Hasty Carroll to Eldon Hill, 15 July 1947; and typed transcript of “Diary Impressions of Hamlin Garland.” Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Theodore Dreiser to Edgar Lee Masters, 7 March 1940, Letters of Theodore Dreiser: A Selection, ed. Robert H. Elias (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1959). Reprinted by permission of the University of Pennsylvania Press.

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garland in his own time Mary Jane Ewing to Eldon Hill, 23 February 1951. Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Mary Jane Ewing, ed. Hamlin Garland as West Salem Knew Him (West Salem, WI: West Salem Historical Society, 1951, 1977). Reprinted by permission of the West Salem Historical Society, West Salem, WI. Alice Field Garland to Eldon Hill, 11 May 1950. Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Franklin Garland to Eldon Hill, 19 July 1940. Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Julie Herne, “James A. Herne, Actor and Dramatist,” James A. Herne Collection. Reprinted by courtesy of the University of Maine Special Collections Department, Orono, ME. Eldon Hill, Journal Notes: “I go on a Pilgrimage to Garland’s Coulee Country”; “1931 Journal Jottings”; “Grey ledge Visit, Volume I”; “Grey Ledge Visit, Volume II”; and “Diary Notes of a Visit with Hamlin Garland in Hollywood in 1936” (holograph and typescript). Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Paul Jordan-Smith to Eldon Hill, 6 July 1950. Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Harold S. Latham, “Hamlin Garland,” My Life in Publishing, intro. Sterling North (New York: Dutton, 1965). Copyright © 1965 Harold S. Latham. Used by permission of Dutton, a division of the Penguin Group (USA) Inc. William Ellery Leonard to Eldon Hill, 18 March 1935, typed transcript. Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Sinclair Lewis, “Text of Sinclair Lewis’s Nobel Prize Address at Stockholm,” New York Times, 13 December 1930, 12. Copyright © The Nobel Foundation. Floyd Logan, “Hamlin Garland, Active at 77, Enjoys Life in California

[ 2 40]

Permissions Home,” News-Sentinel [Fort Wayne, IN], 1938. Reprinted by permission of the (Fort Wayne, IN) News-Sentinel. Floyd Logan, “A Memoir: Hamlin Garland.” Courtesy of the University of Southern California, on behalf of USC Libraries Special Collections. Isabel Garland Lord, A Summer to Be: A Memoir by the Daughter of Hamlin Garland, ed. Keith Newlin, foreword by Victoria Doyle-Jones (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2010). Reprinted by permission of Victoria Doyle-Jones. Edgar Lee Masters to Theodore Dreiser, 5 March 1940, Letters of Theodore Dreiser: A Selection, ed. Robert H. Elias (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1959). Reprinted by permission of the University of Pennsylvania Press. Lee Meriwether, “My Friend Hamlin Garland,” Mark Twain Quarterly 4.1 (1940): 9, 20. Reprinted by permission of the editor. Bailey Millard, “Hamlin Garland as I Knew Him,” Los Angeles Times, 6 March 1940, A4. Copyright © 1940 Los Angeles Times. Reprinted with permission. Fred Lewis Pattee to Eldon Hill, 25 October 1947. Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Elia Peattie, “Star Wagon,” unpublished manuscript transcript. Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Robert B. Peattie, “Story of Robert Burns Peattie, Written for his Sons, Edward, Roderick, and Donald,” unpublished manuscript transcript. Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. M. Lisle Reese, “The South Dakota Federal Writers’ Project: Memoirs of a State Director,” South Dakota History 23 (1993): 230–31. Copyright © 1993 the South Dakota State Historical Society. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission. Grant Richards, “Looking Back,” Monitor (Boston), 1 July 1940, 8. Reprinted by courtesy of the Christian Science Monitor (www.CSMonitor.com).

