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This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held in the Wilson Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in our reading room, and not digitally available through the World Wide Web. See the FAQ section for more information.
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Collection Overview
| Size | 12.0 feet of linear shelf space (approximately 4000 items) |
| Abstract | Writer, union activist, and communist Dorothy Markey (nee Dorothy Page Gary) was born in Newport News, Va., in 1897. Under the name Myra Page, Markey was an active political journalist and writer in the 1930s. In the early 1940s, she taught writing at the Writers' School sponsored by the League of American Writers in New York City. During the 1950s and 1960s, she wrote and published the juvenile biographies. Dorothy Markey died in 1993. The collection includes materials relating to the journalistic and literary activities of Dorothy Markey/Myra Page. Included are business and personal correspondence; contracts and other materials concerning the publication of her works in the United States and the Soviet Union; typed and handwritten manuscripts, newspaper clippings, notebooks, and notes relating to the writing of newspaper articles, radio plays, short stories, poems, books, and screenplays; lecture notes, handouts, student writings, and other materials relating to her writing courses; subject files relating to the American South, organized labor, progressive and radical politics, and other topics; and biographical and family materials including photographs of southern sharecroppers and people in the Soviet Union in the 1930s. |
| Creator | Page, Myra, 1897-1993. |
| Language | English |
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Information For Users
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Subject Headings
The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.
Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.
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Biographical
Information
Dorothy Markey (nee Dorothy Page Gary), writer, union activist, and communist who wrote as Myra Page, was born into the family of a well-established physician in Newport News, Va., in 1897. After completing high school, she attended Westhampton College in Richmond, Va., graduating in 1918 with a bachelor's degree in English and history. Markey briefly taught school in Richmond before moving to New York City, where she attended Columbia University and earned a master's degree in political science and sociology in 1920. After graduating, she returned to Virginia and worked for one year as the Industrial Secretary for the YWCA in Norfolk helping to "organize southern working women." Markey spent the next several years working as a shop clerk and machine worker in Philadelphia, Pa., and St. Louis, Mo., while she was involved with organizing workers for the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America. From 1924 to 1928, she studied at the University of Minnesota and earned her Ph.D. in sociology by writing and publishing, Southern Cotton Mills and Labor (1929). During this period, she married John Fordyce Markey and joined the Communist Party.
Over the next two decades, under the pen name Myra Page, Markey was a very active political journalist. Her writings about the social, political, and economic conditions in the American South, Mexico, and the Soviet Union appeared in a number of Communist-sponsored papers, including The Daily Worker, The Southern Worker, Working Woman, and Soviet Russia Today. She was one of The Daily Worker's correspondents in the Soviet Union in the early 1930s, and, for a number of years, she served on the editorial board of Soviet Russia Today. It was during this period that she wrote and published Gathering Storm: A Story of the Black Belt (1932); Soviet Main Street (1933); Moscow Yankee (1935); and With Sun in Our Blood (1950), which was later republished as Daughter of the Hills: A Woman's Part in the Coal Miners' Struggle (1986). In the early 1940s, Markey taught short story writing and similar courses at the Writers' School sponsored by the League of American Writers in New York City.
During the 1950s and 1960s, Markey wrote and published the juvenile biographies Explorer of Sound: Michael Pupin (1964) and The Little Giant of Schenectady: Charles Steinmetz (1956), both released under her married name.
Dorothy Markey died in 1993.
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Scope and Content
The Myra Page papers includes materials relating to the journalistic and literary activities of writer, union activist, and communist Dorothy Markey (nee Dorothy Page Gary), who wrote under the name of Myra Page. Included are business and personal correspondence; contracts and other materials concerning the publication of her works in the United States and the Soviet Union; typed and handwritten manuscripts, newspaper clippings, notebooks, and notes relating to the writing of newspaper articles, radio plays, short stories, poems, books, and screenplays; lecture notes, handouts, student writings, and other materials relating to writing courses that she taught during the 1940s in New York City for the League of American Writers; subject files relating to the American South, organized labor, progressive and radical politics, and other topics; and biographical and family materials, including an annotated transcript of her interview with the Southern Oral History Program and photographs of southern sharecroppers and people in the Soviet Union in the 1930s.
