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Creator
Barrus, Clara, 1864-1931
Call number
MssCol 3927
Physical description
.42 linear feet (1 box)
Preferred Citation

Clara Barrus Papers, Manuscripts and Archives Division, The New York Public Library.

Repository
Manuscripts and Archives Division
Access to materials
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Clara Barrus (1864-1931) was a physician and long-time companion and biographer of naturalist John Burroughs. Her papers consist of incoming correspondence, 1906-1931, primarily from her friends Elizabeth Dowden and Charles Fletcher Lummis, her notes on a trip to Italy in 1929, and a few of her poems.

Biographical/historical information

Clara Barrus (1864-1931) was a physician and author best known as the official biographer of the prominent American naturalist writer, John Burroughs (1837-1921). Barrus was born in Port Byron, New York and received an M.D. in 1888 from Boston University. During her medical career she practiced privately in Utica, New York, served on the staff of the Middletown State Homeopathic Hospital for the Insane, and as professor of psychiatry at the Woman's Medical College of New York City.

Barrus met John Burroughs in 1902 and became his devoted follower, interviewer, and frequent companion. She published several essays on Burroughs during his lifetime and, after his death, was named his literary executrix and official biographer. She devoted most of her remaining years to Burroughs' memory, editing his posthumous works and journals and publishing the two-volume Life and Letters of John Burroughs in 1928 and Whitman and Burroughs, Comrades in 1931.

Scope and arrangement

The Barrus papers consist chiefly of letters she received, 1906-1931, from friends Elizabeth Dowden and Charles Fletcher Lummis. The remainder of the papers include additional letters, poems by Barrus, and her notes on a trip to Italy in 1929.

The letters from Elizabeth Dowden of Dublin, Ireland, 1913-1931, relate to personal and literary matters, especially the writings of her husband, Edward Dowden, Irish editor and critic, and to John Burroughs and include references to Walt Whitman, World War I, and Irish nationalism. The letters from Charles Fletcher Lummis concern his health and activities after his retirement from a career as a preservationist and promoter of the Southwest. There are also a small number of letters from Walter S. Crump, Frederick S. Dellenbaugh, Richard Watson Gilder, and others. There are only two copies of letters by Barrus in the collection, one to R.W. Gilder praising his latest book or poetry (1907) and the other a letter of congratulation to Charles Fletcher Lummis written as her contribution to a presentation volume given to him by the Southwest Museum (1923).

Administrative information

Source of acquisition

Gift of Mrs. Frank J. Sprague, 1947, 1950

Processing information

Compiled by Melanie A. Yolles, 2005

Related Material

Additional correspondence between Clara Barrus and Richard Watson Gilder can be found in the Richard Watson Gilder Papers and the Century Company Records, Manuscripts and Archives Division, The New York Public Library.

Using the collection

Location

Manuscripts and Archives Division
Stephen A. Schwarzman Building
Fifth Avenue at 42nd Street, New York, NY 10018-2788
Brooke Russell Astor Reading Room, Third Floor, Room 328

Alternative form available

Letters of Elizabeth Dowden available on microfilm, *ZL-253