Pearl Buck Archives Now Housed at West Virginia University

West Virginia University, West Virginia Wesleyan College, and the Pearl S. Buck Birthplace Foundation have announced a new collaboration to preserve and disseminate the legacy of Pearl S. Buck.

A native of Hillsboro, West Virginia, Pearl S. Buck is one of only two American women to earn the Nobel Prize in literature. The daughter of missionaries, she spent most of the first half of her life in China. She did return to the United States to attend Randolph-Macon Women’s College in Lynchburg, Virginia. After graduating from college, Buck returned to China and served as a missionary for 18 years. During these years, she also held a teaching post at the University of Nanking. While in China Buck began her writing career. The best-selling novel The Good Earth won Buck the 1932 Pulitzer Prize. She returned to the United States in 1935 and spent a large part of her remaining life in Pennsylvania. She won the Nobel Prize in literature in 1938.

When Buck died in 1973, West Virginia Wesleyan College was chosen as the repository for her archives. Under the new agreement, the collection will now be housed at West Virginia University Libraries which has far greater resources to make the collection more accessible to researchers and the public. Barry Pritts, vice president at West Virginia Wesleyan College said that the college “understands the importance of these papers. This partnership opens up opportunity. We are appreciative that we are participating in the sharing of these manuscripts and the development of activities surrounding it.”

The archives include 32 linear feet of boxed materials. Most of the documents are handwritten and include drafts, manuscripts, and other correspondence. West Virginia University hopes to have the material available for the public by the end of the year.