Contains correspondence, diaries, articles,
stories, clippings, memorabilia, photographs, and translations of mostly
unpublished works by Spanish-language writers. Some of the authors are Concha
Espina de Serna, Vicente Blasco Ibáñez, Jose Maria Carretero,
Guillermo Diaz-Caneja, Gregorio Martinez Sierra, Rafael Delgado, Pedro Juan
Labarthe, Jose Lopez- Portillo y Rojas, Emilia Pardo-Bazan, Jose Echegaray and
Eduardo Zamacois. Personal material consists of correspondence and family
photographs, from marriage to Charles Fletcher Lummis, and later to Courtenay
DeKalb, with whom she operated the Roadside Mine in Arizona. Photographs and
correspondence related to the mine are present. Also included are typescripts
of Douglas' published and unpublished articles, stories, and translations.
Original drawings are by E.A. Burbank and Carl Oscar Borg. Correspondence with
friends and publishers includes writers Eugene Rhodes, Henry Knibbs, Concha
Espina, Vicente Blasco Ibáñez, José María
Carretero, Pedro Labarthe, Guillermo Diaz-Caneja, and the publisher Phoebe
Hearst. Diaries and photographs document travels to Mexico and Europe. Stories
were recorded by Douglas while she lived among the Isleta Indians. Mexican and
U.S. newspapers, 1911-1915, report on the Mexican Revolution. Related material
in MS 39 and MS 297.
Collection Number:
MS 037
Repository:
University of Arizona Libraries, Special Collections
University of Arizona
PO Box 210055
Tucson, AZ 85721-0055
Phone: 520-621-6423
Fax: 520-621-9733
URL: http://speccoll.library.arizona.edu/
Biographical Note
Author and translator Frances Douglas was born into a large family on 19
November 1870 in Milford, Connecticut; her parents were Alanson Delos Douglas
and Betsy Ellen Miller. Frances attended only a few years of grammar school,
and when she was sixteen, she joined her older sister Ida in Isleta, New
Mexico. She began studying Spanish soon thereafter, at one point claiming that
she knew "so many people who knew a little of several languages and decided
[she] wanted to know all [she] could about one". Most of her knowledge of the
language was self-taught, acquired from reading and from constant conversation
with the Mexicans and Native Americans living in the area.
In 1891, Frances met author and activist Charles Fletcher Lummis in
Isleta. Lummis was in Isleta working on behalf of the Pueblo Indians who were
resisting government education program; he was also hiding from San Mateo
bosses he had angered with his articles, and who had a reward on his head. [The
two fell in love and had their first child, Turbesé, out of wedlock, as
Lummis' divorce was not yet final.] In 1892-in a rather peculiar
arrangement-Frances and Turbesé went to live with Lummis'
soon-to-be-ex-wife, Dorothea, in Los Angeles until the divorce went through.
The couple had four children: Dorothea (Turbesé, Lummis Fiske (1892- ),
Amado Lummis (1894-1900), Jordan (Quimu) Lummis (1899- ), and Keith Lummis
(1904- ). The couple had a troubled marriage, and in June 1909, Frances fled
with Keith and Turbesé to San Francisco. While in San Francisco, she
began a close friendship with mining engineer Courtenay DeKalb, whom she had
known at least since 1908. In 1911, Frances moved to Tucson and filed for
divorce from Charles Lummis, citing physical and emotional abuse and
philandering. She married Courtenay DeKalb in 1913.
Frances Douglas began writing and translating Spanish authors in 1909,
and published her first translation, of Vincente Blasco Ibanez's
Sangre y Arena (translated title
Blood and Sand), with A.C. McClurg in 1911. Her career
spanned several decades, over the course of which she translated the works of
many Spanish and Latin American authors including Concha Espina de Serna,
José Maria Carretero, Guillermo Diaz-Caneja, Gregorio Martinez Sierra,
Rafael Delgado, Pedro Juan Labarthe, José López-Portillo y Rojas,
Emilia Pardo-Bazan, José Echegaray and Eduardo Zamacois. She is also
credited with transcribing and translating the diary of Junipero Serra, which
had been considered undecipherable. The diary was felt by many to be a
fundamental document in California history. Several of her translations of
Blasco Ibanez were made into motion pictures, including
Blood and Sand (1922) and
The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921, based on
The Dead Command), both of which starred Rudolph
Valentino.
