About The Collection

This is a collection of images from digitized historical newspapers that pulls together every instance, or as many as I have found, of Eudora Welty’s name in the newspaper. Included are: reviews, essays, interviews, television listings, advertisements, society columns, and so much more, some of which have been collected by Eudora Welty and by Welty scholars, especially Pearl McHaney and Peggy Whitman Prenshaw. This project builds on their good work. I’m interested in these pieces of news as ephemera, as stamps of time and memory, and in where and when Eudora Welty appears in newspapers and other periodicals. In large part, this project is about protection and exposure, hinging on the balance between two questions: How was Eudora Welty presented to and known by readers in her time? And: When Eudora Welty found her name in the newspaper, what version of herself did she see, “what eye in the world did she feel looking in on her?”

Collection Details

This is an ongoing rather than a comprehensive collection. As I find more sources, and more instances of Eudora Welty’s name in digitized historical newspapers, more articles will be added. This is not proprietary information, that is anyone can search a newspaper database and find articles about Eudora Welty. What is singular to this project is the attention to cataloguing, so that the collection can be considered in various ways, including by subject, location, and date, though this collection is not intended to be used as a database of articles about Eudora Welty. Sources are provided both as citations and as searching aids for scholars.

This is a project which considers Eudora Welty as a piece of news in her time, and how, when, and where readers found her in newspapers and magazines around the world, the visualization and contextualization of which are best understood via the map and timeline pages.

Due to syndication, there are many instances in which an article is repeated in various newspapers. Including these repeated articles should not be seen as a flaw in the data, but rather as points of illumination, as moments of confluence, such as on September 27, 2009, when readers across America opened the Parade Magazine insert in their newspapers and learned that actor Peter Sarsgaard is a “massive fan” of Eudora Welty and considers The Shoe Bird “the most charming thing ever.”

This project is about the instances in which Eudora Welty was a resounding headline in The New York Times as much as it is about the instances in which Eudora Welty was a gentle murmur, a brief mention in her local paper.

About Us

Melissa Fox, Principal Investigator, is a writer and independent scholar who has published pieces in Michigan History Magazine, West Michigan Modern, Owl Canyon Press, and the Eudora Welty Review. Melissa has a BA in English and a Masters Degree in Library Science, both from Indiana University. She worked in libraries for 10 years, most recently in the History and Special Collections Department at the Grand Rapids Public Library. Melissa was the recipient of the 2023 Gordon Olson Award from the Kutsche Office of Local History at Grand Valley State University and was awarded the 2025 Eudora Welty Review research grant.

Rose Caston, Research Assistant, is a Welty Fellow at Millsaps College.