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© 2007 The President and Fellows of Harvard College
Last update on 2008 May 8
Repository: Houghton Library, Harvard College Library, Harvard University
Location: Harvard Depository
Note: This collection is shelved offsite at the Harvard Depository. See access restrictions below for additional information.
Location: b
Call No.: MS Am 2549
Title: Harley Farnsworth MacNair and Florence Wheelock Ayscough diaries,
Date(s): 1903-1945.
Quantity: 1 box (.5 linear ft.)
Note: Collection materials are primarily in English, with some materials in Chinese.
Abstract: Diaries and other papers of Far East historian, Harley Farnsworth MacNair, and his wife, translator and writer, Florence Wheelock Ayscough.
Harley Farnsworth MacNair (1891-1947) (HFM) was a Far East historian, the son of Douglad Evander MacNair and Nettie Adelia Farnsworth MacNair. He graduated from the University of Redlands with a Ph.B. degree in 1912. He went to Shanghai, China immediately after graduation and taught history at St. John's University. He stayed there until 1927, becoming professor of history and government in 1916, and head of the department in 1919. During this period he completed his MA at Columbia University in 1916 and received a Ph.D. in 1922 from the University of California at Berkeley. In 1927-1928 he returned to the United States and taught at the University of Seattle, then moved to the University of Chicago where he remained for the rest of his career teaching Far Eastern history. MacNair published voluminously, but he was especially known as a talented teacher.Florence Wheelock Ayscough (1878-1942) (FWA) was born in Shanghai, China, the daughter of a Canadian business-man father and an American mother. She lived in China until she was eleven, when her parents returned to the United States. In her early twenties, she returned to China and eventually married Francis Ayscough, a British importer living in Shanghai. They periodically visited the U.S., while residing in China. FWA developed as a writer and a translator of Chinese poetry and eventually became a friend of the American poet, Amy Lowell, who she had first met in Boston when they were both girls. They worked together on various publishing projects, especially: Fir-flower tablets : poems translated from the Chinese / by Florence Asycough ; English versions by Amy Lowell. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1921. Francis Ayscough died in 1935 while they were living in Chicago. FWA married Harley MacNair shortly after, having originally met him in China in 1916. . After their marriage, their home in Chicago became the gathering place for persons concerned with China.
Organized into the following series:
- I. Harley Farnsworth MacNair diaries
- II. Florence Wheelock Ayscough diaries
Primarily autograph manuscript diaries concerning various time periods in both lives, but also includes loose materials such as letters, photographs, clippings, articles, pamphlets, and leaflets. Also includes photographs of Amy Lowell and autograph manuscript poems by Amy Lowell, Monadnock and Before dawn.
Other papers concerning Harley Farnsworth MacNair and Florence Wheelock Ayscough can be found at:
- University of Redlands Library, Redlands, California.
- Department of Special Collections, University of Chicago Library.
- Also see HOLLIS for other manuscript materials at Houghton pertaining to both individuals.
- Ayscough, Florence Wheelock. Florence Ayscough & Amy Lowell; correspondence of a friendship. Edited with a preface by Harley Farnsworth MacNair. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1945.
- MacNair, Harley Farnsworth, editor. The incomparable lady; tributes and other memorabilia pertaining to Florence Wheelock Ayscough macNair. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1946.