[ 2 41 ]

garland in his own time Lee Shippey, Luckiest Man Alive: Being the Author’s Own Story, with Certain Omissions, but Including Hitherto Unpublished Sidelights on Some Famous Persons and Incidents (Los Angeles: Westernlore Press, 1959). Reprinted by courtesy of Westernlore Press. Carroll Sibley, “Hamlin Garland: Delightful Host,” Mark Twain Quarterly 4.1 (1940): 3–4. Reprinted by permission of the editor. Mary E. Strout to Eldon Hill, 1 January 1939. Reprinted by courtesy of the Eldon Hill Collection, Walter Havighurst Special Collections, Miami University Libraries, Oxford, OH. Students’ Round-Robin Letter of Appreciation of Garland’s Lectures at Boston School of Oratory. 1890. Item 711a. Courtesy of the University of Southern California, on behalf of USC Libraries Special Collections. Booth Tarkington, “Hamlin Garland,” Commemorative Tributes of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1905–1941 (New York: American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1942), 399–402. Reprinted by courtesy of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden. Vol. 4, ed. Sculley Bradley (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1953). Reprinted by permission of the University of Pennsylvania Press. Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden. Vol. 5, ed. Gertrude Traubel (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1964). Copyright © Gertrude Traubel. Reprinted by permission of Southern Illinois University Press. Wheeler, Post, and Hallie Erminie Rives, Dome of Many-Coloured Glass (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1955). Reprinted by courtesy of Random House.

[242]

Index

X Abbey Theatre, 94, 95n1 Addison, W. D., 169–71 Ade, George, 199 Akeley, Carl, 98, 101n3, 203 American Academy of Arts and Letters, 59, 113, 120, 131, 132, 139, 147, 176, 177, 188, 190 American Psychical Society, 33 Anderson, Sherwood, 120, 123, 151, 198 Anti-Poverty Society, 110 Arena (journal), xxvi, 35, 42 Arvidson, Lloyd, 197 Austin, Mary, 217, 219n1 Author’s Club, 152 Babcock, Charles, 1, 4 Bacheller, Irving, 183–85, 228; Eben Holden, 184 Bacheller Newspaper Syndicate, 183 Baldwin, Stanley, 97, 100n2 Barrie, James M., 114, 139, 179, 225, 228 Baxter, Frank C., 132 Beaman, Alexander Gaylord, 139, 196 Beard, Dan, 218, 219n4 Benchley, Robert, 135 Blake, William, 151 Bookman (journal), xxiii, 217 Booth, Edwin, 5, 109

Boston Evening Transcript, xxv, 108, 109 Boston Public Library, 13 Boston School of Oratory, xii, 4, 13, 23, 27, 28, 109 Bradley, John H., 137, 138n1, 152, 153, 215; The Autobiography of Earth, 152; A Journey Through Time, 152; Parade of the Living, 152 Brandon, C. Watt, 79–85 Breasted, Charles, 99, 101n3 Brett, George, xxiii Bright, John, 125 Brooks, Van Wyck, xxvii, 167, 214–15, 224; The Ordeal of Mark Twain, 224; The Pilgrimage of Henry James, 214 Broun, Heywood, 123 Browne, Charles Francis, 152, 153n2 Buck, Pearl S., 129 Bucke, Richard Maurice, 16, 19n7 Burns, Robert, 151 Burroughs, John, 11, 104, 105n1, 123, 125–26, 153, 228; “Waiting,” 174 Burroughs, Julian, 126 Burroughs Memorial Association, 126 Burton, Richard, 93n3 Bush, Alva, 170, 171n1 Bynner, Witter, 199

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Index Cable, George Washington, 47 Caldwell, Erskine, 151 Cameron, Beatrice, 28 Cargill, Oscar, xxvii, xxviii, 106–7; Intellectual America, 107; The Social Revolt, 106 Carrel, Alexis, 154n7; Man the Unknown, 153 Carroll, Gladys Hasty, xxvi, xxviii, 141–44; As the Earth Turns, xxvi, 141 Case, Leland D., 210–11 Cather, Willa, 120; Death Comes for the Archbishop, 129 Catherwood, Mary Hartwell, 44, 45 Cedar Valley Seminary, xii, 1, 2–3, 118, 170, 171 Century Club, 106–7, 131, 132, 228 Century (magazine), 35 Chamberlin, Joseph E., xxv–xxvi, 30, 108–15 Chapman, Frank, 203 Chicago Theater Society, 95n1 Clarkson, Ralph, 94 Clemens, Samuel. See Mark Twain Cliff Dwellers (club), 92, 94–95, 176 Cobb, Irvin, 152 Collier’s Weekly (magazine), xiv, 176 Collins, Seward, 124 Collins, Vere, 123 Conquest (fi lm), 133 Cooke, John D., 132, 151, 205 Cooper, Gary, 153 Corcoran, Mollie, 28, 29, 32, 33, 34 Cosgrave, Jessica Finch, 99, 101n4 Cosgrave, John O’Hara, 101n4 Crane, Stephen, 63, 96, 128, 137, 151–52, 192, 205; Maggie, a Girl of the Streets, 215; The Red Badge of Courage, 183

