Scrapbooks

In the course of investigating the writings of Robert Sparks Walker, I encountered references to his scrapbooks and was able to view three of them. I discuss these scrapbooks in this article, but first I must mention a scholarly work about Walker.

1937 Mary Bell Fisher, Robert Sparks Walker: Naturalist and Writer, Nashville, Tennessee.

Mary Bell Fisher mentioned the Walker Scrapbooks in a thesis about his published works. She completed the thesis as partial completion of the requiremens for a Master’s Degree in Literature at Peabody College of Education at Vanderbilt University. I know knothing about her as an author except for having read the thesis. She mentions having attended youth programs Walker conducted, so she must have grown up in Chattanooga. I examined a bound copy of the typewritten thesis at the Local History Department of the Chattanooga Public Library.

Fisher is certainly not alone in remembering Walker. I have heard several older residents mentioning learning about trres under his leadership.

In Chapter I Fisher mentions an unpublished autobiography and the Walker Scrapbooks.

Chapter II consists of an analysis of Walker’s first two published volumes of poetry, Anchor Poens and My Father’s Farm, with excerpts from the books and from published critical reviews. 

Chapter III is her analysis of four published prose works, including the nonfiction works Torchlights to the Cherokees, and Chattanooga: Its History and Growth. It also includes comments on the young adult fiction works Eating Thunder, and The Beechblock Circus. I will discuss these books in later posts.

The Scrapbooks

There are likely a number of scrapbooks beyond the three that I examined. If they still exist, I do not know their whereabouts, but I imagine they may still be in possession of the Walker family or possibly the Special Collections Department of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga Library. This library has been posting a lot of material pertinent to Robert Sparks Walker online, discoverable through the worldcat.org online catelog.

The Tennessee State Library has the Southern Fruit Grower Scrapbook, a collection of correspondence Walker received wihile publishing and editing Soiuthern Fruit Grower. The Chattanooga Public Library has two scrapbooks of articles about the Brainerd Mission to the Cherokees.

1910 – 1917 Walker, Robert Sparks, Southern Fruit Grower Scrapbook, Archival Materials.

On October 13, 2019, I examined this document in a restricted area at the Tennessee State Library and Archives in Nashville, Tennessee. A guard provided me with a key to a locker for storage since no pens, cameras, cell phones, or other extraneous items were permitted in the archival portion of the library. Library personnel allowed me to bring in a mechanical pencil. The archivist provided loose-leaf paper for notes, one sheet at a time, and a pair of white cotton gloves to wear while examining the document. 

The scrapbook consists of correspondence Robert Sparks Walker received relevant to his role as editor and publisher of the Southern Fruit Grower magazine. The letters offered thanks for copies received and accolades stating how the magazine had benefitted the recipients in business. A few included subscription renewals. 

Many letters from government agencies noted the value of the magazine for agriculture and horticulture in their respective states. Those from academic institutions stated its value for their students. Most were typed on letterhead stationery. A few were handwritten on stationery and some on lined paper. 

A list of a few of the correspondents whose letters are preserved in this scrapbook follows: 

U. S. Department of Agriculture, C.B. Bracket, Pomologist
Luther Burbank
South Carolina Agricultural Experiment Station
The Commonwealth of Virginia, State Crop Pest Commission
The University of Kentucky, Agricultural Experiment Station
The University of Tennessee, Experiment Station
Georgia Experiment Station
The Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institution

Walker spent twenty years editing Southern Fruit Grower. Consult the early chapters of Robert Sparks Walker: The Unconventional life of an East Tennessee Naturalist by Alexandra Walker Clark for further information. 

1929 Walker, Robert Sparks. The Brainerd Mission: A collection of Magazine and Newspaper Articles, Chattanooga.

Walker assembled this collection in a scrapbook. The only copy resides in the Local History Department, Chattanooga Public Library. It is fragile and not kept in the stacks. Any reader permitted to look at this scrapbook should handle it gently. 

In addition to his articles, it includes several photographs and some of Walker's typewritten notes. It contains a complete copy of A Brief Story of an Old Mission.

These articles tell the story of the Brainerd Mission to the Cherokees, which took its name from the deceased missionary David Brainerd. A section of Chattanooga is also named Brainerd. Missionary Ridge, which later became a Civil War battleground, takes its name from the mission.

Walker, Robert Sparks, A Brief Story of an old Mission, Nashville, Cokesbury Press. Cokesbury is a Methodist publishing house.

At the end of the work, the publisher's note indicates it appeared in serial format. I examined the Chattanooga Public Library's copy, preserved in a scrapbook with the pages pasted into it. It tells the story of The Brainerd mission to the Cherokees. It could be considered a predecessor to the book Torchlights to the Cherokees. 

Walker states that the Cherokees were anxious to have the trade school aspect of the mission, which included farming, blacksmithing, and other practical arts at the time. They were not so keen on religious training. Some stated that the white man's centuries of having the Christian religion had not improved their character, as evidenced by their treatment of their Indian brothers.

Reading the two scrapbooks at the Chattanooga Public Library revealed to me how Walker’s research for the book Torchlights to the Cherokees was a work that progressed over several years.