Short journalistic and literary works are articles and short stories written for publication in The Daily Worker, The Southern Worker, Working Woman, and Soviet Russia Today. They concern progressive politics, labor issues in the South, life and politics during the 1930s in the Soviet Union and Mexico, and the United States homefront during World War II. Longer works include juvenile biographies ( Explorer of Sound: Michael Pupin (1964), "Joseph Henry: Genius Who Inherited Franklin's Mantel" (unpublished); and The Little Giant of Schenectady: Charles Steinmetz (1956)); an unproduced screenplay ("Mona Lisa and Da Vinci"); an unpublished autobiographical novel ("Soundings"); and With Sun in Our Blood (1950), which was reissued as Daughter of the Hills (1986).
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Series Quick Links
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Series 1. Correspondence, 1925-1990.
Arrangement: chronological.
Chiefly letters to Myra Page/Dorothy Markey with some drafts of her letters to others. Most of the letters date from the 1960s to the 1980s, but there are clusters of earlier letters from the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. Topics vary, but the dominant theme is Page's efforts to publish her writings. There are also a few letters from Mexico and the Soviet Union that date from the 1930s.
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Series 2. Publishing Materials, 1932-1988.
Arrangement: chronological.
Contracts, advertisements, and other business materials relating to the publication of Myra Page's works. Included are materials from the 1930s that relate to the publication of her works in the Soviet Union.
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Series 3. Writings and Related Materials, 1919-1987.
Arrangement: by type of work.
Chiefly typed manuscripts, newspaper clippings, and research notes relating to books, newspaper articles, radio and screen plays, short stories, poems, and other works written as Myra Page or Dorothy Markey. Also included are published reviews of her book-length works.
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Subseries 3.1. Short Works, 1924-1981.
Chiefly typed manuscripts, newspaper clippings, and notes relating to newspaper articles, radio plays, short stories, poems, and other short journalistic or literary works written as Myra Page or Dorothy Markey. Topics include progressive politics, labor issues in the American South, life and politics in the Soviet Union and Mexico, and the homefront during World War II.
Note that that there are working notes in series 3.4 that may relate to the works in this series.
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Subseries 3.2. Long Works, 1950s-1980s.
Arrangement: alphabetical.
Typed annotated manuscripts, manuscript fragments, research notes, derivative works, and other materials associated with the book-length works written as Myra Page or Dorothy Markey.
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Subseries 3.2.1. Explorer of Sound: Michael Pupin.
Typed annotated manuscripts, research notes, and manuscript fragments of Explorer of Sound: Michael Pupin, a juvenile bography of Hungarian-born, American inventor and physicist, Michael Idvorsky Pupin (1858-1935). This work was first published in 1964 under the name Dorothy Markey.
| Folder 158-165 |
Manuscripts #05143, Subseries: "3.2.1. Explorer of Sound: Michael Pupin." Folder 158-165Folder 158Folder 159Folder 160Folder 161Folder 162Folder 163Folder 164Folder 165 |
| Folder 166 |
Notes #05143, Subseries: "3.2.1. Explorer of Sound: Michael Pupin." Folder 166 |
| Folder 167-169 |
Manuscript fragments #05143, Subseries: "3.2.1. Explorer of Sound: Michael Pupin." Folder 167-169Folder 167Folder 168Folder 169 |
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Subseries 3.2.2. Joseph Henry: Genius Who Inherited Franklin's Mantel.
