Archives Online at Indiana University

• Home

• Browse

• Search

• Advanced Search

• Help

A Guide to the Papers at the Indiana University Archives

Electronic finding aid encoded by Donald C. Force

Summary Information

Repository
Indiana University Archives
1320 East Tenth Street
Herman B Wells Library E460
Bloomington, IN 47405-7000
Phone: 812-855-1127
Email: archives@indiana.edu
http://www.libraries.iub.edu/archives

Creator
Heffner, Hubert C.

Collection No.
C296

Extent
11.4 cubic feet
(12 boxes)

Language
Materials are in English.

Abstract
Hubert C. Heffner was a Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Speech, Theatre, and Dramatic Literature at Indiana University. After teaching at several institutions across the United States and England, he settled in Bloomington in 1955. In addition to his teaching responsibilities within the Dept. of Speech and Theatre, Heffner was acting director of the Indiana University Theatre from 1959-60 and 1970-71, and he was involved with the Indiana Theatre Circle. He retired in 1971 but continued as an occasional guest lecturer at IUB until his death in 1985. The collection consists of lecture notes, classroom handouts and teaching aids, Heffner's correspondence and personal writings, book reviews written by Heffner and files on various organizations to which he belonged throughout his career. Prominent in the teaching materials are Heffner's files on drama, especially American drama, and individual playwrights.

Access Restrictions

One file containing recommendations is closed to researchers at this time.

Advance notice is required for access.

Biographical Note

Hubert Crouse Heffner was born in Maiden, North Carolina, on February 22, 1901, to Sylvanus and Lillie (Crouse) Heffner. He earned his A.B. and M.S. degrees from the University of North Carolina in 1921 and 1922, respectively, and did graduate work at the University of Chicago from 1930-1934, and the autumn of 1942. In 1922, he married Ruth Penny.

Hubert Heffner had a boundless teaching and research career, having been a faculty member or visiting lecturer at several universities in the United States and England. He was an instructor in English and Director of Dramatics at the University of Wyoming from 1922-1923, and at the University of Arizona from 1923-1926. He then returned to his alma mater, the University of North Carolina, where he became assistant professor of English and associate director and manager of "The Carolina Playmakers" from 1926-1930.

During most of the 1930’s, Heffner was Professor of Dramatic Literature at Northwestern University, 1930-1939. Throughout his tenure there, he also served as a visiting lecturer at Stanford University (1937) and the University of California-Berkeley (1939). He was also an International Research Fellow at the Huntington Library from 1934-1936. By the end of the decade, in 1939, Heffner was named as the head of the Department of Speech and Drama at Stanford University, a position he held for 15 years, from 1939-1954.

During World War II, Hubert Heffner was commissioned as a captain of the Special Reserves in the United States Army, and served on various assignments for the Army from 1943-1946. While serving with the Information and Education Division of the U.S. Army at Biarritz American University, Heffner headed the theatre and radio arts branch and was chief of the Fine Arts division of the University from 1945-1946. After the war ended, Heffner went back to Stanford to teach and serve as a visiting lecturer at several universities, including Cornell University (1948), University of Colorado (1950), and the University of Bristol, England (1954-1955), where he was a Fulbright Lecturer.

In 1955, Prof. Heffner resigned from his position at Stanford University to come to Indiana University, where he remained until his retirement in 1971. While at IU, Heffner was Professor of Speech, Theatre and Dramatic Literature, but also served as acting director of the University Theatre in 1959-1960 and 1970-1971. He lectured and researched on various topics including dramatic structure, tragedy, comedy, and melodrama. Many of his students went on to become prolific figures in American theatre, including actor Shepperd Strudwick, critic Walter Kerr, director Jules Irving, and Professors Sam Smiley (University of Missouri), Horace Robinson (University of Oregon), and Oscar Brockett (Indiana University).