Crawford, Jack, 151 Cross, Hiram, 5–6, 8n5 Dakota Territory, xii, 1, 2, 110, 178, 188, 203 Darwin, Charles, 27, 125, 126, 150 David Livingstone (fi lm), 153 DeMille, Cecil B., 130, 157 Derleth, August, xxvi–xxvii, 197–98; Bright Journey, 197; Poetry Out of Wisconsin, 197; Sac Prairie Saga, 197 Diaz, Porfiro, 69 Dickens, Charles, 28, 151 Doren, Carl Van, xxviii, 126, 218, 219n4 Dos Passos, John, 106 Doyle, Arthur Conan, 228 Doyle, Constance Garland, 55, 58, 77, 96, 99, 100, 104, 142, 172, 187, 204, 212–13; as artist, 165, 213, 227; illness of, 85; marriage of, 130; as performer, 212–13, 227; and psychic interests, 160–62; reminiscence quoted, 226–27 Drane, Dora, 133–34, 134n3 Dreiser, Theodore, 92n1, 120, 128, 152, 176–77; The “Genius,” 176; Sister Carrie, 176; A Traveler at Forty, 176 Dudley, George, 54, 104, 117, 118 Durant, Will, 135 Ehrich, Louis, 76, 78n3 Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 118, 125, 152, 176, 198 Enneking, John J., 30 Ewing, Mary Jane, 52–55, 57–58 Fairbanks, Douglas, 218, 219n4 Falk, Luther, 156

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Index Farrar, John, 217–19 Faulkner, William, 128, 151, 152; Sanctuary, 123 Fawcett, Edgar, 60, 62n2 Field, Eugene, xxv, 44–46, 66–68, 179, 192; The House, 66 Field, Roswell, 95, 95n2 Finch School, 99, 101n4, 144 Finley, John, 218, 219n4 Flower, B. O., xxvi, 30, 35–37, 64 Franklin, Benjamin, 151 Franklin Head Club, 92 Freeman, Mary Wilkins, 151, 214 French, Alice, 47 Friends of the Middle Border, 210 Frost, Robert, 99, 101n3, 153; “Death of the Hired Man,” 153 Fuller, Henry B., xxv, 40, 40n2, 50, 107, 127, 128, 134, 214; “The Downfall of Abner Joyce,” xxixn7, 40n2, 75, 78n2, 107n2, 119, 214 Gale, Zona, 197, 198 Galsworthy, John, 97, 100n2 Gammon, John, 169 Garbo, Greta, 132–33 Garland, Alice Field, xxviii, 192–94 Garland, Constance. See Constance Garland Doyle Garland, Franklin, xxviii, 1–8, 10, 12, 30, 55, 192–94 Garland, Hamlin Life: and Alice, 1, 192, 194n1; and arthritis, 98; as autobiographer, xiv, xxiii–xxiv, 200, 208, 215; birth of, 57; and Boston, xii, 1, 4–8, 108–9, 181; burning of home, 54–55; and Camp Neshonoc, 104, 126, 227; and crosses, 137–38,

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159–62, 190–91, 215, 222, 224, 227; and Dakota homestead, 3–4, 7, 9–12; as Dean of American Letters, 157, 163, 178; and depression, 173–74, 227; description, 16–17, 22, 25–27, 43, 84–85, 107, 109–10, 114–15, 144, 173, 179, 181, 187, 220, 225–26; dispersion of papers, 205; early life, xii, 1–4; and farm life, xi, 11–12, 193; fi lm adaptations of novels, 231n3; final days of, 174–75, 192–93, 194n2, 196, 208; and Grey Ledge, 125–28, 130, 200, 202, 214, 221, 224, 230–31; Hollywood home, xxvii, 130, 149–50, 165–66, 186–87; honorary degrees, 147, 205; Klondike experiences, xiii, xiv, 81, 84; as lecturer, xiii, 7–8, 14, 31–32, 147, 212–13, 225; and Maple Shade (Garland Homestead), 48, 50, 52; marriage, 75–77; and modernism, xxvi, 123–24, 128–29, 150–51, 152, 184–85, 224, 228–29; and Oklahoma properties, 118, 119n4, 194; and Osage (Iowa), xii, 1, 169–70, 171; psychic interests, xxvii, 32–33, 133–34, 157, 188, 229–30; and realism, xxv, 44, 46–47, 87–88, 190; religious beliefs, 27, 150; relocation to New York, 94, 96; response to criticism, xxiv, 200–1, 220–21, 223; as school teacher, 8n4, 19n4, 21–22, 23; and theater, 28–30; visits to England, xxiii, 195; and West Salem (Wisconsin), 48–51, 52–55, 57–58, 118 Works: Afternoon Neighbors, xxiii; “Among the Corn Rows,” 215;

