Scope and Content Note
The papers of Kathleen Lanier Harriman Mortimer (1917-2011) span the years 1933-2011, with the bulk of the material dating from 1937 to 1974. The collection documents Mortimer’s education, journalism career, social activities, and international travel with her father, W. Averell Harriman. The papers are primarily in English, with some Russian and French.
The collection features letters sent by Mortimer to her sister, Mary Averell Harriman Fisk, and her former governess, Elsie ("Mouche") Marshall during World War II. From 1941 to 1943, Mortimer lived in London working as a journalist during W. Averell Harriman’s tenure as a special envoy for the Lend-Lease program. Her letters from this period discuss her work for the International News Service and Newsweek, her friendship with Pamela Digby Churchill (who would later become her stepmother Pamela Digby Churchill Hayward Harriman in 1971), and requests for clothing and other personal items from home. In 1943, W. Averell Harriman was appointed the United States ambassador to the Soviet Union, and Mortimer moved with her father to Moscow. She served as the embassy’s hostess for social functions and also worked for the Office of War Information. Particularly noteworthy are Mortimer’s letters describing her trip in January 1944 to the site of the Katyn Massacre and her attendance at the Yalta Conference in February 1945. The incoming correspondence also includes several letters from United States Army Air Forces General Ira Eaker and a condolence letter from Clementine Churchill, wife of Winston Churchill, following the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt. The collection also includes clippings of newspaper articles by Mortimer, a small amount of photographs, notes by Mortimer, and copies of notes on the Yalta Conference by Anna Roosevelt.
The 2024 Addition contains correspondence, engagement books, article drafts, clippings, notes, photographs, and other papers related to Mortimer’s activities in London and Moscow during World War II. The addition includes a few additional letters Mortimer sent to Mary Averell Harriman Fisk and Elsie Marshall during the war. Also present are class notes and papers written by Mortimer while studying at Bennington College. The addition also features correspondence, schedules, reports, printed matter, notes, and photographs documenting two trips Mortimer took with W. Averell Harriman. In 1967, she traveled with Harriman in his capacity as United States ambassador-at-large to view the dedication ceremony for the Mangla Dam in Pakistan. This trip also included diplomatic visits to Afghanistan, Iran, Yugoslavia, and Romania. In 1974, Mortimer and Harriman returned to the Soviet Union and visited Moscow, Zagorsk, and Leningrad. Harriman also met with Soviet leader Leonid Il’ich Brezhnev during this trip. Two scrapbooks in the addition contain obituaries and other clippings compiled after the deaths of Pamela Digby Churchill Hayward Harriman and W. Averell Harriman. The other two scrapbooks are printed copies scanned from the originals and provided by the donor. They feature clippings, printed matter, and photographs pertaining to Mortimer’s life and career during World War II and shortly thereafter.