The Federal Writers’ Project field files for Avon Park are held across three repositories
The raw field files that supported the 1939 WPA Florida: A Guide to the Southernmost State — and which captured Avon Park’s earliest history directly from living pioneers — are not held in a single archive. Barbara Berry Darsey conducted extensive local fieldwork in Avon Park and Highlands County between 1937 and 1939 as an interviewer and writer for the Federal Writers’ Project. Her resulting manuscripts, life histories, and town sketches are dispersed across the Library of Congress, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and the University of Florida.[darsey-1937]
The Library of Congress: American Life Histories
The Library of Congress Manuscript Division holds several of Darsey’s specific “Life History” interviews from the region in its Federal Writers’ Project collection (MSS55715):
- [Virginia Suffolk]: An interview dated 14 February 1939 from Avon Park, recorded by Darsey and edited by Veronica Ruass (Box A710).[loc-mss55715]
- [Florida Squatters]: A December 1938 manuscript describing families living where the Florida Ridge meets the Everglades, written by Darsey and revised by Stetson Kennedy (Box A711).[loc-mss55715]
- [Mary Taylor]: A 1 February 1939 interview taken in Sebring with Willa Blanding (Box A710).[loc-mss55715]
University of North Carolina: Southern Historical Collection
The core of Darsey’s narrative fieldwork beyond the town guide — including multiple life histories recorded in Avon Park and Sebring — resides in the Federal Writers’ Project Papers (#3709) at UNC’s Wilson Library:
- “Albert and Anne Denman” (7 February 1939, Folder 104)
- “Lolly Bleu” (29 November 1938, Folder 105)
- “Life History of The Thomas Family” (8 February 1939, Folder 103)
- “Willard and Cornelia Mitchell (Frank and Ella Merryvale)” (8 February 1939, Folder 107)[unc-3709]
University of Florida and the State Archives
The single largest consolidated document produced by this effort is Darsey’s unpublished 220-page Avon Park Guide (1936–1938), held at the P.K. Yonge Library of Florida History at the University of Florida. It is this document that captured the original advertising language from Oliver Marvin Crosby’s The Florida Home Seeker, which the 1939 state guide subsequently condensed and quoted without citation.[darsey-1937]
Meanwhile, the State Library and Archives of Florida holds the parallel administrative outputs of the WPA’s Historical Records Survey (ca. 1939), which include brief historical sketches of Highlands County (such as items 326848 and 326850) generated during the same era.[floridamemory-326848]
References
- darsey-1937 — Barbara Berry Darsey. Avon Park, Florida [Avon Park Guide], typescript for the Federal Writers’ Project, University of Florida. 31 December 1938. avon-park-guide-federal-writers-project-1937.md
- loc-mss55715 — Library of Congress, Manuscript Division. American Life Histories: Manuscripts from the Federal Writers’ Project, 1936-1940, MSS55715. 1940. https://www.loc.gov/collections/federal-writers-project/
- unc-3709 — University of North Carolina. Federal Writers’ Project Papers #3709, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. 1940. https://finding-aids.lib.unc.edu/03709/
- floridamemory-326848 — Works Progress Administration, Historical Records Survey. Highlands County, Florida History, WPA Historical Records Survey. 1939. https://www.floridamemory.com/items/show/326848
Related
- Reference: The Avon Park Guide, a Federal Writers’ Project typescript of 1936–1938
- Finding: Avon Park was advertised as a town free of Black people
Where this comes from
- Evidence
- corroborated — More than one independent source agrees.
- Review
- unverified — Drafted from sources but not yet checked by a volunteer.
- Rights
- society
Sources
- Barbara Berry Darsey, Avon Park, Florida [Avon Park Guide], typescript for the Federal Writers' Project, University of Florida (references/avon-park-guide-federal-writers-project-1937.md) (1938) · archival
- Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, American Life Histories: Manuscripts from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1940, MSS55715 (1940) · archival
- University of North Carolina, Federal Writers' Project Papers #3709, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1940) · archival
- Works Progress Administration, Historical Records Survey, Highlands County, Florida History, WPA Historical Records Survey (1939) · archival
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