Aside from teaching and lecturing, Heffner was involved in, and held several offices and appointments within, many professional organizations. He was acting chairman of the editorial board of Pacific Spectator , 1947-1948; associate editor of Quarterly Journal of Speech, 1947-1950; and, editor of Educational Theatre Journal, 1954-1957. Heffner served as vice president (1948) and president (1949) of American Educational Theatre Association (AETA), and was also a past president of the American Theatre Association (ATA). Heffner also served as a member of the Executive Board of the American National Theatre and Academy (ANTA). Other professional affiliations of Heffner included the Modern Language Association, Speech Association of America, National Theatre Conference, Western Speech Association, and the Philological Association of the Pacific Coast. He was also a member of the famed Author’s Club of London and the Bohemian Club of San Francisco.

A prolific writer on various theatre topics, Heffner has several notable publications. These include "Dod gast ye both" in Carolina Folk Plays, 1922; A Guide for the Director of Amateur Plays, 1926; Modern Theatre Practice, with Samuel Selden and Hunton D. Sellman, 1935, revised edition, 1946; Davy Crockett and Other Plays , edited with Isaac Goldberg, 1940; and The Nature of the Drama, 1959, which also included a series of video cassettes for classroom instruction. Aside from these major publications, Heffner was very active in writing articles and papers on theatre in drama that appeared in several major scholarly publications, and were often presented at professional functions, including AETA conferences.

Heffner’s professional accomplishments have been publicly recognized with several distinguished honors and awards. In 1960 he was given the Distinguished Service Award from the American Educational Theatre Association and was elected a fellow of the American Theatre Association (ATA). He received the Theta Alpha Phi award in 1961 for his contributions to the American theatre. He held the prestigious Berg Professorship of English at New York University from 1968-1969, and the Carnegie Professorship of Drama at the University of Hawaii in 1958. In 1961 he received the title of Distinguished Professor of Indiana University; in 1964 Illinois Wesleyan University honored him with the degree of Doctorate of Humane Letters; and, in 1969 his alma mater, the University of North Carolina conferred on him the Doctor of Letters degree.

After retiring from Indiana University in 1971, Hubert Heffner resided in Bloomington, Indiana, and made himself available as a guest lecturer at IU. He died on April 17, 1985, in Bloomington, after a long illness.

Scope and Content Note

The Hubert C. Heffner papers span the years 1919-1978 and are organized into six series: Correspondence; Associations and committees; Teaching files; Writings; Subject files; and Audiovisual.

The first series, Correspondence, spans the period from 1920 to 1978, and includes correspondence related to the personal and professional activities of Hubert Heffner. The largest portion of this series consists of eight files of general correspondence arranged chronologically. These files were received in the Archives in this order, so it was decided that they should retain their original order. The first general correspondence folder contains communication between Heffner and acquaintences, including a French pen pal, from Heffner's days as an undergraduate student. Most successive correspondence is with other theatre professors at IU and throughout the United States, as well as editors of professional journals or publishers. Following these are some files arranged alphabetically by correspondent or topic. Prominent correspondents include: J. Jeffery Auer, Oscar G. Brockett, Kalmon Burnim, Wendell Cole, Lee Devin, Earle Ernst, Winona Fletcher, Thomas Fujimara, Patti Gillespie, Jules Irving, Monroe Lippman, R. Keith Michaels, Lee Norvelle, Claude Shaver, Sam Smiley, Elvis Stahr, Carla Waal, Herman B Wells, members of the "Carolina Playmakers" and some family members.

Associations and committees is the second series, and it spans the period from 1950 to 1976. This series consists of files on the various professional organizations Heffner was involved in throughout his career. These records consist mostly of correspondence, publications, and meeting notes. Prominent associations include: American Education Theatre Association (AETA), Indiana Arts Commission, Rockefeller Foundation, International Institute of Arts and Letters, and the American and British branches of the Society of Theatre Research.

