Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Cemeteries, Rajia Hassib

Critical Humanities

The first house we bought in West Virginia was sandwiched between two cemeteries. The larger one stood behind our house and was hidden by a patch of trees, so we could see it only in the winter when the trees lost their leaves and the headstones emerged, rectangular specks visible between the bare branches. The smaller cemetery perched on top of a low hill across from our house, on the other side of the narrow, dead-end street.

01. Finding Aid To The Physical Collection, Robert H. Ellison, Elizabeth James

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This document follows the same format as Marshall's other Guides to Manuscript Collections. It includes a biographical note, the "scope and content" of the archive, and other information, along with a complete listing of the contents of each of the 31 boxes on the shelves.

11. Miscellaneous Items, Melville Homer Cummings, Robert H. Ellison

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The Cummings collection includes 34 miscellaneous items, ranging from his drivers licenses to a document entitled "End Alien Control of the United States." All items are posted here as a single PDF; additional information is provided in the User Guide.

12. Newspaper Articles By And About Cummings And His Family, Melville Homer Cummings, Robert H. Ellison

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The Cummings collection includes some 120 newspaper clippings by and about Cummings and his family; many of Cummings' pieces are short poems published as Corner Couplets or maxims from "Josh Hayseed." All of the clippings are posted here as a single PDF; additional information is provided in the User Guide.

04. Radio Addresses, Melville Homer Cummings, Robert H. Ellison

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The Cummings collection includes 35 addresses delivered over the radio. Most aired on station WMON in Montgomery, West Virginia; a few were broadcast over WLW in Cincinnati. They are posted here as a single PDF, and combined with the sermons in a single tab in the User Guide.

05. Newspaper Columns, Melville Homer Cummings, Robert H. Ellison

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The Cummings collection includes 66 columns written for various newspapers. They were published under 4 headlines: "Clergyman Chatter," "Our Weekly Message," "Our Weekly Visit," and "The Parson Writes." In some of the clippings, only the words "Our Weekly" are visible, so we cannot be sure which category they belong to.

All 66 columns are posted here as s single PDF. There are also supplemental files for "Clergyman Chatter," "Our Weekly Message/Visit," and "The Parson Writes."

The columns do not have individual titles, but they often have section headings; for ease of navigation, the first heading in each column is included …

13. Poems Not By Cummings, Melville Homer Cummings, Robert H. Ellison

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The Cummings collection includes 26 poems that were among the donated materials but turned out to be definitely or probably not by Cummings. They are posted here as a single PDF; information about each poem, including authorship when available, is provided in the User Guide.

03. Sermons, Melville Homer Cummings, Robert H. Ellison

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The Cummings collection includes approximately 100 typed and handwritten sermons, sermons printed or summarized in the newspaper, and some "sermons in rhyme." The sermons and radio addresses have been combined in a single tab in the User Guide.

The master PDF of the sermons is nearly 150MB in size; to make things somewhat more manageable, the contents of each folder in the physical collection have been upload as supplemental files.

06. Poems, Melville Homer Cummings, Robert H. Ellison

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The Cummings collection includes approximately 45 stand-alone poems, 9 booklets of poems, and An Earth Wayfarer, a 111-page spiral-bound book. Everything is posted here as a single PDF; information about individual poems, including each selection in the booklets and Earth Wayfarer, is provided in the User Guide.

08. Correspondence, Melville Homer Cummings, Robert H. Ellison

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The Cummings collection includes 39 complete or partial letters to or from Cummings; many of his drafts are typed on the back of his sermon manuscripts. All of the letters are posted here as a single PDF; information about each one is provided in the User Guide.

09. Literary And Bible Training School, Melville Homer Cummings, Robert H. Ellison

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The Cummings collection includes items pertaining to his time at the Literary and Bible Training School (now Trevecca Nazarene University) in Nashville, Tennessee, from which he graduated in 1909. There are examination papers he wrote on homiletics and theology, along with the catalog for the 1909-10 academic year. All items are posted here as a single PDF; additional information is provided in the User Guide.

