Washington Post Article About the Finding of the Federal Theatre Program Collection
Dublin Core
Title
Washington Post Article About the Finding of the Federal Theatre Program Collection
Subject
Lorraine Brown
John O'Conner
Federal Theatre Program
John O'Conner
Federal Theatre Program
Description
An article in the Washington Post by Doree Lovell was written about Lorraine Brown and her colleague John O’Conner, both English professors at George Mason University. The article starts out by mentioning how the documents from the Federal Theatre Program have been “lost for a quarter of the century.” Lorraine started the search for the materials, “because of a course I taught in American drama. Materials from the 1930s were very scant. When I heard about some unedited play scripts at the Library of Congress, I began slogging around there one day asking questions.”
Brown’s determined search landed her in John Cole’s office, the then reference librarian at the Library of Congress. Cole, Brown, and O’Conner set out to Maryland where 900 cubic feet of materials were found in an abandoned airport hangar. The collection was then brought back to Mason:
“…in 1974, a research center for the Federal Theatre Project was set up in the George Mason library in Fairfax. The FTP materials have been on permanent loan there by the Library of Congress…”
A National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) grant was given to make an archive possible. Brown is quoted saying the staff had completed, “the phenomenal task of unpacking, analyzing, and cataloging the materials in just three years.” According to assistant curator Louanne Wheeler, 25,000 production photographs, 7,000 play scripts, and 1,645 costume design sketches were amongst the vast number of materials in this collection. Additional funds in the NEH grant were allotted for oral history interviews of surviving actors and directors from the program.
Lorraine Brown’s insistence on finding the materials allowed for the FTP materials to be the first collection to be brought to George Mason's Fenwick Library and brought the need for our Special Collections Research Center where currently over 600 collections can be viewed.
Brown’s determined search landed her in John Cole’s office, the then reference librarian at the Library of Congress. Cole, Brown, and O’Conner set out to Maryland where 900 cubic feet of materials were found in an abandoned airport hangar. The collection was then brought back to Mason:
“…in 1974, a research center for the Federal Theatre Project was set up in the George Mason library in Fairfax. The FTP materials have been on permanent loan there by the Library of Congress…”
A National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) grant was given to make an archive possible. Brown is quoted saying the staff had completed, “the phenomenal task of unpacking, analyzing, and cataloging the materials in just three years.” According to assistant curator Louanne Wheeler, 25,000 production photographs, 7,000 play scripts, and 1,645 costume design sketches were amongst the vast number of materials in this collection. Additional funds in the NEH grant were allotted for oral history interviews of surviving actors and directors from the program.
Lorraine Brown’s insistence on finding the materials allowed for the FTP materials to be the first collection to be brought to George Mason's Fenwick Library and brought the need for our Special Collections Research Center where currently over 600 collections can be viewed.
Creator
Doree Lovell
Source
ProQuest Historic Newspaper: Washington Post
Date
15 September 1974
Contributor
Grace Owens HIST390 Spring 2025
Files
Citation
Doree Lovell, “Washington Post Article About the Finding of the Federal Theatre Program Collection,” Mason History, accessed July 26, 2025, https://masonhistory.gmu.edu/items/show/183.