Buried Treasure

Imagine finding a captain's log from the Titanic, lost diaries of General Sherman, or Rembrandt sketches in the attic.

This is how professor of education John Regan felt when he discovered 20 dusty boxes stuffed with long-forgotten original letters, documents, and clues leading to old Chinese and English books in the basements of Honnold Library and Claremont Graduate University.

As Regan and a team of student researchers began the monumental task of sorting through the collection, they discovered its great historical value. In these boxes were fragile original documents to, from, and about major figures in China and the U.S., telling previously untold stories of remarkable years. They chronicle China in the early decades of the twentieth century, with its rapidly shifting political climate and tumultuous events leading up to and following World War II.

Regan, a scholar of cultural communications and professor in the CGU School of Educational Studies, began interviewing people about events in the archives. He extended some of his many trips to China to study themes in the archives. When Chinese scholar Weijiang Zhang saw some of the letters and papers, he said in astonishment, “These were extremely prominent people, household names in China.”

The collection was bequeathed to CGU by university supporter William B. Pettus, a well-known foreign dignitary and president of the College of Chinese Studies in Beijing. Pettus founded the college in 1916 as a school for businessmen, diplomats, and English-speaking missionaries. Its mission later expanded to include the training of Americans in knowledge of China, its civilization, language, and trade customs. After Japan invaded China, the college was reestablished at the University of California, Berkeley. As tensions escalated in Asia, Pettus placed valuable papers and books on indefinite loan to CGU for protection.

For decades Pettus was at the center of Beijing's political, educational, and intellectual life. Until CGU researchers examined these documents, few Westerners remembered that the college had been a major player in the last days of China. “This leading educator, Pettus, faded out of our history, and with him went our knowledge of people who later became vitally important,” says Regan.

The archives afford fresh perspectives on that history. They fill important gaps in U.S.–China relations, revealing personal tragedies and relationships of key figures during crucial times. The letters and documents cover the years 1928 to 1965, a time when goodwill between the U.S. and China eroded.

“During the McCarthy era the U.S. turned away from China,” Regan says. “Things were very complicated. This university and this country allowed a rich history to be buried and forgotten. Who wanted to read anything about China?”

Until recently the archives stood unopened, a body of almost completely forgotten documents about individuals, events, and institutions little known in the Western world. These papers tell inside stories from an American intellectual center in the heart of China, within walking distance of the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square.

“What times those must have been,” Regan muses. In addition to Pettus' relationship and correspondence with notable historical figures, the 30,000 papers already examined document the connection between leaders in China, prominent individuals in Los Angeles, and educational leaders in Claremont. Trustees of the California College in China foundation included Los Angeles Times publisher Harry Chandler, Pomona College president Charles K. Edmunds, Douglas Fairbanks, and Seely G. Mudd. Their support of the Beijing College of Chinese Studies was among the last vestiges of Western influence in China before communism.

Particularly valuable are handwritten notes from Pearl Buck's acceptance speech for the 1938 Nobel Prize in literature. Buck, author of more than 100 books including The Good Earth, was a champion of civil rights whose lifelong efforts to increase understanding between Asia and America left a lasting imprint on the world. Her work played a major role in shaping Westerners' understanding of China.

Inside accounts show the escalation of events leading up to and following Mao's revolution. The archives contain personal letters of Pettus' student General Joseph Stilwell. Known to his troops as “Vinegar Joe,” Stilwell served as commanding general of all U.S. forces in China, Burma, and India. In 1945, as commander of the U.S. Tenth Army, Stilwell received the surrender of more than 100,000 Japanese troops.

More than 150 letters in the collection are from, to, and about U.S. ambassador to China Leighton Stuart.

A missionary, educator, and former president of Yenching University in China, Stuart was appointed ambassador to China in 1946. Mao Tse Tung's infamous mocking essay, “Goodbye Leighton Stuart,” which ridiculed the United States, and the “White Paper” were presented to Stuart in the presence of Pettus. Mao's essay is a striking example of rhetorical study, used for decades in Chinese school books and now an important part of Chinese literary history. “The archival letters on this topic have great significance for scholars in my country,” says Zhang.

While many Chinese names are less familiar to Westerners, they are nonetheless pivotal figures. “Hu-Shih, a major figure in the archives, changed China,” says Regan. A Chinese diplomat, ambassador to the U.S., and scholar, Hu-Shih was an important leader of Chinese thought who established the vernacular as the official written language, facilitating universal written communication among Chinese peoples. China's foremost political liberal, he advocated rebuilding China through education rather than revolution. The archives show the relationships and scholarly connections of Hu-Shih, his Claremont connections, and the honorary doctorate he received at Claremont Graduate School in 1950.

