Jack Conroy Papers, 1864-1991

Gift, Jack Conroy, 1989.

The Jack Conroy Papers are open for research in the Special Collections Reading Room; 5 folders at a time maximum (Priority II).

The Jack Conroy Papers are the physical property of the Newberry Library. Copyright may belong to the authors or their legal heirs or assigns. For permission to publish or reproduce any materials from this collection, contact the Roger and Julie Baskes Department of Special Collections.

Jack Conroy Papers, The Newberry Library, Chicago.

Diana Haskell, 1992; Martha Briggs, Alison Hinderliter, Pamela Olson, and Monica Petraglia, 2003.

This inventory was created with the generous support of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this inventory do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

John Wesley Conroy was born Dec. 5, 1898 to Irish immigrants in Monkey Nest, a coal mining camp in Missouri. From age 13 he labored in various train car factories, steel mills, and auto factories. Conroy drew upon these experiences to write his first novel, The Disinherited. Widely reviewed, The Disinherited propelled its impoverished author, then 34, into public attention both in the U.S. and abroad and firmly established his reputation as an authentic worker-writer of the proletarian literary movement.

While editor of literary "little magazines" such as The Rebel Poet, The Anvil, and The New Anvil, Conroy helped launch writers like Richard Wright, Erskine Caldwell, and Nelson Algren. In 1938 Conroy came to Chicago, on Algren's suggestions, to work on the Illinois Writer's Project. Along with recording folktales and industrial folklore, Conroy was assigned to the black history portion of the IWP, and collaborated with Arna Bontemps, producing the pioneering black studies works They Seek A City (1945) and Anyplace But Here (1965), both about African-American migration from the South to the North. Conroy and Bontemps also collaborated on several successful juvenile books based on folktales, including The Fast Sooner Hound (1942) and Slappy Hooper, The Wonderful Sign Painter (1946)

In 1965, Conroy moved from Chicago back to Moberly, Missouri, where he lived until his death in 1990. He continued to write into his 80's, publishing The Weed King and Other Stories in 1985. Over the course of his career, Conroy was also a teacher and lecturer, and a mentor to younger radical writers.

Correspondence, works, scrapbooks, subject files, magazines, journal submissions, photographs, and ephemera documenting the life and literary output of Jack Conroy.

The bulk of the collection is correspondence to Jack from friends, relatives, coworkers, colleagues, and admirers. Prominent and frequent correspondents include Nelson Algren, Sanora Babb, Arna Bontemps, Gwendolyn Brooks, Malcolm Cowley, Lawrence "Bud" Fallon, Lou Gilbert, Curt Johnson, H.H. Lewis, James Light, Frank Mead, H.L. Mencken, Charlie Miller, Emerson Price, John C. "Jack" Rogers, and W.W. "Wallie" Wharton. Conroy's works are primarily typescript, and include entire novels as well as assorted lecture notes, poems, and sketches for his proposed autobiography, which he never completed. There are also copies of reviews and articles published in various newspapers. His subject files include newsclippings of people he knew and/or admired, biographical information, and reviews and promotional material for his works. He collected a vast amount of "little magazines" which illuminate the radical ideas and philosophies from the 1930's to the 1950's. His scrapbooks are also newsclippings, kept together by subject.

Conroy kept some originals of submissions he received for publication, as well as short works by friends or colleagues. He started to compile press about himself and his books, as well as articles on various topics, into seven scrapbooks. The collection is rounded out with an assortment of photographs and ephemera, including Conroy's various membership cards and some audiocassette tapes of Conroy reading from The Disinherited. Family and personal papers include cards and letters to and from various family members of Conroy's, with some financial and miscellaneous other personal documents.

Papers are organized in the following series:

Title Box Series 1: Incoming Correspondence Boxes 1-38 Series 2: Outgoing Correspondence Box 39 Series 3: Works Boxes 40-44 Series 4: Subject Files Boxes 45-52 Series 5: Personal Magazine Collection Boxes 53-89 Series 6: Submissions Boxes 90-91 Series 7: Photographs Boxes 92-93 Series 8: Scrapbooks Boxes 94-95 Series 9: Ephemera Box 96 Series 10: Family and Personal Papers Boxes 97-99

• Names
  • Algren, Nelson, 1909-1981
  • Babb, Sanora
  • Bontemps, Arna Wendell, 1902-1973
  • Brooks, Gwendolyn, 1917-2000
  • Caldwell, Erskine, 1903-
  • Conroy, Gladys
  • Cowley, Malcolm, 1898-1989
  • Fallon, Lawrence
  • Gilbert, Lou, 1909-1978
  • Hagglund, Ben, 1908-
  • Hazlett, Carolee
  • Johnson, Curt, 1928-
  • Le Sueur, Meridel
  • Lewis, H.H., 1901-
  • Lieber, Maxim
  • Light, James F.
  • Mencken, H. L. (Henry Louis), 1880-1956
  • Price, Emerson
  • Rogers, John, 1907-
  • Rowland, Neal
  • Snow, Walter, 1905-1973
  • Stracke, Win, 1908-1991
  • Terkel, Studs, 1912-
  • Wharton, Walter William
  • Wixson, Douglas C.
  • Wright, Richard, 1908-1960
  • Writers' Program of the Work Projects Administration in the State of Illinois.
• Subject
  • Bohemianism -- Illinois -- Chicago
  • Chicago
  • Literature
  • Manuscripts, American -- Illinois -- Chicago
  • New Left -- Illinois -- Chicago
  • Radicalism -- Middle West -- 20th century
  • Radicalism in literature
  • Radicals -- Middle West -- 20th century
  • Social Action
  • Working class authors -- United States
  • Working class writings, American -- History and criticism
• Geographic CoverageChicago (Ill.) -- Intellectual life -- 20th century