Index Garland, Hamlin— Works (continued) “Among the Moki Indians,” 69, 70; “The Art of Edwin Booth,” 109; Back-Trailers from the Middle Border, xxiii, 125, 228; Boy Life on the Prairie, xiv; “A Branch Road,” 8n, 215; The Captain of the Gray Horse Troop, 50, 55, 72, 87, 92, 190; Cavanagh, Forest Ranger, xiii, 87, 231; Companions on the Trail, xxiii, 127; Crumbling Idols, xxv, 28, 34, 40, 59, 62n, 91, 228; “Current Fiction Heroes,” 91; A Daughter of the Middle Border, xiv, xxiii, xxiv, 51, 75, 111, 112, 200, 201, 208, 217, 220, 228; “Despotism in Mexico,” 69; The Eagle’s Heart, 85, 86n6, 87; Five Hoosier Painters, 152; “The Fortunate Coast,” 168n1; “Fortunate Exile,” xxiii, 164, 187; Forty Years of Psychic Research, 179, 190, 221, 229; “Growing Old,” 111; Hesper, 87; Jason Edwards, 138; “The Land of the Straddle-Bug,” 63, 65n2; “Literary Emancipation of the West,” 106; “Local Color in Fiction” (lecture), 44; MainTravelled Roads, xii–xiii, 9, 29, 31, 39, 40, 41, 87, 88, 89, 113, 121, 146, 178, 183–84, 207, 214; “The Makers of American Literature” (exhibit), 170–71, 173, 175n1; A Member of the Third House, 29, 42; “Memories of the Middle Border” (lecture), 213n2; Miller of Boscobel, 146, 147; Money Magic, 50, 85n4, 87; “Mrs. Ripley’s

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Trip,” 215; My Friendly Contemporaries, xxiii, 143, 182; The Mystery of the Buried Crosses, 159, 162, 188, 191, 222, 230; “Old Mosinee Tom,” 183; “Only a Lumberjack,” 60–61, 62n3; “Optimism and Altruism—Hope for the Future and Sympathy Toward Men” (lecture), 20n11; Other Main-Travelled Roads, 87, 88; “The Outlaw and the Girl,” 85n5; “Pioneers and City Dwellers,” 217; Prairie Folks, 9, 42; “A Prairie Heroine,” 35, 36; Roadside Meetings, xxiii, 26, 125; Rose of Dutcher’s Coolly, xiii, 55, 66, 87, 114, 121, 152, 190; The Shadow World, 101n4; A Son of the Middle Border, xiv, 1, 9, 11, 26, 30, 39, 49, 58, 92, 102, 106, 112–13, 146, 190, 207–8, 215, 220; The Spirit of Sweetwater, 50; “The Spirit World on Trial,” 104; “The Story of Grant McLane,” xiv; Sunset Edition, 87; They of the High Trails, xxvi, 102; The Trail of the Goldseekers, 85n1; Trail-Makers of the Middle Border, xxiii, 108, 213, 218–19; The Tyranny of the Dark, 229; Ulysses S. Grant, His Life and Character, xiii, 65n8, 69, 190; “Under the Lion’s Paw,” 31–32, 38, 89, 106; Under the Wheel, 25, 89; “Up the Coolly,” 215; “The West in Literature,” 65n3; “Whitman at Seventy,” 13, 20n11; “Whitman’s ‘November Boughs,’” 15, 19n5; “A Wind from the East Sea,” 17; Witch’s Gold, 50