The third series, Teaching files, spans the period from 1922 to 1977 and consists primarily of course materials and lecture notes that span Heffner’s teaching career. This series is further organized into four subseries that are arranged by topic: General, Drama, Literature, and Playwrights. The folders within these subseries are arranged by topic instead of course numbers, which follows the original order of the papers. Consequently, one folder may include materials from several courses on a similar topic. The General subseries includes faculty annual reports, general bibliographies, course descriptions and two folders on an "Introduction to Graduate Study," which was a general course Heffner taught to prepare graduate students for research in theatre and drama. The Drama subseries includes course materials and lecture notes for courses on various topics related to drama, including American drama, Comedy, English drama, Melodrama, and Tragedy. Many of these folders include materials from Heffner’s "Comparative Drama" series of courses. Also included in this subseries is a notebook on Elizabethan drama dated from 1922, which does not appear to be Heffner’s, but was kept in the collection because it could not be determined. The Literature subseries consists of four folders on literature topics Heffner taught, including Celtic literature and Shakespeare. The final subseries, Playwrights, consists of files of research and lecture notes on various playwrights arranged alphabetically by last name. Prominent playwrights include Arthur Miller, Eugene O’Neil, William Shakespeare, and George Bernard Shaw. There also appear to be copies of writings by Heffner as well as what appear to be his research notes within the files in this series. This series also includes some student papers, and student names have been blacked out to protect their privacy while still making them available for research.

Writings is the fourth series, spanning the period from 1947 to 1974. This series is further arranged into four subseries: Speeches and lectures, Articles and papers, Analysis of Drama, and William Dunlap’s History of American Theatre. Speeches and lectures include correspondence and copies of speeches and lectures Heffner gave outside of his teaching responsibilities. Included in this subseries are scripts and notes from lectures Heffner gave as a Fulbright Lecturer at the University of Bristol, as well as a lecture series Heffner gave at Louisiana State University. The Articles and papers subseries consists mostly of notes and drafts of some of Heffner’s writings, many of which were eventually published in scholarly journals or presented at professional conferences. Topics of these writings range from American theatre and melodrama to theatre education and theory. Prominent among Heffner’s articles and papers are entries he wrote on melodrama for Encyclopedia Britannica and on pageants for Encyclopedia Americana , and several papers written for AETA conferences. Correspondence with editors and reprints of some of these publications are also included. Analysis of Drama was a proposed textbook Heffner wanted to write for use in university courses on drama, and the records in this subseries include the outline, research notes, and drafts of chapters for this book. The final subseries, William Dunlap’s History of American Theatre , consists mostly of drafts and revisions of another proposed book by Heffner, in which he was to provide an annotated edition of William Dunlap’s History of the American Theatre that was written in 1832. Under each chapter, there are typically two or three folders that include at least a rough draft and a revised draft, and occasionally an edited version with corrections. Also included in the final folder under each chapter is a photocopy of the corresponding chapter from History of the American Theatre by William Dunlap, upon which Heffner has marked the placement for his annotations. This subseries also includes some correspondence with possible publishers and editors, although it appears as if neither Analysis of Drama nor the annotated edition of William Dunlap’s History of American Theatre were ever published.

The fifth series, Subject files, spans the period from 1919-1974 and includes files on various topics relevant to Heffner's activities not explicitly connected with his professional career as it relates to Indiana University. Materials in this series include notes, research materials, news clippings, documents from universities other than Indiana University (including some correspondence), newsletters, playbills, travel documents, awards, and other documents relating to Heffner's various pursuits and interests. Also included in this section are Heffner's personal school notes and original early scripts, most which he appears to have written as a student. Files are arranged alphabetically by subject.

Records in the sixth and final series, Audiovisual, date circa 1977 and include audiovisual recordings of programs from "The Nature of Drama" lecture series. Programs one through thirteen are present in videocassette format. Programs five, six, seven, and nine are present in film reel format. Files are arranged first by format, and further by program number.

Arrangement

This collection is organized into six series: Correspondence; Associations and committees; Teaching files; Writings; Subject files; and Audiovisual.

