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Guide to the James Marie Hopper papers, [ca. 1897-1952]
BANC MSS C-H 139
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Table of contents
Collection Title: James Marie Hopper Papers,
Date (inclusive): [ca. 1897-1952]
Collection Number: BANC MSS C-H 139
Origination: Hopper, James, b. 1876
Extent:
Number of containers: 2 boxes, 2 cartons
Repository: The
Bancroft Library.
Berkeley, California 94720-6000
Physical Location: For current information on the location of these materials, please consult the Library's online catalog.
Abstract: Mainly manuscripts of his short stories and articles, including those written while foreign correspondent, World War I; some
correspondence; tear sheets; clippings; photographs; copies of poems written by George Sterling and by Nora May French.
Languages Represented:
English
Collection is open for research.
Copyright has not been assigned to The Bancroft Library. All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts
must be submitted in writing to the Head of Public Services. Permission for publication is given on behalf of The Bancroft
Library as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which
must also be obtained by the reader.
[Identification of item], James Marie Hopper papers, BANC MSS C-H 139, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.
Photographs have been transferred to the Pictorial Collections of The bancrorft Library.
Among the authors who came to Carmel in 1906 and helped create its fame as a literary and artistic colony was James M. Hopper,
the popular writer more commonly known as Jimmy Hopper. Like many of the other Carmel pioneers, he was a friend of George
Sterling, Upton Sinclair, and Sinclair Lewis, and like them, too, he was a Californian only by adoption. He was born in Paris,
July 23, 1876, and was brought to America at the age of ten. After attending public schools in Oakland, he went to the University
of California, winning fame as quarterback on the football team and as one of the trio that reputedly first stole the Stanford
Axe in 1898. After graduation he studied law at Hastings College of Law and was admitted to the California bar. But, instead
of practising law, he took a job as reporter on the
San Francisco Chronicle. This journalistic experience was followed by a two-year period of teaching in the Philippine Islands, where he gathered material
for his first book,
Caybigan (1906), a collection of' short stories. Upon his return to the United States, Hopper seriously embarked on a writing career,
which he pursued successfully, with several novels, more than 400 stories published in leading popular magazines like
Collier's and the
Saturday Evening Post, and nonfiction, including his syndicated articles as a foreign correspondent at the front during the first World War. Hopper
lived abroad and in the East for many years, but he returned to Carmel eventually, and it was there he died in 1956.
The Bancroft Library purchased his papers in November 1961 from his widow, Mrs. Elayne Hopper Chanslor. The collection consists
primarily of manuscripts of his short stories and articles, but includes also some correspondence, tear sheets of some of
his published items, clippings, photographs, and copies of poems written by George Sterling and by Nora May French.
A key to the arrangement of the papers and a list of the major correspondents follows.