Scope and Content Note
The papers of Owen Wister (1860-1938), American novelist best known for his Western stories, span the years 1829 through 1966 with the bulk concentrated in the period 1890-1930. The collection is organized in eight series: Journals; Family Correspondence; General Correspondence; Scrapbooks; Speech, Article, and Book File; Biographical File; Printed Matter; and Addenda.
The Family Correspondence series includes numerous handwritten letters of Owen Wister and of such relatives as his grandmother Fanny Kemble Butler, his mother, Sarah Butler Wister, and his cousins, Silas Weir Mitchell and Langdon E. Mitchell. Wister's letters to his mother, 1870-1907, and to his wife, Mary Channing Wister, 1898-1913, contain detailed descriptions of his activities and thoughts during those years. The letters of Wister's grandmother, the celebrated British actress, Fanny Kemble, are numerous and extend from 1829 to 1891. His mother, the anonymous author of articles published by The Atlantic Monthly, was a close friend of Henry James, and the family papers contain several of James's letters to her.
The large General Correspondence series consists mainly of letters received by Wister. Copies of his replies are infrequent. There is a great deal of correspondence from Wister's publishers, particularly the Macmillan Company. Much of his correspondence concerning specific literary works has been placed in the Speech, Article, and Book File. Among prominent individuals who are represented by numerous letters are John Jay Chapman, Joseph H. Coit, Horace Howard Furness, Mark Antony DeWolfe Howe, Jean Jules Jusserand, Kirke LaShelle, Henry Cabot Lodge, Charles Eliot Norton, Agnes Repplier, Theodore Roosevelt, Henry Dwight Sedgwick, Upton B. Sinclair, Malcolm Campbell Stuart, Barrett Wendell, and Caspar Whitney.
The first eight volumes in the Scrapbook series bear the title, "Babel," which Wister assigned to them. They contain correspondence and printed matter, the latter mainly newspaper clippings. There is a card index to items in the first six volumes of "Babel" in the Manuscript Reading Room. A microfilm edition of the scrapbooks is available for consultation.
An extensive Speech, Article, and Book File contains handwritten manuscripts of many of Wister's literary works. Several of these works are accompanied by correspondence and printed matter relating to them.
The Addenda includes journals, family correspondence and papers, general correspondence, writings, and miscellany.