Scope and Contents
The correspondence in the collection encompasses letters from editors and publishers to De Quille about his writing, as well as a small quantity of letters written by De Quille to his daughter Mell Wright Evans and sister Louisa G. Wright Stevens. There is also a small group of correspondence about De Quille between his granddaughter Irma Evans Morris and Nevada historian Effie Mona Mack in 1936.
Writings by De Quille include a notebook with outlines, drafts, and notes for stories and articles. Other writings include draft manuscripts for articles about Virginia City and California, as well as about Peru, and tales based in the Middle East.
Photographs in the collection include portraits of De Quille and views of his gravesite. Ephemera in the collection includes scrapbook sheets with illustrations that De Quille clipped from magazines and newspapers to present to his granddaughter.
Dates
- circa 1860-circa 1956
- Majority of material found within 1885 - 1898
Creator
Conditions Governing Access
Conditions Governing Use
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Arrangement
Extent
1 Linear Feet (4 boxes)
Language of Materials
English
Catalog Record
A record for this collection is available in Orbis, the Yale University Library catalog
Persistent URL
Overview
Dan De Quille (1829-1898)
In 1857, Wright traveled alone to California and prospected for gold in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains and in the Mono Lake region. In 1859, he moved to the silver mining town of Virginia City, Nevada, which extracted its mineral wealth from the Comstock Lode, the first major discovery of silver ore in the United States. In 1862, Wright began writing for the Daily Territorial Enterprise newspaper in Virginia City and adopted the pen name Dan De Quille. He remained on the staff of the newspaper for over thirty years and wrote extensively about the people, events, and mining operations in the region. From August 1863 to May 1864, he supervised the work of Samuel Langhorne Clemens (1835-1910), who adopted the pen name Mark Twain while writing for the newspaper.
In 1874, a group of mine operators in Virginia City approached De Quille to write a history of the Comstock Lode. Working in Hartford, Connecticut, under the editorship of Mark Twain, he wrote A History of the Big Bonanza (American Publishing Company, 1876).
Near the end of his life, De Quille returned to West Liberty, Iowa.
Processing Information
- Authors, American -- 1885-1898 -- Archives
- California -- Description and travel
- Comstock Lode (Nev.)
- De Quille, Dan, 1829-1898
- De Quille, Dan, 1829-1898 -- Pictorial works
- Evans, Mell Wright, 1855-1906
- Frontier and pioneer life -- California
- Frontier and pioneer life -- Nevada
- Frontier and pioneer life -- Sierra Nevada Region (Calif. and Nev.)
- Journalists
- Mack, Effie Mona
- Mines and mineral resources -- Nevada
- Morris, Irma Evans
- Nevada
- Newspaper editors
- Peru
- Photographic prints
- Scrapbooks
- Sierra Nevada (Calif. and Nev.)
- Silver mines and mining -- Nevada
- Stevens, Louisa G. Wright, b. 1843
- Virginia City (Nev.)
- West (U.S.) -- Social life and customs
- Title
- Guide to the Dan De Quille Papers
- Author
- by Matthew Daniel Mason
- Date
- May 2011
- Description rules
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard
- Language of description note
- Finding aid written in English.
Part of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library Repository
Location
121 Wall Street
New Haven, CT 06511
Opening Hours
Access Information
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