SCRBG 1 Inventory of Countee Cullen Correspondence, 1918-1939 University of Minnesota Libraries April 2004
University of Minnesota Libraries Minneapolis, MN 55455
Finding aid created by Christine DeZelar-Tiedman July 25, 2001 University of Minnesota LibrariesGivens Collection of African-American Literature, Special Collections and Rare Books [scrbg] Cullen, Countee, 1903-1946 Countee Cullen Correspondence, 1918-1939 (bulk 1918-1927) 1 box The collection consists of letters from poet Countee Cullen to his childhood friend William Fuller Brown, Jr. Much of the correspondence refers to Cullen's writing and includes many handwritten and manuscript copies of poems. SCRBG 1 English Use of Materials

Items in this collection do not circulate and can be used in-house only.

 Copyright

Copyright of all materials in the collection is retained by the Cullen estate. Contact the Amistad Research Center, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118-5698, (504) 865-5535, for permission to quote any items in the collection for commercial purposes.

 Acquisition Information

Purchased in 1986 from Mrs. Nancy Brown, wife of William F. Brown, Jr., through the University of Minnesota Foundation as the first major acquisition of the Black Literature Collection (later Givens Collection of African-American Literature).

 Arrangement

The material is arranged in three series:

Correspondence Poems Magpie Biographical Note

Born in 1903, Countee Cullen was a major figure in the Harlem Renaissance. Primarily known as a poet, he also wrote children's books, plays, and a novel. Born Countee Porter, he was adopted by Rev. Frederick Cullen, a Methodist minister, and attended DeWitt Clinton High School in New York City. He began writing poetry as a teenager and edited his high school newspaper and literary magazine. Cullen received degrees from New York University and Harvard. He married Yolande DuBois, daughter of W.E.B. DuBois, in 1928, but they divorced in 1930. He was a French teacher at Frederick Douglas Junior High School, where one of his students was James Baldwin. He married Ida Mae Roberson in 1940.

Cullen's poetry was in the lyric romantic tradition of Keats and Shelley, though he often (but not exclusively) touched upon racial concerns. Among is best known works are Color, Copper Sun, and The Ballad of the Brown Girl. He was writing the book of the musical St. Louis Woman when he died in 1946.

William Fuller Brown, Jr. was born in Lyon Mountain, N.Y. in 1904 and received degrees from Cornell and Columbia Universities. He was a research physicist at several firms including Sun Oil Co. and 3M. He later served as an electrical engineering professor at the University of Minnesota from 1957-1973. He died in St. Paul, Minnesota in 1983.

 Scope and Content Note

The collection consists of correspondence from Countee Cullen to his childhood friend William F. Brown, Jr., as well as miscellaneous items relating to Cullen's writing. Many letters are partially written in Latin, and concern Cullen's literary and scholarly pursuits. Cullen included in his letters many handwritten and manuscript copies of his poems, in addition to a few newspaper clippings of his published poems, and copies of the high school literary journal and newspaper for which Cullen wrote. Also included are several of Cullen's attempts at writing song lyrics, as well as a copy of a letter regarding this pursuit from a composer's bureau. The bulk of the correspondence is from the years 1918-1927.

Index Terms

This collection is indexed under the following headings in the catalog of the University of Minnesota Libraries. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons, or places should search the catalog using these headings.

Cullen, Countee, 1903-1946. Brown, William Fuller, 1904- Dewitt Clinton High School (New York, N.Y.) High school students' writings, American. Correspondence. Clippings. Essays. Manuscripts. Poetry. Programs. Sheet music. Advertising. Student newspapers and periodicals. Clinton news (New York, N.Y. : Dewitt Clinton High School) Magpie (New York, N.Y.) Detailed Description of the Collection

The following section contains a detailed listing of the materials in the collection.The correspondence is arranged chronologically. Handwritten poems and other items were often included in Cullen's letters to Brown; titles of these are listed under the date of the letter with which they were sent. The collection also includes undated typed manuscript copies of poems, some in more than one version, and many with Cullen's editorial changes written in pencil. These are arranged alphabetically by title.