Typed annotated manuscripts, research notes, and manuscript fragments of "Joseph Henry: Genius Who Inherited Franklin's Mantel," an unpublished juvenile biography of Joseph Henry (1797-1878), 19th-century American scientist who served as the first director of the Smithsonian Institution.
| Folder 170-172 |
Partial manuscripts #05143, Subseries: "3.2.2. Joseph Henry: Genius Who Inherited Franklin's Mantel." Folder 170-172Folder 170Folder 171Folder 172 |
| Folder 173-174 |
Partial manuscripts with critiques #05143, Subseries: "3.2.2. Joseph Henry: Genius Who Inherited Franklin's Mantel." Folder 173-174Folder 173Folder 174 |
| Folder 175-177 |
Notes #05143, Subseries: "3.2.2. Joseph Henry: Genius Who Inherited Franklin's Mantel." Folder 175-177Folder 175Folder 176Folder 177 |
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Subseries 3.2.3. The Little Giant of Schenectady: A Story of Charles Steinmetz.
Typed annotated manuscripts, research notes, manuscript fragments, and an audiotaped reading of The Little Giant of Schenectady: A Story of Charles Steinmetz, a juvenile biography of Prussian-born, American electrical engineer, inventor, and socialist, Charles Proteus Steinmetz (1865-1923). This work was published in 1956 under the name Dorothy Markey.
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Subseries 3.2.4. Mona Lisa and Da Vinci, A Screenplay.
Typed annotated manuscripts, research notes, and manuscript fragments of "Mona Lisa and Da Vinci," an unproduced screenplay that was written under the names Myra Page and Jonathan Finn.
| Folder 184-186 |
Manuscripts #05143, Subseries: "3.2.4. Mona Lisa and Da Vinci, A Screenplay." Folder 184-186Folder 184Folder 185Folder 186 |
| Folder 187 |
Manuscript fragments #05143, Subseries: "3.2.4. Mona Lisa and Da Vinci, A Screenplay." Folder 187 |
| Folder 188 |
Notes #05143, Subseries: "3.2.4. Mona Lisa and Da Vinci, A Screenplay." Folder 188 |
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Subseries 3.2.5. Soundings.
Typed annotated manuscripts, research notes, manuscript fragments, and excerpts of "Soundings," an unpublished autobiographical novel written under the name Myra Page.
| Folder 189-201 |
Partial manuscripts #05143, Subseries: "3.2.5. Soundings." Folder 189-201Folder 189Folder 190Folder 191Folder 192Folder 193Folder 194Folder 195Folder 196Folder 197Folder 198Folder 199Folder 200Folder 201 |
| Folder 202-220 |
Manuscript fragments #05143, Subseries: "3.2.5. Soundings." Folder 202-220Folder 202Folder 203Folder 204Folder 205Folder 206Folder 207Folder 208Folder 209Folder 210Folder 211Folder 212Folder 213Folder 214Folder 215Folder 216Folder 217Folder 218Folder 219Folder 220 |
| Folder 221-226 |
Notes #05143, Subseries: "3.2.5. Soundings." Folder 221-226Folder 221Folder 222Folder 223Folder 224Folder 225Folder 226 |
| Folder 227 |
"Tidewater Girl" #05143, Subseries: "3.2.5. Soundings." Folder 227 |
| Folder 228 |
"Daughter of Man" #05143, Subseries: "3.2.5. Soundings." Folder 228 |
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Subseries 3.2.6. With Sun in Our Blood or Daughter of the Hills: A Woman's Part in the Coal
Miners' Struggle.
Typed annotated manuscripts, research notes, manuscript fragments, derivative works, and a dust jacket relating to With Sun in Our Blood and Daughter of the Hills. With Sun in Our Blood was first published in 1950 and subsequently republished in 1986 as Daughter of the Hills.
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Subseries 3.3. Reviews of Books, 1933-1987.
Book reviews of works published as Myra Page or Dorothy Markey.
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Subseries 3.4. Journals, Notebooks, and Notes, 1919-1987.