With Courtenay DeKalb, Frances visited Spain twice in 1918 and 1926, on
behalf of the United States Commerce Department. During these visits, in
addition to her work for the government, she visited authors, organizations,
and publishers. She also spent time with Concha Espina, with whom she had
become close. In 1933, the University of Arizona honored Frances Douglas with
an honorary doctor of letters, and in 1935 Frances Douglas became a charter
member of the American Association of University Women. Between 1930-1941, she
was the Associate Editor of
Hispania, and remained on staff as a member of the
magazine's advisory council following 1941.
Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, Frances continued to write and publish
translations of her favorite authors, as well as short stories of her own.
Additionally, she remained active giving speeches to various local and national
women's and book clubs. In 1963, Frances Douglas and her daughter moved to San
Diego, California. Prior to the move, she donated her library of 1100 books to
the University of Arizona's Department of Romance Languages. Frances Douglas
died in Berkeley, California in March 1969.
Scope and Content Note
The bulk of the papers relate to Frances Douglas' life after 1911. With
the exception of photographs of family and friends prior to that date, there is
little information about her early life; many of the photographs of Charles
Lummis are unidentified, even when he is in pictures with others who are
identified. Correspondence (Series II) with family and Douglas' diaries (in
Series I) provide some information regarding her early life, but not very much.
The diary from 1892-1893 documents many of her daily activities in California;
many of the entries are in Spanish. There is a huge gap in the diaries
represented here, with the next diary dated 1910, after Douglas' relocation to
San Francisco. The diaries dated 1910, 1911, and 1912 mention little about her
crumbling relationship with Lummis-although there are a few brief entries
regarding notice of the separation in the papers-and, equally surprising is the
lack of mention of Courtenay DeKalb, whose address is listed on one of her
first copyright applications, in 1908. Additionally, the early correspondence
with family is equally vague on this first part of her life, as if she wished
to wipe parts of it from the record (her entry in
Who's Who in the West lists only her marriage to DeKalb).
However, Douglas' correspondence files for the years following 1911 is a
rich resource for those interested in her work and her relationships with
authors and other leading scholars of the time. As Douglas maintained a copy of
her outgoing correspondence, both sides of a conversation with an author,
editor, or family member are well documented. Researchers will find of
particular interest Douglas' correspondence with publishers and authors, most
particularly her correspondence with Concha Espina, whom she tried diligently
to introduce to the American public in the same way she did with Vincente
Blasco Iba?? Espina's works were not as well received in America as they were
in Spain, and the letters Douglas wrote to one publisher after another on
behalf of the author (and her translations from the Spanish) document her
unsuccessful crusade. Additionally interesting is the correspondence regarding
the Roadside Mine, near Silverbell, Arizona co-owned by Douglas and DeKalb, as
well as her additional mining claims.
In Series III Manuscripts are the drafts of much of her translations as
well as copies of articles, short stories, and book reviews she submitted to
newspapers and magazines. In some cases, Douglas retained the copy of the work
she was translating from Spanish, as well as her notes and vocabulary lists. Of
interest is the copy of the American edition of Blasco Ibanez's
The Dead Command, which Douglas used to note the recommended
changes for the British version of her translation (unpublished). In Series IV
Research Files, are Douglas' clippings on authors she translated, photographs
of the authors, and clippings of stories she wished to translate. Series V
Photographs, in addition to photographs of Douglas, contains a large number of
photographs of the children-mostly cyanotypes-taken by Charles Lummis.
Photographs of trips, other family members, and Tucson round are also
included.
It is the responsibility of the user to obtain permission to publish
from the owner of the copyright (the institution, the creator of the record,
the author or his/her transferees, heirs, legates, or literary executors). The
user agrees to indemnify and hold harmless the Arizona Board of Regents for the
University of Arizona, its officers, employees, and agents from and against all
claims made by any person asserting that he or she is an owner of
copyright.
