Skip to main content
Please contact the Booth Family Center for Special Collections for assistance with accessing these materials.

Gallery of Living Catholic Authors Collection

 Collection
Identifier: GTM-GAMMS472

Scope and Contents

The Gallery of Living Catholic Authors Collection was formed by the Gallery, founded in 1932 by Sister Mary Joseph, S.L. It was transferred in 1980 from its original home at Webster College in St. Louis to Georgetown. It consists of manuscripts, letters, and photographs by and about more than 600 British, American, European, and Asian Catholic authors of the twentieth century, including such writers as Hugh de Blacam, Roy Campbell, Wilfrid Rowland Childe, August Derleth, Julian Green, Mary Lavin, Claude McKay, Alfred Noyes, Daniel Sargent, and Frank H. Spearman. The strength of the collection is as an indicator of the breadth and depth of the Catholic literary movement, although it also contains a number of highly important and attractive individual items, from a leaf of the holograph manuscript of John F. Kennedy's "Profiles in Courage" (1956) to the corrected typescript of Hilaire Belloc's "The Crisis of Civilization" (1937) to the manuscript of Josephine Ward's last novel "Tudor Sunset" (1932). Appended to the main portion of the collection are extensive files of Daniel Lord, S.J., and a series of architectural sketches by Ralph Adams Cram for a proposed Gallery building.

Dates

  • 1890 - 1965
  • Majority of material found within 1932 - 1961

Creator

Collection-level Access Restrictions

Most manuscripts collections at the Georgetown University Booth Family Center for Special Collections are open to researchers; however, restrictions may apply to some collections. Collections stored off site require a minimum of three days for retrieval. For use of all manuscripts collections, researchers are advised to contact the Booth Family Center for Special Collections in advance of any visit.

Conditions Governing Use

Researchers are solely responsible for determining the copyright status of the materials being used, establishing who the copyright owner is, locating the copyright owner, and obtaining permission for intended use.

Biographical and Historical note

Sister Mary Joseph (Scherer) SL was born in Peoria, Illinois, on September 28, 1883. She was educated at Creighton University, Omaha, Nebraska, receiving a B.A. in 1917 and an M.A. in 1921. She received a Ph.D. from De Paul University, Chicago in 1925. She was a member of the order of the Sisters of Loretto at the Foot of the Cross, and taught English at Loretto academies in Kansas City, Missouri from 1905 to 1906, from 1919 to 1921, and from 1926 to 1929; and in academies in Colorado from 1906 to 1914. She then taught at St. Mary's Academy in Denver from 1914 to 1917. Sr. Mary Joseph became a professor of English at Webster College in 1921, and then served as librarian from 1929 to 1937 when she resigned to devote her time to the Gallery of Living Catholic Authors. She died June 5th, 1967.

**************************

"The Gallery seems to me to be a unique method of aiding the revival of Catholic literature, a revival which cannot be over emphasized..." (Msgr. Fulton J. Sheen)

The Gallery of Living Catholic Authors was founded by Sister Mary Joseph (Scherer), S.L., professor of English at Webster College in Webster Groves, Missouri, from 1921, and librarian from 1929 to 1937. Her aim, so aptly expressed by Msgr. Sheen, was to create a literary hall of fame for contemporary Catholic authors, and to foster an appreciation of Catholic letters by building up a Catholic reading public. In May 1932, Sr. Mary Joseph invited one hundred carefully selected Catholic writers to become members of the Gallery.

Dedicated to Our Lady of Letters, the Gallery was headed by Sr. Mary Joseph as director, aided by an executive council, a board of governors, and various committees. Membership was deisgnated unlimited, and from 1945, foreign language works (untranslated) were admitted based on committee recommendation. In general, the committees accepted all submissions of authors' names. Candidates would then be reviewed and voted on by committees composed of literary authorities knowledgeable in certain fields or foreign languages. On acceptance into the Gallery, authors were requested to send an autographed photograph, a letter, and a page or more of original manuscript. Originals would then be photographed and, in many cases, laminated. Slides were also often made to accompany Sr. Mary Joseph on a lecture circuit of schools, colleges, literary conferences and clubs.

By 1954, Gallery membership of contemporary Catholic authors numbered 775. When membership had reached 200, the board of governors decided to create an academy of its greatest authors, in much the same tradition as the French Academy. The academy was to be composed of 40 authors: 15 Americans and 25 non-Americans. Election to the academy was by a combined electoral and popular vote with vacancies decided by the board. Rev. Francis X. Talbot, S.J., chairman of the board and editor of "America" magazine, headed a national plebiscite, the partial results of which were published in "America" on October 10, 1936. Ulitmately, 31 places were filled: 11 American authors and 20 non-American. G.K. Chesterton was elected to the the academy but died before the formal opening.

The concept of the Gallery of Living Catholic Authors was not only to encompass a collection of autographed photographs and original manuscripts, but a place of research for scholars of the history of contemporary Catholic literature. This library or research center was to house books, pamphlets, magazines, etc., of contemporary Catholic literature, and was to provide an information service offering biographical and bibliographical data on authors. A brochure published in 1954 boasts that the Gallery had collected over 60,000 pages of manuscript, 750 letters, photographs and voice recordings. At that time a card catalogue was also in existence.

Realization of a Gallery library building went so far as commissioning the great architect Ralph Adams Cram for designs. This collection includes a set of original blueprints by Cram of floor plans for the first through third stories of a Catholic Library to be constructed especially to house the Gallery. Also included are elevations of all four sides of the facade. Unfortunately, construction depended on donations, and it must be assumed that without them the Gallery did not attract the monetary assistance needed.

Although the building never materialized, this collection still represents an invaluable archive of Catholic writers and their works. In addition to the material sent by authors, there is a large body of administrative material related to the establishment and operation of the Gallery.

The perpetuity envisioned by Sr. Mary Joseph was not to be the Gallery's lot. She resigned as director in 1960. Plans for the growth and development of the Gallery faded without her inspiration when she died on June 5, 1967, in St. Louis.

Extent

125 Linear Feet (84 boxes and 1 oversized folder)

Language of Materials

English

Arrangement

The collection is organized into 5 series:

Series I. Individual Authors

Series II. Miscellaneous Manuscripts

Series III. Laminated Manuscripts

Series IV. Gallery Archives

Series V. Oversized

Provenance

This collection is the gift of Webster College (June 1981) consisting of authors' material collected for the Gallery of Living Catholic Authors, as well as administrative files. Included is Sr. Mary Joseph's personal correspondence and items such as honorary certificates, academic hood and an honorary doctorate from Seton University. Other items include voice recordings of many of the collected authors, such as Claude McKay; Cram blue prints; and dolls donated by Doran Hurley.

One issue of "Our Lady of Letters" (vol. VII, no. 4), was donated by the Providence Archives, Sisters of Providence (Seattle, Wash.), in 2022.

Title
Gallery of Living Catholic Authors Collection
Status
Completed
Author
Deborah Marrone
Date
1990
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin

Revision Statements

  • 2022: Edited for DACS compliance by John Zarrillo

Repository Details

Part of the Georgetown University Manuscripts Repository

Contact:
Lauinger Library, 5th Floor
37th and O Streets, N.W.
Washington DC 20057