Correspondence 1 Correspondence, 1918 Sept. 10. 1 item + envelope. 2 Correspondence, 1918 Sept. 22. 1 item + envelope. 3 Correspondence, 1918 Dec. 26. 1 item + envelope. 4 Correspondence, 1919 Jan. 21. 1 item + envelope. 5 Correspondence, 1919 Jan. 30. 2 items + envelope. 6 Correspondence, 1919 Feb. 22. 1 item + envelope. 7 Correspondence, 1919 Apr. 15. 1 item + envelope. 8 Correspondence, 1919 Jun. 6. 1 item + envelope. 9 Correspondence, 1919 Jul. 31. 1 item + envelope. 10 Correspondence, 1919 Nov. 4. 1 item + envelope. 11 Correspondence, 1919 Dec. 14. 3 items + envelope. 12 Correspondence, 1920 Jan. 24. 1 item + envelope. 13 Correspondence, 1920 Mar. 29. 1 item + envelope. 14 Correspondence, 1920 May 15. 5 items + envelope.

Includes: "Words", "The Poet", "The Puzzle", "The Prodigal", "Lad & Lass"

 15 Correspondence, 1920 Jul. 27. 5 items + envelope.

Includes: "Gods", "To Jean on Her 16th Birthday", "Fortibus Pulchrae", "Query", "Love Came Like a Star", "Life and Death", "Judgment", "Eyes"

 16 Correspondence, 1920 Jul. 28. 1 item. 17 Correspondence, 1920 Sept. 29. 3 items + envelope.

Includes: "The New Mayflower", "I Held Thee as a Charm", "When I am Dead", "Auror Modernus (After the Quarrel)", "Heart's Door", "Petition"

18 Correspondence, 1920 Oct. 21. 1 item. 19 Correspondence, 1920 Nov. 6. 3 items + envelope. 20 Correspondence, 1920 Dec. 24. 1 item + envelope. 21 Correspondence, 1921 Jan. 8. 6 items + envelope.

Includes: "Road Song", "In Clinton's Heart", "The Shadow", "Ave Atque Vale", "Noel"

 22 Correspondence, 1921 Feb. 21. 1 item. 23 Correspondence, 1921 Mar. 23. 2 items + envelope.

Includes "In Memory of Lincoln"

 24 Correspondence, 1918 [i.e. 1921] Apr. 9. 7 items + envelope.

Includes: "A Lover Teaches the Alphabet", "Values", "Motherhood", "The Parting of the Ways", Clinton news, Vol. 10, iss. 235 (Apr. 15, 1921)

 25 Correspondence, 1921 May 14. 6 items + envelope.

Includes: "On Songs", "The Secret", "Pan on Boy's Week", "God and the Negro" (speech)

 26 Correspondence, 1921 Jun. 20. 1 item + envelope. 27 Correspondence, 1921 Jul. 6. 3 items + envelope.

Includes: "I Only Know I Love You", "Good-By Means Two Broken Hearts"

 28 Correspondence, 1921 Aug. 21. 9 items + envelope.

Includes: "At the End of the Rainbow There's Gold", "My Beautiful You", "A Song for the Wife", "The Girl God Made for Me", "The Moth and the Flame", "Drifting Down Love's Bay"

 29 Correspondence, 1921 Sept. 12. 1 item + envelope. 30 Correspondence, 1921 Oct. 3. 2 items + envelope.

Includes Clinton news, Vol. 11, iss. 241 (Sept. 16, 1921)

 31 Correspondence, 1921 Oct. 29. 1 item + envelope. 32 Correspondence, 1921 Dec. 28. 5 items + envelope.

Includes: Sweethearts, Facutlywocky, Night Rain, On the Arista(essay)

 33 Correspondence, 1921 Dec. 30. 1 item + envelope. 34 Correspondence, 1922 Feb. 8. 1 item. 35 Correspondence, 1922 Feb. 12. 5 items + envelope.