• Indexing Terms

• The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in IUCAT, the IU Libraries' online catalog. Materials about related topics, persons or places can be found by searching the catalog using these terms.

• • Names
  • Indiana University. Dept. of Speech --History --Sources.
  • Indiana University. Dept. of Speech and Theatre --History --Sources.
  • Indiana University, Bloomington. Dept. of Theatre and Drama --History --20th century --Sources.
  • Heffner, Hubert C. --Archives.
  • Heffner, Hubert C. --Correspondence.
• • Topics
  • Theater --Study and teaching (Higher) --Indiana --Bloomington.
  • American drama --Study and teaching (Higher) --Indiana --Bloomington.
  • Drama --Study and teaching (Higher) --Indiana --Bloomington.
  • College theater --Indiana --Bloomington --History --20th century --Sources.
  • Acting teachers --Indiana --Bloomington --Archives.
  • Acting teachers --Indiana --Bloomington --Correspondence.

Separated Material

Publications that were not written by or annotated by Heffner were pulled and sent to the Wells Library. Duplicates of more than three copies of any document were weeded out.

The following were pulled from the collection and transferred to the Archives' photograph collection: approximately forty photographs of Professor Heffner, circa 1940 1955; twelve photographs to be published in Modern Theatre Practice, 5th edition, as received by Heffner through correspondence with Peggy Laves, Samuel Selden, and Hunton D. Sellman; one case and four boxes of lantern slides depicting such subjects as Elizabethan drama and Classic theatre and stage; one box of nitrate film showing theatre and stage scenes: one roll of 35mm microfilm sent to Heffner while at Stanford University; and, eleven wood printing blocks, possibly depicting IU theatre scenes and people, possibly used for publishing in the Indiana Daily Student.

Photographs Pulled: Seven (7) photographs have been removed and transferred to the Archives Photograph Collection. These seven (7) photographs were removed from Box 5, Series: Writings, Sub-series: Articles and papers, Folder: Untitled.

1.) 7 x 9.25", b/w, horizontal, "STUDIO-FOTO VAJENTI-VICENZA" on back, 10 men and women, photo still of a play?

2.) 7 x 9.25", b/w, vertical, "STUDIO-FOTO VAJENTI-VICENZA" on back, 14 men and women, photo still of a play?

3.) 7 x 9.25", b/w, horizontal, "L. 300" on back, "STUDIO-FOTO VAJENTI-VICENZA" on back, photo of an elaborate state, orchestral pit, and audience seats

4.) 7 x 9.25", b/w, horizontal, [Conférence Internationale des Universités / NICE / Centre Universitaire Méditerranéen / (4-10 Décembre 1950 / PHOTO "ERPÉ" NICE] on front, "12" on back, photo shows a large group of seated men and women.

5.) 7 x 9.25", b/w, horizontal, [Conférence Internationale des Universités / NICE / Centre Universitaire Méditerranéen / (4-10 Décembre 1950 / PHOTO "ERPÉ" NICE] on front, "53" on back, photo shows a large group of seated men and women seated at a food-related event.

6.) 7 x 9.25", b/w, vertical, [Conférence Internationale des Universités / NICE / Centre Universitaire Méditerranéen / (4-10 Décembre 1950 / PHOTO "ERPÉ" NICE] on front, [Stanford-Heffner, U. of Cal.-Pourel, Pomona-Lyons / California at Monte Carlo Dec 1950] on back, photo shows three suited men in foreground posing in front of a statue, a hatted and suited man is seen walking in background.

7.) [Reprint of Photograph 6]: 7 x 9.25", b/w, vertical, [Conférence Internationale des Universités/ NICE / Centre Universitaire Méditerranéen / (4-10 Décembre 1950 / PHOTO "ERPÉ" NICE] on front, [Stanford - Heffner, U. of Cal. - Pourel, Pomona - Lyons / California at Monte Carlo Dec 1950] on back, photo shows three suited men in foreground posing in front of a statue, a hatted and suited man is seen walking in background.

Administrative Information