The Wells Fargo Steinbeck Collection, originally the Rodgers Collection of John Steinbeck, contains more that 770 letters, photographs, clippings, unpublished short pieces, and ephemera from John Steinbeck and the Steinbeck and Hamilton families, dating from the 1890s to the early 1980s. The bulk of the collection consists of John Steinbeck's letters to his family, beginning in the 1923 with his letters home from Stanford University. The letters from the globetrotting Steinbeck continue throughout his life, addressed primarily to his sister Esther Steinbeck Rodgers of Watsonville, California, until just before his death from a heart attack on December 20, 1968.

John Ernst Steinbeck was born in Salinas, CA, on February 27, 1902, to John Ernst and Olive Hamilton Steinbeck, the third of four children. After being graduated from Salinas High School, he attended Stanford University intermittently between 1920 and 1925. After leaving Stanford, Steinbeck moved to New York City, where he worked as a construction laborer and wrote briefly for the Hearst-owned The American newspaper. In 1926, Steinbeck returned to California. He lived and worked during the late 1920s in the Lake Tahoe area, where he wrote his first novel, Cup of Gold, published by Robert M. McBride, New York, in 1929.Derived extensively from Meyer, Michael J. THE HAYASHI STEINBECK BIBLIOGRAPHY, 1982-1996 (Lanham, Md. : Scarecrow Press, 1998)

ca. 5 linear ft., 111 volumes

The library does not have full title to the portion of the collection comprising Steinbeck's letters. This material cannot be cited without first obtaining permission at the address below. Copyright administered by: Mc Intosh and Otis, Inc. 475 Fifth Ave. New York, NY 10017 Property rights reside with the repository. Literary rights reside with the creators of the documents or their heirs. To obtain permission to publish or reproduce, please contact the Public Services Librarian of the Dept. of Special Collections.

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