07. Songs, Melville Homer Cummings, Robert H. Ellison

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The Cummings collection includes his work as a song writer and publisher: 75 stand-alone songs, approximately 40 booklets of his songs, and 18 books he published with his own songs and those of other artists. There are also approximately 420 song books (336 unique titles) from other publishers, 23 of which contain at least one of Cummings' songs. Information about each of these songs--295 in all--is provided in the User Guide.

All of these songs, along with the relevant front- and backmatter in the books, are posted here as a single PDF. It is nearly 140 MB; to make …

10. Mccrum Slavonic Training School, Melville Homer Cummings, Robert H. Ellison

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The Cummings collection includes 2 publications by the McCrum Slavonic Training School in Uniontown, Pennsylvania. They date to 1912, the year Mary Kacmar graduated from the school, and 1918, the year she and Cummings married. They are posted here as a single PDF; additional information is provided in the User Guide.

"Our Women Are Made Of The Right Stuff": Gender, Politics, And Conflict In Civil War West Virginia, Amanda Romain Shaver

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

“’Our Women Are Made of the Right Stuff:’ Gender, Politics, and Conflict in Civil War West Virginia” examines the lives and contributions of white West Virginia women and argues that they were not merely victims of the war, but dynamic participants whose opinions were influential and whose actions determined the ability of both the Union and Confederate armies to wage war in Appalachia. Striking a balance between the antebellum standards of “True Womanhood” and the emerging ideals of the women’s rights movement, West Virginia women became politically engaged in both the statehood movement and the Civil War. They transformed their …

“A Constant Reminder To All”: Remembering Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson In West Virginia, Steven Cody Straley

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

This thesis argues that Confederate heritage groups leading the Lost Cause Movement in West Virginia promoted Stonewall Jackson, through tactics such as ceremonies, publications, and monuments, to the point where his appeal expanded beyond that of former Confederates and their descendants. During the late 1800s, Confederate supporters in the state formed branches of Confederate heritage organizations and espoused a Lost Cause narrative with Stonewall Jackson as its figurehead. In doing so, they accomplished two things: to integrate the seemingly proUnion West Virginia into Confederate memory, and to gain acceptance of Confederates as full members of West Virginia society. Jackson’s advocates …

1981-2021: The Early Development Of The Marshall University Joan C. Edwards School Of Medicine And Its Department Of Medicine, Maurice A. Mufson

Internal Medicine

When we arrived in Huntington, the physician shortage was so extreme that we, who had great medical connections, found it difficult to locate physicians who accepted new patients. We invited the first class of medical students, the Class of 1981, who began medical school in January 1978, their spouses, and all faculty and spouses to our home for an evening of fellowship and food (Appendix 1: The First Graduating Class, the Class of 1981). The first class included twenty-four students, and everyone invited fit in our house for the gathering. Within three years, the medical students and staff had grown …

The Library Of Appalachian Preaching: A Digital-Humanities Project At Marshall University, Robert H. Ellison, Larry Sheret

English Faculty Research

This article provides an overview of the sermons in the Special Collections Department at Marshall and a description of the Library of Appalachian Preaching, a project that will make these materials universally discoverable and accessible online. In addition to the sermons themselves, the Library will include biographical sketches of each preacher featured in the project and a robust User Guide, a Google sheet which users can search, sort, and download to help make their research as efficient and productive as possible

Episcopal Sermons In The Library Of Appalachian Preaching, Robert Ellison, Larry Sheret

English Faculty Research

The Library of Appalachian Preaching provides online access to sermons preached in Appalachia, or elsewhere by preachers with ties to the Appalachian region. This article, in a newsletter published by the Historical Society of the Episcopal Church, discusses Episcopal sermons that are currently in the Library, and some that will be added in the very near future. 

Minimum Capacity, Sandra Reed

Art & Design Student Research

Students in this project were inspired to create an exhibition for which the exhibition venue would be filled to maximum capacity on the night of the reception in April. However, by the time that the students returned from their trip to NYC, it became clear that the COVID-19 pandemic would make that exhibition impossible. In response, while retaining “maximum capacity” as the motivating prompt, the students pivoted and created new work for this zine rather than for a traditional exhibition. By definition, the zine is small yet the students’ work addresses important topics such as infrastructure, possessions, technology, femininity, stereotypes, …

Frederick Douglass Junior And Senior High School, Kelli Johnson

Publications

Douglass High School stood as a pillar in the community for over 70 years. The school, named after abolitionist Frederick Douglass, was also the social heart of the community. Past graduates remember the school as a close-knot community with supportive teachers who expected the best from their students.

Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, Kelli Johnson

Publications

In June 1905, on the fourth Sunday of that month, a petition signed by forty-one members of First Baptist Church was read. The petition asked for letters of dismissal from the Church in order to organize and start and new church. Those forty-one people wanted to create a new church that better met the needs of the community. After a vote, with only one dissent, the news was delivered to the Church clerk on a Thursday in July. This new church would become the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church.

Memphis Tennessee Garrison, Kelli Johnson

Publications

Memphis Tennessee Garrison was born Memphis Tennessee Carter in Hollins, Virginia on March 3, 1890. She moved with her family to Gary, WV, as a young child. She was named after the city where her aunt worked as a teacher; Memphis, Tennessee, had a large black population. Her parents, Wesley Carter and Cassie Thomas Carter, were former slaves. She had an older brother by 10 years, John Carter, who moved to Columbus, Ohio, as an adult and worked in a steel mill.

Series Iii. Folder 7. Handwritten Notes, N.D, Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The final folder contains a miscellaneous assortment of letters, sermon manuscripts, and sermon notes or outlines. Topics include “Mutual Dependence” (1 Cor. 3), “A Stairway to Heaven” (Gen. 28:12), “The Misunderstood Christ” (Mark 15:36), and “The Looks of Christ” (several verses in Mark and Luke).

Series Iii. Folder 6. Poems, N.D., Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains approximately 15 poems and 2 letters: a letter to a parishioner praising her singing voice, and one to Cummings thanking him for making regular payments on his account with the Benson Printing Co., located in Nashville, Tennessee.

Series Iii. Folder 5. Poems, N.D., Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains typescripts and manuscripts of approximately 10 poems. Some of them show Cummings’ political side, criticizing what he saw as the shortcomings of the GOP and warning that “If you vote for Ike you’ll cut your throat.”

Series Iii. Folder 4. Poems, N.D., Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains typescripts and manuscripts of approximately 15 poems. Topics include the dangers of cynicism, the fleeting nature of wealth, and Cummings’ reflections on his long pastoral career.

Series Iii. Folder 3. Articles, N.D., Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains materials ranging from a poem written in honor of retired ministers to several sayings by a character named Josh Hayseed. Most of items are approximately 25 newspaper columns written by Cummings, under the titles “Clergyman Chatter,” “Our Weekly Message,” and “Our Weekly Visit.” The dates and names of the papers do not appear on the clippings; according to the Register, “Our Weekly Visit” appeared in the Grantsville News, with “other featured columns” published in the Huntington Herald-Dispatch.

Series Iii. Folder 2. Articles, N.D., Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

The majority of the items in this folder are approximately 15 “Our Weekly Message” and roughly the same number of “Our Weekly Visit” columns. The dates and names of the papers do not appear on the clippings; according to the Register, “Our Weekly Visit” appeared in the Grantsville News, with “other featured columns” published in the Huntington Herald-Dispatch.

Some items appear to be duplicates of articles in Series III, Folder 3. Topics range from pastoral visitation to the value of optimism and a clear conscience to an anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Other items in this …

Series Iii. Folder 1. Articles, 1931-1965, Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains approximately 20 columns and other newspaper pieces written by Cummings, most of which are entitled either “Our Weekly Message” or “Our Weekly Visit.” The names of the papers rarely appear on the clippings; according to the Register, “Our Weekly Visit” appeared in the Grantsville News, with “other featured columns” published in the Huntington Herald-Dispatch. Other examples of these recurring columns can be found in folders 2 and 3 of this series as well.

Topics of columns in this folder range from death and eternity to George Washington’s birthday to the various meanings of the word …

Series Ii(B). Radio Sermons. Folder 3. Radio Sermons, N.D., Melville Homer Cummings

Cummings, Melville Homer, 1890-1978

This folder contains of approximately 20 sermons delivered on the radio at unspecified times (some bear the month and date, but not the year). Some are typed, others handwritten; some are complete, others unfinished. Topics include “domestic subjects,” church membership, and “turning defeat into victory.”