Overview
Papers of Amercan monologist and author Helen Howe.
Dates
- Creation: 1927-1967
Language of Materials
Collection materials are in English
Conditions Governing Access
This collection is not housed at the Houghton Library but is shelved offsite at the Harvard Depository. Retrieval requires advance notice. Readers should check with Houghton Public Services staff to determine what material is offsite and retrieval policies and times.
Extent
1 linear feet (1 box)Collection includes scripts for over 75 of Helen Howe's monologues. Also included are several unfinished drafts and short stories that were never published as well as radio scripts for on-air performances. The collection also includes programs and promotional materials as well as some correspondence, largely regarding booking appearances. A ledger detailing performance information between 1927 and 1945 is also included.
Biographical / Historical
Monologuist and author Helen Howe studied acting with Georges Vitray in France, joined the New York Theater Guild, performed to critical acclaim in the United States and London, toured with "Community Concerts" during World War II, and wrote several novels and a family history. Her parents, Mark Anthony Dewolfe Howe and Fanny Quincy Howe, were writers. Her brothers were Quincy Howe, an editor and radio commentator, and Mark DeWolfe Howe, a Harvard law professor. Howe married Reginald Allen, curator of the Gilbert and Sullivan collection at the Morgan Library in New York City, and formerly an administrator of the Metropolitan Opera and the Philadelphia Orchestra.
Arrangement
Arranged into the following series:
- I. Scripts
- II. Other material
Physical Location
Harvard Depository
Physical Location
b
Immediate Source of Acquisition
No accession number. A few items transferred from Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America; received: 1982.
Bulk of items from unknown sources, unknown dates.
General note
This collection is shelved offsite at the Harvard Depository. See access restrictions below for additional information.
Processing Information
Processed by: Suzanne E. Sutherland
- Title
- Howe, Helen, 1905-1975. Helen Howe papers, 1927-1967: Guide.
- Author
- Harvard Theatre Collection, Houghton Library, Harvard College Library
- Description rules
- dacs
- Language of description
- und
- EAD ID
- hou02516
Repository Details
Part of the Houghton Library Repository
Houghton Library is Harvard College's principal repository for rare books and manuscripts, archives, and more. Houghton Library's collections represent the scope of human experience from ancient Egypt to twenty-first century Cambridge. With strengths primarily in North American and European history, literature, and culture, collections range in media from printed books and handwritten manuscripts to maps, drawings and paintings, prints, posters, photographs, film and audio recordings, and digital media, as well as costumes, theater props, and a wide range of other objects. Houghton Library has historically focused on collecting the written record of European and Eurocentric North American culture, yet it holds a large and diverse number of primary sources valuable for research on the languages, culture and history of indigenous peoples of the Americas, Africa, Asia and Oceania.
Houghton Library’s Reading Room is free and open to all who wish to use the library’s collections.
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