Includes: Gypsy Road Song, Balsam, A Gift, An Old Old Song

 36 Correspondence, 1922 Apr. 13. 3 items + envelope.

Includes A Life of Dreams

 37 Correspondence, 1922 Apr. 18. 3 items + envelope.

Includes If You Should Go

 38 Correspondence, 1922 Jun. 8. 1 item + envelope. 39 Correspondence, 1922 Jul. 11. 2 items + envelope.

Includes In Praise of Boys

 40 Correspondence, 1922 Aug. 20. 1 item. 41 Correspondence, 1922 Sept. 25. 6 items + envelope.

Includes: Questioning Lydia, As Then, Even Now, The Poet to His Spouse

 42 Correspondence, 1922 Nov. 12. 3 items + envelope.

Includes: The Change, No Dreams to Sell

 43 Correspondence, 1923 Feb. 1. 2 items + envelope.

Includes The Ballad of the Brown Girl

 44 Correspondence, 1923 Mar. 5. 1 item + envelope. 45 Correspondence, 1923 Mar. 21. 1 item. 46 Correspondence, 1923 Mar. 29. 1 item. 47 Correspondence, 1923 Apr. 12. 1 item + envelope. 48 Correspondence, 1923 Apr. 24. 1 item + envelope. 49 Correspondence, 1923 Apr. 27. 1 item + envelope. 50 Correspondence, 1923 May 4. 2 items + envelope.

Includes From Youth to Age

 51 Correspondence, 1923 May 28. 1 item + envelope. 52 Correspondence, 1923 Jun. 23. 2 items + envelope.

Includes Wisdom Cometh with the Years

 53 Correspondence, 1923 Jun. 28. 2 items. 54 Correspondence, 1923 Aug. 10. 3 items + envelope.

Includes: The Moth & The Flame, Mary, Mother of Christ(sheet music; music by Wilbur Lesemann)

 55 Correspondence, 1923 Sept. 9. 1 item + envelope. 56 Correspondence, 1923 Sept. 10. 1 item + envelope. 57 Correspondence, 1923 Dec. 18. 1 item + envelope. 58 Correspondence, 1923 Dec. 23. 1 item + envelope. 59 Correspondence, 1924 Jan. 2. 1 item + envelope. 60 Correspondence, 1924 Mar. 10. 1 item + envelope. 61 Correspondence, 1924 Jul. 10. 2 items + envelope.

Includes Spirit Birth

 62 Correspondence, 1924 Aug. 20. 1 item + envelope. 63 Correspondence, 1924 Sept. 17. 1 item + envelope. 64 Correspondence, 1924 Nov. 25. 1 item + envelope. 65 Correspondence, 1925 Jan. 2. 1 item + envelope. 66 Correspondence, 1925 Jul. 22. 1 item + envelope. 67 Correspondence, 1926 Apr. 7. 1 item + envelope. 68 Correspondence, 1926 Jun. 26. 1 item + envelope. 69 Correspondence, 1926 Aug. 28. 2 items + envelope.

Includes To Endymion

 70 Correspondence, 1927 Apr. 13? 1 item + envelope. 71 Correspondence, 1927 Jun. 6. 1 item + envelope. 72 Correspondence, 1936 Nov. 6. 1 item + envelope. 73 Correspondence, 1937? 1 item. 74 Correspondence, 1938? 1 item. 75 Correspondence, 1939. 1 item. Poems 76 Poems, n.d. 9 items.

Includes: Body and Soul (2 c.), Bread and Wine, Caprice (2 c.), Cast Off, Colored Blues Singer, Disenchantment (2 c.)

 77 Poems, n.d. 10 items.

Includes: En Passant, An Epitaph for a Master and His Slave, Gods, A Group of Epitaphs (2 c.), If Love Be Staunch, In Memoriam (2 c.), Judas Iscariot, The Lover's Grapes are Hung too High, The Magic Touch

 78 Poems, n.d. 10 items.

Includes: Mater Dolorosa (2 c.), Near White (2 c.), Nocturne, Rivaled, Road Song, Scandal and Gossip, Song in Praise, A Song of Sour Grapes

 79 Poems, n.d. 5 items.

Includes: The Spark, Spring Reminiscence, Suicide Chant, Timid Lover, To John Keats, Poet, at Springtime

 80 Poems, n.d. 8 items.

Includes: To One Who Said Me Nay, To One Who Was Cruel (2 c.), Under the Mistletoe, Vilanelle Serenade (2 c.), Wisdom Cometh with the Years, Words to My Love

 Magpie 81 Magpie, 1919-1921. 3 items.