A journal of poems, several working research notebooks, and loose-leaf notes chiefly relating to Page's literary and journalistic projects. When possible, notes readily identifiable as relating to specific works have been placed with the relevant materials in series 3.2 for short works and 3.3 for book-length works.
| Folder 250-251 |
Journal of poems and enclosures, 1919 #05143, Subseries: "3.4. Journals, Notebooks, and Notes, 1919-1987." Folder 250-251Folder 250Folder 251 |
| Folder 252 |
Notebook: Mexico, 1938 #05143, Subseries: "3.4. Journals, Notebooks, and Notes, 1919-1987." Folder 252 |
| Folder 253-258 |
Notebooks #05143, Subseries: "3.4. Journals, Notebooks, and Notes, 1919-1987." Folder 253-258Folder 253Folder 254Folder 255Folder 256Folder 257Folder 258 |
| Folder 259-261 |
Scrapbook and enclosures, 1950s #05143, Subseries: "3.4. Journals, Notebooks, and Notes, 1919-1987." Folder 259-261Folder 259Folder 260Folder 261 |
| Folder 262-267 |
Notes #05143, Subseries: "3.4. Journals, Notebooks, and Notes, 1919-1987." Folder 262-267Folder 262Folder 263Folder 264Folder 265Folder 266Folder 267 |
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Series 4. Writing Courses, 1940-1981.
Lecture notes, handouts, student writings, and other materials related to the writing courses that Myra Page taught in New York City for the League of American Writers. Also included are materials from a children's writing contest and a poetry workshop that she attended.
| Folder 268-278 |
League of American Writers, Writers' School, 1940s #05143, Series: "4. Writing Courses, 1940-1981." Folder 268-278Folder 268Folder 269Folder 270Folder 271Folder 272Folder 273Folder 274Folder 275Folder 276Folder 277Folder 278 |
| Folder 279 |
Hudson River Coalition children's writing contest, 1975 #05143, Series: "4. Writing Courses, 1940-1981." Folder 279 |
| Folder 280 |
Poetry workshop, 1981 #05143, Series: "4. Writing Courses, 1940-1981." Folder 280 |
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Series 5. Subject Files, 1919-1988.
Files created from materials collected by Page. Included are newsletters, magazines, pamphlets, flyers, articles, and other materials clustering around topical areas such as the southeastern United States, especially Appalachia and the Highlander Folk School; organized labor, primarily the steelworkers in the shipyards of Newport News, Va., and the coal miners of Southern Appalachia; progressive and radical politics; and other subjects.
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Subseries 5.1. American South, 1953-1988.
Newsletters, magazines, pamphlets, flyers, articles, and other materials concerning issues of social and economic justice in the southern United States, especially in Appalachia.
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Subseries 5.2. Labor Unions, 1919-1986.
Pamphlets, flyers, newsletters, articles, and other materials concerning organized labor in the southeastern United States. The collected materials relate primarily to mine workers in Appalachia, striking steelworkers from the shipyards in Newport News, Va., and textile workers and the Southern Tenant Farmers' Union.
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Subseries 5.3. Progressive and Radical Politics, 1939-1986.
Pamphlets, flyers, newsletters, articles, and other materials concerning progessive and radical politics.
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Subseries 5.4. Miscellaneous, 1930s-1982.
Articles, pamphlets, flyers, newsletters, and other materials concerning a variety of topics, including United States public policy, civil defense, and Mexico.
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Series 6. Biographical and Family Materials, 1910-1986.
Autobiographical notes; annotated transcripts of an oral history interview; photographs; newspaper clippings; genealogical materials; a college yearbook; and materials relating to educational, social, civic, and professional organizations with which Dorothy Markey was associated. There is a file related to a Piccoli sculpture that the Markeys donated to the Hudson River Museum. Photographs include pictures of southern sharecroppers and people in the Soviet Union that were taken in the 1930s.
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Series 7. Books, 1923-1981.
Books from Myra Page's library, some with inscriptions.
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Items Separated
Items separated include photographs (P-5143), audiotapes (C-5143), and oversize papers (0P-5143).
Back to TopProcessed by: Matthew Turi, February 2004
Encoded by: Matthew Turi, March 2004
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