Joyce H. Caldwell to Charles W. Chesnutt, 13 February 1931
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WEST VIRGINIA STATE COLLEGE
INSTITUTE, WEST VIRGINIA1
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
W. EDWARD FARRISON
HILLARY C. THORNE
FANNIN S. BELCHER
JANE E. EVERETT
MILES M. JEFFERSON
Feb. 13, 1931
Mr. Chas W. Chestnutt
9719 Lamont Ave.,
Cleveland, Ohio.
My dear Mr. Chestnutt,
We did regret very deeply that illness made it impossible for you to be with us on Jan 30. However, the Literary Club will be very happy to have you as guest on Sunday evening, April 26. I trust that date will meet your approval. I'm sure your selection of "The Negro in Fiction"2 as a subject was very happily made. We look forward to your coming with a great deal of enthusiasm. We would like for you to arrange your schedule so as to spend the following Monday morning on our campus.3
I trust that by this time you are in the best of health.
Very Sincerely yours, Joyce H. Caldwell Pres. Literary Club.Correspondent: 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]
