Charles W. Chesnutt to Joyce H. Caldwell, 5 February 1931
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February 5, 1931
Miss Joyce H. Caldwell,
West Virginia State College,
Institute, W. Va.1
My dear Miss Caldwell:
I meant to have written you sooner, confirming my telegram canceling my engagement at your school, of January 30th, but this is the first time for a week that I have been at my office where stenograph assistance is available. I was all set to leave here Thursday night, and had a little paper prepared on the subject of "The Negro in Fiction," which I like to think you would have enjoyed.2 But on Wednesday I was taken ill, which generally happens about this time of the winter, the result of a cold which affects certain rather vital bodily organs.
If you should wish me to come to you a little later in the spring, when the weather is milder, I can probably arrange it.3
Meanwhile I hope your program was not unduly interfered with and that you were able to supply my place.
With regards and best wishes, Sincerely yours, CWC:MKCorrespondent: Joyce H. Caldwell (b. 1910), the student president of the Literary Club at West Virginia State College (later University), graduated in May of 1931 and returned to her home state of North Carolina to become a schoolteacher.
1. West Virginia State College (now University) is a historically Black land-grant university founded in 1891 in Institute, West Virginia, as the West Virginia Colored Institute. Initially focused on teacher preparation and vocational training, it began to offer college degrees in 1915. [back]
2. "The Negro in Fiction" is likely a variant on Chesnutt's speech "The Negro in Present-Day Fiction," which was presented to a student organization at Oberlin College around 1929; see Charles W. Chesnutt: Essays and Speeches, ed. Joseph R. McElrath, Jr., Robert C. Leitz, III, Jesse S. Crisler (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999): 516–529. [back]
3. In late 1930, Chesnutt agreed to give a reading to the Literary Club of West Virginia State College, a student organization. In 1930 and 1931, the club discussed nine Black authors and their works. Upon Chesnutt's request, they offered to pay his travel expenses. Due to illness, Chesnutt missed the reading, and an attempt to reschedule it came to nothing. [back]
