PBA Galleries

Archive of 24 autograph letters, signed. Of various lengths and on various letterheads and stationery; typescripts, carbons, etc.

Belle Livingstone [Isabelle Graham Hutchins] (1875-1957), American writer, adventurer, saloon operator, etc. Author of 2 autobiographies and the only woman jailed in the U.S. for violating the Prohibition Amendment. Archive of 24 letters all addressed to author T. Everett Harré. Included are a letter from Belle while jailed in 1931 with the return address of "Harlem Prison, Cell 5" in which she writes: "My Dearest Everett, I suppose you good writers are not thinking of the stone floors, barred windows, mattressless iron bed and the iron spoon and bowl. All you are seeing behind these surly walls is the wealth of stories. I can only compare it to a four ring circus and even though I have a front row seat I need four pairs of eyes to see all the dreadful falls frought with bitterness and despair....Imagine if you can being shut up, crammed together face to face for 30 days with the lowest and commonest of prostitutes, reds, drug addicts and shop lifters, to say nothing of the drunks they pick out of the ash cans, but they will all people my next book for I sit all day drawing pen pictures of my tormentors." Also included are 3 typescript versions of "The Passing of the Splendid Sirens" by Belle Livingstone as told to T. Everett Harré, with numerous manuscript corrections by Harré; typescript titled "Night by Night with Belle Livingstone"; several carbons of letters to Livingstone from Harré; proof copies of 4 (of 5) parts of "Belle Livingstone's Jail Memoirs" as published in Every Week Magazine.