Much of the collection is fragile—old onionskin pages and handwritten letters. Among the books on Chinese history and civilization there are incredible treasures. Many are exceptionally rare, like the beautiful silk-bound Calls and Sounds of the Streets. Produced in Beijing in 1936, it describes the sounds of Peking (as it was then known in the West) street vendors, in Chinese and English, in sounds and pictures. Featuring delicate paper cuts and watercolor illustrations, its pages depict familiar village sounds in onomatopoeic reproductions, asking and answering questions such as, “What is the sound of apple blossoms falling?” and “What are the early morning sounds of a street peddler's cry?”

Holding this rare volume, it is possible to actually feel the gentleness of the past, to sense the rhythms of the city and the reverence for life that existed in rural China. “The idea of Pettus—this strict, stern disciplinarian who trained military leaders for war—allowing this tender, evocative work which began as a master's thesis at his college is extraordinary,” remarks Regan.

Closely aligned with the collection are 138 posters, lavishly colored illustrations showing idealized visions of ordinary people toward the end of the Cultural Revolution. These forceful and beautifully rendered scenes depicting the future of China have been appraised and insured for more than one hundred thousand dollars. Painted by various Chinese artists, the original artworks were reproduced in mass quantities to be used as posters. They were hung in villages, schools, and stores, shaping culture and becoming highly familiar images to millions of Chinese. The posters are reminiscent of Rockwell’s Saturday Evening Post covers, evoking images of peace, prosperity, and innocent times as well as determination to resist enemies. Plans are currently underway to add more posters to the collection.

Presentations on the Pettus archives have drawn enormous attention in China. Here in the U.S., interest is growing. Four-time Emmy Award winner Valerie Harper, former costar of “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” and creator of a successful Pearl Buck play, recently visited CGU with a top screenwriter to research an upcoming feature film about Pearl Buck's life for ABC Television.

Despite the fragile nature of the documents, Regan, Zhang, and CGU are cautiously bringing the collection to the attention of the public for the benefit of scholars. More importantly, the documents reestablish the memory of what was once a golden era of exchange, respect, and appreciation between the United States and China.

Letters to the Editor of the Flame

From Professor Regan, Claremont Graduate University and President Bowman, Randolph Macon Woman's College

Dear Editor:

We wish to add an item to the "Buried Treasure" article in the Spring 2001 edition of The Flame, on the W. B. Pettus archival project. The Pearl Buck words in that excerpt came from the extensive Buck archives at the Randolph-Macon Woman's College Lipscomb Library in Lynchburg, Virginia, under archivist Frances E. Webb:

"Now there is not only fear of the Japanese but also of the Communists. I have come to feel that there is grave likelihood of all central China going communist at almost any hour." (February 1932)

Those words, in a letter to a friend, have been of particular interest to the ongoing joint Claremont Graduate University and Randolph-Macon Woman's College research, for they were written from Beijing at the college residence of President W. B. Pettus during a previously unknown two-month visit-a visit of considerable literary and cultural experiences for Pearl Buck. During this January to March period, while staying in the elegant College of Chinese Studies within walking distance of the Forbidden City and Tiennamin Square, Pearl Buck wrote to friends, and these letters now reside in the Randolph-Macon Woman's College library. The first knowledge the scholarly world had of this experience in Beijing came from one of the Claremont letters contained in the Pettus College archives, housed in Special Collections in the Honnold Library at the Claremont Colleges. In one such letter, William Bacon Pettus wrote:

"Mrs. Pearl Buck, author of 'The Good Earth,' is giving her third lecture here this morning. She and her husband are stopping in our home and are charming house guests. Both of them are splendid students of Chinese and are finding the opportunities in this institution and in this city very rich for research in their lines."

In the Randolph-Macon Woman's College archive is a letter written to the editor of the college's 1932 yearbook:

"I have mislaid the letter which gave me the address of the publishing company to which I promised to send a picture of myself and a few words to the Randolph Macon girls. I am enclosing these here. I have sent two prints, not knowing which you would like better for the Helianthus. I appreciate very much indeed your wanting to make the Helianthus this year a book modeled after The Good Earth. It is a very gracious thought."

And then she adds her contribution, quite a remarkable statement:

"It has been many a year since I walked your college halls and the green lawns of the campus. Across these years, across the wide seas, what have I to say to you today? I think only one thing: believe in life! Life is glorious. I would not have missed any of it. I shall be in love with life to the very end. Bring zest to it and bring humor and purity of purpose and you will find that pain or pleasure, life is good."

This short visit in Beijing from the war-

ravaged south apparently rejuvenated Buck's enthusiasm for life. Immediately upon return to Nanjing University on March 14, 1932, she wrote the above for her fellow students. We find those words remarkable considering that on her arrival in Beijing in January she wrote from the Language School in a letter found in the Lipscomb Library, dated February 23, 1932:

"Here in Peiping there is anxiety about the Japanese attack from the north as soon as warm weather comes, but at least there is not momentary terror as there was in Nanking. I find my nerves do not stand tension as they once did. I can't bear it somehow with any fortitude. I am ashamed, but so it is."