Index Garland, Harriet Edith, 175n2 Garland, Isabelle, 2, 11, 51, 76, 118, 119n3, 150, 173, 193 Garland, Jessie Viola. See Jessie Viola Garland Knapp Garland, Mary Isabel. See Isabel Garland Lord Garland, Richard, 150 Garland, Richard Hayes, 10, 11, 12, 39, 109, 112, 113, 173, 193; death of, xiv Garland, Zulime. See Zulime Taft Garrison, William Lloyd, 110 George, Henry, xii, 8, 31, 35, 36, 38, 67, 88, 110, 128, 215; Progress and Poverty, 7, 8n7, 150 Gilfallen, Roy, 54, 55 Goethe, Wolfgang, 176 Grant, Ulysses S., 127 Green’s Coulee, 2, 57, 109, 114, 117 Greever, Garland, 132, 151, 204–5 Guggenheim, Eleanor, 100n2 Guggenheim, Irene Rothschild, 97, 100n2 Gullickson, Mrs. Oliver, 49 Haeckel, Ernst, 150 Hagedorn, Hermann, xi, 207–9 Halliman, Harriett, 23 Hamlin Garland, Dean of American Letters (fi lm), 157, 166, 171 Hamlin Garland Memorial (Federal Writer’s Project), 156–57 Hampden, Walter, 185 Hansen, Harry, 123 Hapgood, Norman, 218, 219n4 Hardy, Thomas, 112, 114, 128, 179, 224 Harper, Connie, 166 Harper, Constance Garland. See Constance Garland Doyle

Harper, John, 166 Harper, Joseph Wesley, 130 Harris, Joel Chandler, 47, 60, 62n2 Harte, Bret, 205 Haselton, Guy D., 157n1 Hawthorne, Julian, 137, 138n2 Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 21, 115, 176, 187 Hedding Academia Summer School, 21 Hemingway, Ernest, 120, 128 Henry E. Huntington Library, 74, 151 Henry, O., 199 Herne, Chrystal, 25 Herne, Dorothy, 25, 26 Herne, James A., 7, 8, 10, 25–34, 39, 89; Drifting Apart, 7, 10, 25, 29, 30, 89; Hearts of Oak, 7, 8n6; Margaret Fleming, 10, 25, 34, 89; Shore Acres, 7, 8n6, 10, 29, 39 Herne, John, 25 Herne, Julie, 25–34 Herne, Katharine, 8n6, 10, 39, 25–34 Hill, Eldon, xxvii–xxviii, xxixn10, 91, 117–19, 123–29, 149–54, 172; Garland’s perception of, 149 Hitler, Adolf, 174 Homer, 60 Hoover, Herbert, 139 Hornaday, W. T., 218, 219n4 Hough, Emerson, 219 House, E. M., 123 Howells, William Dean, xi, xiii, xxv, 28, 30, 47, 50, 53, 61, 87–89, 99, 109, 123, 124, 128, 137, 157, 176, 191, 192, 205, 214, 217, 228; and Garland, influence on, 40, 45–46, 120–21, 179; Impressions and Experiences, 151 Hubbard, Elbert, xxv, 63–65 Hughes, Rupert, 152, 153n4

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Index Hurd, Charles E., 109, 115n3 Huxley, Aldous, 151 Huxley, Thomas, 150 Ibsen, Henrick, 28; A Doll’s House, 28 Ingersoll, Robert, 13–14, 19n1 Jacobs-Bond, Carrie, 187 James, Henry, 28, 49 Jean de Reske Singers (quartet), 74 Jewett, Sarah Orne, 214 Joff re, Joseph, 97, 100n2 Johnson, Hardesty, 74, 130, 131, 142 Johnson, Samuel, 151 Jones, Richard, 105, 127 Jones, Zeph, 79 Jordan-Smith, Paul, xxvii, 137–38 Kennedy, William Sloane, 14, 19n3 Kimball, Hannibal Ingalls, 65n2 Kipling, Rudyard, 139, 179, 225; “The Recessional,” 151 Kirkland, Joseph, 44 Knapp, Jessie Viola Garland, 175n2 Lanier, Sidney, 28, 153; “The Symphony,” 32 Lantern Club, 195 Latham, Harold S., xxiii, xxvii, 200–1, 202, 213, 220–23 Lawrence, D. H., 151 Leonard, William Ellery, xxviii, 146–48; Two Lives, 147 Lewis, Sinclair, 120–22, 123; Arrowsmith, 120; Main Street, 106, 107n1, 120; Our Mr. Wrenn, 120 Lindsay, Vachel, 128, 129; “The Light o’ the Moon,” 129n8; “The Wizard in the Street,” 129n8 Living Philosophies (Einstein), 124

