Charles W. Chesnutt to Sarah Mitchell Bailey, 26 February 1931
| Textual Feature | Appearance |
|---|---|
| alterations to base text (additions or deletions) | added or deleted text |
| passage deleted with a strikethrough mark | |
| passage deleted by overwritten added text | Deleted text Added text |
| position of added text (if not added inline) | [right margin] text added in right margin; [above line] text added above the line |
| proofreading mark | ‸ |
| page number, repeated letterhead, etc. | page number or repeated letterhead |
| supplied text | [supplied text] |
| archivist note | archivist note |
February 26, 1931
Mrs. Sarah Mitchell Bailey,
Outhwaite School,1
Cleveland, Ohio.
My dear Mrs. Bailey:
You must pardon me for not having answered sooner your letter of several months ago, but I have been ill a good part of the time, which accounts for my laxness.
With regard to giving your school a copy of one of my books, I have to say that all of my books, except the "Conjure Woman,"2 are out of print and not procurable.3 There are copies of the "Conjure Woman" in the public libraries, which are available for your pupils as well as to the rest of the community.
As I have no copies of my books except a set for my own library, the only way I could give your school a book would be to buy one, which, in view of the small returns at present from my writings, I am sorry I could not afford to do.
With regards and best wishes, Sincerely yours, CWC:MKCorrespondent: Sarah Mitchell Bailey (1862–1937), who was from Cleveland, became the city's first Black public school teacher in 1888. She was active in the temperance and the women's suffrage movement. In 1904, she became the third wife of Horace C. Bailey (1860–1942), the pastor of Cleveland's Antioch Baptist Church. From 1926 until her death, she taught at Cleveland's Outhwaite School.
1. The Outhwaite Public School on Outhwaite Avenue in Cleveland, Ohio, was founded in 1884. Beginning in 1926, the school dedicated itself to the education of Cleveland students who had fallen behind academically but were expected to be able to be reintegrated into their home school. The neighborhood and the student body were by that time predominantly Black. Outhwaite School was renamed the Alfred A. Benesch School in 1962 and closed in 2006. [back]
2. Chesnutt's collection of short stories, The Conjure Woman, was published by Houghton, Mifflin & Company in March 1899. [back]
3. After Chesnutt had received the NAACP's Spingarn Medal, Houghton Mifflin reissued Chesnutt's 1899 short story collection, The Conjure Woman (1928). [back]
