The Howellsian
Volume 1, Number 1 (June, 1996)

As you know, interested scholars organized the William Dean Howells Society on June 1, 1996 at the recent ALA meeting in San Diego. Enclosed is a write-up of the society which I have sent to several journals who have agreed to include it in their next issues, making whatever changes are necessary, depending on when those issues appear. These journals include Frank Norris Studies, Stephen Crane Studies, The Call, Dreiser Newsletter, Nineteenth-Century Literature, American Literary Realism, and Thalia. If you think of other journals that might be interested in including news of the organization of our new society, please send me their names and any other mailing information you have for them.

You will see from the preceding paragraph that I am referring to our organization as the William Dean Howells Society, even though other possibilities were suggested. Since, to be strictly fair, we should vote on our name, on the enclosed ballot I have listed all the suggestions I remember. Vote by checking one of these or by writing in an alternative of your choice; even more simply, send me your vote by e-mail.

I have also enclosed a list of names of founding members, mailing addresses, phone numbers, fax numbers, and e-mail addresses to the extent  that you provided these on the roll sheets circulated at the organizational meeting. Please send any corrections or additions to me so that we can keep this list as current as possible.

We are now even more official than we were in San Diego. I have set up through the English department here an "agency" account which allows me to deposit dues and other funds from the Society and to write checks on those funds without having to go through the English department itself. In other words, the account becomes the Society's own, even though it exists within the department. A few of us paid our dues or made a contribution to the Society at its organizational meeting. Most of us did not, pending information concerning a more permanent system for monitoring funds. Those of you who have not already paid your dues may now forward a modest sum of $10.00 to me for your 1996-1997 membership as soon as possible.

Finally, please consider this notice an official "Call for Papers" for the Howells session at the ALA conference in Baltimore, May 22-25, 1997. I reported the formation of the Society to Alfred Bendixen who suggested that we plan only one Howells session for this conference, to which I acquiesced, though my hope is that interest will be great enough to generate two sessions in the future. Please send abstracts or papers of no more than ten double-spaced pages to me (3127 JKHB, English Department, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT 84602) by September 1, 1996, for consideration for the session. As soon as a program has been determined, I will send out information regarding it in the next issue of The Howellsian.

I thank all of you for your interest in and support of the Society.