Logan, Floyd, xi, 163–68, 225–31 Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, 28 Loomis, Hope, 169 Lord, Chester S., 64, 65n6 Lord, Isabel Garland, xxiv, 48–49, 55, 58, 74–77, 96–100, 104–5, 130–34, 139, 142, 143–44, 159–62, 164, 172–75, 187, 204; marriages of, 74; as performer, 213; reminiscence quoted, 227–28; A Summer to Be, 74; as writer, 165, 174 Lord, Mindret, 74, 159, 160, 164, 172, 175; and psychic interests, 161–62 Lovett, Robert Morss, xxviii, 107n1 Lowes, John Livingston, 124 Lummis, Charles Fletcher, xxv, 69–71 Mabie, F. Carleton, Jr., 35 MacDowell, Edward, 128, 213n1, 227; Woodland Sketches, 212 MacDowell, Marian, 227 Macmillan, xiv, xxiii, 200, 201, 202, 220 Maguire, James G., 36–37 Maria Chapdelaine (Hemon), 113 Markham, Edwin, 42–43 Markham, William, 169 Masters, Edgar Lee, 153, 176–77; The Living Thoughts of Emerson, 177; Spoon River Anthology, 176 Matthews, Brander, 59 Mau, B. A., 53 Mazzini, Giuseppe, 43n1 McClintock, Hugh, 173 McClure, Samuel S., 199 McClure’s (magazine), 65, 66, 189, 199 McCutcheon, George, 199 McCutcheon, John, 199 McEldowney, Eva, 58 Mencken, H. L., 92n1, 123, 124

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Index Meriwether, Lee, 181–82 Millard, Bailey, 178–79 Miller, Joaquin, 153, 179 Millikan, Robert A., 139, 140n2 Milton, John, 60 Morris, Constance Lily Rothschild, 97, 100n2 Morse, Sidney H., 16, 19n6 Moulton, Louise Chandler, 109, 115n1 Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (fi lm), 153 Mrs. Eddy: The Biography of a Virginal Mind (Dakin), 127 Mudgett, Herman Webster, 64, 65n4 Muir, John, 153 Musgrove, W. A., 14 National Institute of Arts and Letters, 59, 120, 125, 176 Norris, Frank, xxvi, 197 Norris, Kathleen, xxvi, 206; What Happened to Judy, 206 O’Connor, William Douglas, 16, 19n8 O’Neill, Eugene, 120; Anna Christie, xxvi; Beyond the Horizon, 93n3 Ordway, Dakota Territory, 1, 9, 10, 12, 13, 156 Page, Thomas Nelson, 44 Page, Walter Hines, 59 Paine, Albert Bigelow, 228 Parent, Gregory, 159–60 Parent, Violet, 159–60 Pattee, Fred Lewis, xxvii, xxviii, 91–92; A History of American Literature since 1870, 91; “Those Fiery Radicals of Yesteryear,” 91 Patten, Thomas, 174 Peattie, Donald Culross, 153, 154n6, 215

Peattie, Elia, 38–39 Peattie, Robert Burns, xxiv–xxv, 38, 39–40 People’s Party, 38, 39 Perry, Thomas S., 30 Phelps, William Lyon, xxvi Philistine (magazine), xxv, 63 Pinchot, Gifford, 139 Pinedale (Wyoming), 79, 80 The Playboy of the Western World (Synge), 95n1 Players Club, 94 Poe, Edgar Allan, 21, 151 Populist Convention, 38–39 Prescott, Frederick Clarke, 124 Progressive Party, 41 Pulitzer Prize, xxiii, xxvi, 93n3, 106, 107n1, 135, 188, 201, 220 Quick, Herbert, 146, 148n1, 219 Reedy, William Marion, 199 Reese, M. Lisle, 156–57 Richards, Grant, 72–73 Riley, James Whitcomb, 47, 225 Rives, Hallie Erminie, 195–96 Robinson, Edwin Arlington, 153 Rogers, Will, 135, 139, 140n2 Roosevelt, Theodore, 41, 59–61, 102–3, 123, 128, 207 Ruskin, John, 117, 119n2, 125 Sander, Hulda, 55 Schulte, F. J., 42 Scott, Walter, 28 Sequoya League, 69 Seton, Ernest Thompson, 50, 51n3, 53 Severn, Joseph, 151 Seymour, Ralph Fletcher, 94–95 Shafter, William Rufus, 65

