Main content
Carl W. Gatter collection on Ezra Pound
Notifications
Held at: University of Pennsylvania: Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts [Contact Us]3420 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6206
This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the University of Pennsylvania: Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.
Overview and metadata sections
Though the American poet Ezra Pound (1885-1972) was born in Idaho, he spent most of his formative years—from 1889 to 1907—living in Pennsylvania, in or around the city of Philadelphia. This period of the poet's life serves as the focal point of this collection of research material.
Carl W. Gatter has lived for many years at the childhood home of Ezra Pound at 166 Fernbrook Ave., Wyncote, Pa. As a result of this connection to the poet, Carl Gatter and his mother Elsie K. Gatter established a correspondence with Ezra Pound between the years of 1956 and 1966. During this time Carl Gatter became interested in taking what Pound called a "census report" of the poet's childhood acquaintances. Based on references in Pound's letters, Gatter began to collect printed material and photographs relating to Pound's youth in Pennsylvania. He also interviewed Wyncote residents who had known Pound as a child. In 1958, when Pound was released from St. Elizabeths Hospital, he visited the Gatter's in their Wyncote home before returning to Italy. Gatter used this visit as an opportunity to interview the poet about his early life in Wyncote, and to take photographs.
As Gatter's research on Pound's early life became known to the larger community of Pound scholars, his collection served as a resource for Pound biographers, several of whom have credited Gatter and used his photographs to illustrate their works. The culmination of this research was Gatter's collaboration with Noel Stock on Ezra Pound's Pennsylvania, published in 1976 by The Friends of the University of Toledo Libraries. The title page of this work reads: "Compiled for the most part from Mr. Carl Gatter's researches into original sources and documents." In fact, almost all of Gatter's significant research and photographs have been published in this work.
While this collection contains very little original Pound material, it does offer a unique resource for scholars researching the details of Pound's youth, by conveniently gathering together diverse secondary material relating to the poet's life in Pennsylvania. This collection has been reorganized with consideration for the researcher's need to quickly and easily access the most pertinent material. In order to facilitate research, and to insure proper storage, all photographs have been moved to albums at the end of the collection.
Gift of Carl W. Gatter, 1976
- Publisher
- University of Pennsylvania: Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts
- Finding Aid Author
- Rebecca C. Smith
- Finding Aid Date
- 1996
- Access Restrictions
-
This collection is open for research use.
- Use Restrictions
-
Copyright restrictions may exist. For most library holdings, the Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania do not hold copyright. It is the responsibility of the requester to seek permission from the holder of the copyright to reproduce material from the Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts.