Mary Dickerson Donahey to Charles W. Chesnutt, 23 June 1931
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The Societyof
Midland Authors1 June 23 1931 Dear Mr. Chesnutt,---
Herewith a check and as usual many thousands of thanks! We do so appreciate your care of oiur end of the business!!2
We are off in the early morning for our far north woods and are so busy we are tumbling over each other. Hence shortness of news. Both well--both sending every good wish--both reminding you it is Grand Marais Michigan and igf you get up around there---come!!3
Sorry bout the body blow! Us too!4
Correspondent: Mary Augusta Dickerson Donahey (1876–1962) was a White journalist and author of children's books. She was originally from New York City and worked for the Cleveland Plain Dealer from 1898 to 1905. She married the cartoonist William Donahey (1883–1970) in 1905 and moved with him to Chicago, where she wrote children's and young adult books, cookbooks and newspaper columns. The couple befriended the Chesnutts in the early 1900s, when they were part of the Tresart Club and the Chester Cliffs Club. See Helen Chesnutt, Charles Waddell Chesnutt: Pioneer of the Color Line (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1952), 187–88.
1. The Society of Midland Authors was founded in 1915 by and for published authors from twelve Midwestern U.S. states. Its headquarters are in Chicago. Both Mary Dickerson Donahey (1876–1962) and her husband William Donahey (1883–1970) were members by 1930; Chesnutt was not. For readability, the remainder of the letterhead is not transcribed at the top of the letter but is included in this footnote as unformatted text: "PRESIDENT HOWARD VINCENT O'BRIEN THE CHICAGO DAILY NEWS CHICAGO, ILLINOIS VICE-PRESIDENTS ILLINOIS MARY HASTINGS BRADLEY INDIANA MEREDITH NICHOLSON IOWA ALICE FRENCH KANSAS WILLIAM ALLEN WHITE MICHIGAN ARTHUR H. VANDENBERG MINNESOTA OLE E. ROLVAAG MISSOURI JAY WILLIAM HUDSON NEBRASKA H. ADELBERT WHITE OHIO STUART WALKER SOUTH DAKOTA JOSEPH MILLS HANSON WISCONSIN ZONA GALE SECRETARY ELIZABETH KNOBEL 6300 KENMORE AVENUE CHICAGO, ILLINOIS TREASURER CLARA INGRAM JUDSON 1122 JUDSON AVENUE EVANSTON, ILLINOIS DIRECTORS DOROTHY ALDIS BAKER BROWNELL FANNY BUTCHER FRANCES R. DONOVAN ALICE GERSTENBERG EDGAR J. GOODSPEED DAVID HAMILTON LLEWELLYN JONES DOUGLAS MALLOCH JOHN T. MCCUTCHEON ARTHUR MEEKER, JR. HARRIET MONROE" [back]
2. The mentioned check would have covered the Donahey's share of the property and franchise tax relating to the land owned jointly by the Chester Cliffs Club near Cleveland, due every six months. Although neither the Donaheys nor the Chesnutts summered in Ohio after 1921, they kept their land. Chesnutt oversaw the financial matters in the late 1920s, so most correspondence with the Donaheys mentions financial transactions relating to the Club. [back]
3. William Donahey (1883–1970) and his wife Mary Dickerson Donahey (1876–1962) went to Grand Marais on Michigan's Upper Peninsula for their summer vacations. They owned an unusual cottage on Grand Sable Lake: the barrel-shaped Pickle Barrel House, built for them in 1926, evoked William Donahey's Teenie Weenie cartoons and advertising illustrations. In 1937, the Donaheys no longer found it feasible to live in it, and it was moved to Grand Marais in 1937 as a tourist attraction. [back]
4. Both Chesnutt and his wife Susan had health concerns by the early 1930s, and he was bedridden that fall for several weeks, but it is unclear which specific illness or incident Mary Dickerson Donahey refers to here. [back]
