Nebraska Authors

Alexander was born in Lincoln and received his bachelor's degree from the University of Nebraska in 1897. After study elsewhere, Alexander would serve as dean and professor of philosophy at the University from 1908 to 1928. He taught philosophy at a time when that subject was conceived much more broadly than it is now. His interests encompassed philosophy, anthropology, art and art history, and religion. He had a special interest in the culture of Native Americans. His students included Helen Blish, who introduced Amos Bad Heart Bull's ledger drawings to scholars.

When the second state capitol building began to decay, Alexander persuaded the citizens of Nebraska of their need for a new capitol building and worked with the architect, Bertram Goodhue, who eventually gave Alexander the task of designing the program of symbolism in artwork and the inscriptions on the building, including "The salvation of the state is watchfulness in the citizen."

He designed the symbolism and inscriptions on the University of Nebraska Football Stadium (famously, "Not the victory but the action; Not the goal but the game; in the deed the glory."), the Rockefeller Center in New York City, the Department of Justice Edifice in Washington D.C., the Oregon State Capitol, and the Los Angeles Public Library. The Syracuse Foundation purchased and renovated the former home of Alexander for both a repository of Alexander's works and artifacts as well as the Nebraska Writers Hall of Fame (1988).

A bust of Hartley Burr Alexander in the Nebraska State Capitol was created by bronze sculptor Tom Palmerton of Brownville.

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Dawes, a Republican, served under three GOP Presidents: He was campaign chairman and comptroller of the currency for William McKinley; Vice President of the United States (1925-1929) under Calvin Coolidge; and Ambassador to England under Herbert Hoover. Charles Dawes was also awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his 1925 "Dawes Plan" addressing the crisis arising from the German reparations settlement after WW I.

Dawes was the son of Civil War General Rufus Dawes and Mary Gates Dawes. Dawes' uncle was James Dawes, Nebraska's governor from 1883-1887. Charles Dawes began his career as a very successful Nebraska businessman, by the turn of the 20th century, following the Depression of 1893, he was a millionaire. Dawes found close friends in William Jennings Bryan and General John J. Pershing. Another associate was Lincoln banker George W. Holmes

Dawes Middle School in Lincoln, NE is named after him.

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Morris received critical acclaim for his literary work, and many awards, but never achieved the broader kind of fame that would be expected to go with the level of critical interest he received.

Morris traveled extensively through Europe during the early 1930's. He had a major photographic retrospective 'Wright Morris: Origin of a Species' at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. He wrote in many different genres and is sometimes credited with the invention of a new genre in his "Photo-Texts." Literary critics sometimes compare him to Sherwood Anderson and Sinclair Lewis; Willa Cather evinced a similar strong sense of place but her writing style was more traditional. He has also been compared to Louise Erdrich, in aspects of his writing style and sense of place.

By chance, in the 1945, Wright Morris and his first wife and Loren Eiseley and his wife Mabel lived in the same apartment building near the University of Pennsylvania, and the two men became friends.

Heritage Room collections at Lincoln City Libraries include page proofs, some corrected manuscript pages, the Wright Morris-Victor Musselman Correspondence, Wright Morris-Gale Christianson letters in our Christianson-Eiseley collection, galley proofs for About Fiction, and A Life. Correspondence between Jane Geske and Wright's widow about the appraisal and sale of his book collection are in our vertical files. See also Magazines in gray flat archival box, Heritage Room office. There are signed materials, e.g. the pamphlet The Writing of My Uncle Dudley in the Wright vertical files, and many additional magazines.

There are two major collections of Wright Morris materials. The University of California, Berkeley's Bancroft Library has 22 linear feet of materials dated 1934-1980, and there is an on-line finding aid. The University of Nebraska-Lincoln Archives & Special Collections has many linear feet of manuscripts, letters and other archival materials. For details, please contact the Archives as the finding aid for the main collection is not yet public. UNL also holds Wright Morris's heavily annotated personal library.

Many of Morris's books were autobiographical:
Wright Morris, Solo: An American Dreamer in Europe 1933-1934. 1983. In HR
Wright Morris, Writing My Life: An Autobiography(First published as "A Cloak of Light"), 1985, 1993. In HR

There are several biographies, among them:
Jackson J. Benson, Haunted: The Strange and Profound Art of Wright Morris. 2013. In HR
David Madden, Wright Morris. 1964. In HR

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