Marjorie Weeden Champlin (1921-1993) of Jamestown, Rhode Island, was a 1943 graduate of Wheaton College, where she had earned her bachelor’s degree in English. During World War II, Champlin worked as a cryptographer at the Army Signal Corps in Washington, D.C. After the war, she held positions at the Washington Post and the Christian Science Monitor, but her life’s passion was teaching and studying Shakespeare. When she returned to Rhode Island, she taught all grades from kindergarten through high school while also earning her masters in Classics at Brown University and working towards a doctorate in English at Trinity College, Harvard University, University of Chicago, and the University of Rhode Island. Marjorie W. Champlin died on October 5, 1993, and was buried at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church in Portsmouth, Rhode Island. Following her death, her brother, Richard L. Champlin, and sister, Jeanne C. Haymon, had her finished transcript, Changing the face of Shakespeare, printed in 1996.
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This collection is owned by the Redwood Library and Athenaeum. Permission to publish materials must be obtained in writing from the Special Collections Librarian of the Redwood Library and Athenaeum.
Marjorie W. Champlin papers, RLC.Ms.540, Redwood Library and Athenaeum.
This collection consists primarily of letters and postcards Marjorie W. Champlin received in reply to the letters she sent to various United States and Rhode Island legislators and politicians, college professors, journalists, a member of England’s House of Commons, and Queen Elizabeth’s personal secretary at Buckingham Palace. Majority of the letters Champlin received were the sender’s response to her concerns, comments, and personal analysis of political campaigns, education reform, Social Security and Medicare, immigration, energy, and especially the Iran-Contra Affair of the early 1980s. Some correspondence received was in response to Champlin’s personal acknowledgment of an individual’s illness, birth, death, or visit to Newport, Rhode Island. Sometimes, the replies she received were mass produced and generalized, but the majority contain the sender’s actual signature with a personalized response to Champlin’s original communication.
Marjorie W. Champlin corresponded most often with Rhode Island Representative, Governor and Senator John H. Chafee (1922-1999) and Rhode Island Senator Claiborne Pell (1918-2009) as reflected in the letters in this collection. She also received correspondence from United States Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower, George Bush, and Bill Clinton. The complete list of individuals she received correspondence from, in alphabetical order, is as follows:
Also included are two letters received by her brother, Richard L. Champlin, after her death in October 1993, and an undated essay she wrote titled, "What is Republicanism."
This collection is arranged in chronological order.
Gift of Richard L. Champlin, 1993.
This collection was initially processed by Aimee Saunders in 2010.