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Index Shakespeare, William, 2, 28, 60, 151 Shaw, George Bernard, 125, 139, 179, 225, 228 Shelly, Percy Bysshe, 151 Sherman, Stuart Pratt, 107n1 Shippey, Lee, 135–36, 141, 140n2 Sibley, Carroll, 186–88 Single Tax, xii, 7, 17, 31–32, 36, 38, 66–68, 110–11 Spencer, Herbert, 27, 150, 218 Spinden, Herbert Joseph, 203 Stanley, Henry M., 153 Stanley, John A., 57 Stanton, Frank L., 64, 65n5 Steele, T. C., 152, 165 Stefansson, Vilhjalmur, 98, 101n3, 202–3 Stone and Kimball (publisher), 152 Stone, Herbert S., 65n2 Strout, Mary E., 21–22 Sullivan, Mark, 21, 22n1, 99 Sutton, Vida, 126–27 Taft, Lorado, xxiv, 39, 40, 51, 75, 133, 152, 165, 179, 203, 228; sculpture museum of, 143, 145n1 Taft, Zulime, xxiv, 39, 40, 51, 75–77, 97–98, 100, 107, 131, 135, 144, 164, 165, 172, 179, 184, 187, 202, 203, 226; and affair with Larry, 76–77; death of, 194; and Parkinson’s Disease, 130, 149; sculptures by, 77n1 Tagore, Rabindranath, 97, 100n2 Tarkington, Booth, xxvi, 167, 189–91, 217; The Gentleman from Indiana, xxvi, 189 Tennyson, Alfred, 28, 125 Thackery, William Makepeace, 28 Thoreau, Henry David, 152, 153, 198 “The Three Warnings” (Thrale), 194n2

Tilson, Ida E., 48–51, 53, 58, 118 Tompkins, Juliet Wilbor, 50 Torrey, Edwin C., 9–12 Town Hall Club, 218 Tracy, Spencer, 153 Traubel, Horace, 13–19; With Walt Whitman in Camden, 13 Turck, Fenton B., 96, 100n1, 207 Twain, Mark, 60, 121, 127, 137, 187, 199, 205, 220, 225 University of Southern California, xxiii, 137, 197, 204, 205 Vigilantes, 207 The Virginian (Wister), 83, 85n2 Wallace, Edgar, 152 Watson, John B., 117, 119n1 Wells, H. G., 120, 125 Westerners International, 210–11 Wharton, Edith, 139; The Age of Innocence, 106, 107n1 Wheeler, Edward J., 98, 101n3 Wheeler, Post, 195–96 White, William Allen, 41, 99 Whitman, Walt, 13–19, 28, 125, 126, 137, 153, 176, 205; Leaves of Grass, 13, 15, 16; “Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking,” 153 Wilkins, Mary. See Mary Wilkins Freeman Wilkinson, Margaret, 123, 124 Williams, Sophia, 159 Wind River Wilderness, 79, 84 World’s Columbian Exposition, 42, 44, 51, 66, 75, 179 Zangwill, Israel, 179 Zola, Émile, 28, 128

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w r i t e r s i n t h e i r ow n t i m e book s Alcott in Her Own Time Edited by Daniel Shealy Emerson in His Own Time Edited by Ronald A. Bosco and Joel Myerson Franklin in His Own Time Edited by Kevin J. Hayes and Isabelle Bour Fuller in Her Own Time Edited by Joel Myerson Garland in His Own Time Edited by Keith Newlin Hawthorne in His Own Time Edited by Ronald A. Bosco and Jillmarie Murphy Jefferson in His Own Time Edited by Kevin J. Hayes Lincoln in His Own Time Edited by Harold K. Bush, Jr. Poe in His Own Time Edited by Benjamin F. Fisher Stowe in Her Own Time Edited by Susan Belasco Thoreau in His Own Time Edited by Sandra Harbert Petrulionis Twain in His Own Time Edited by Gary Scharnhorst Whitman in His Own Time Edited by Joel Myerson