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"John Harrington Cox (May 27, 1863 - November 21, 1945) was one of the pioneers in the field of American folk song scholarship. Cox was born in Madison County, Illinois. Educated at Brown and Harvard (Ph.D. 1923) universities, he received an appointment on the English Department faculty at West Virginia University in 1903. His early efforts at the university were devoted to the study of Old and Middle English, and Medieval literature, in which fields he achieved distinction as an educator, author, and editor.
Cox collected his first folk song in 1913. Two years later, on July 15, 1915, he presided over the founding of the West Virginia Folklore Society, serving as its first president, archivist, and editor. Though the society met formally only twice, it established a network of field collectors across the state that continued to function loosely under Cox's direction for many years.
During the early 1920s, Cox organized and edited an extensive body of the folk songs collected under the Society's auspices as the basis of his Ph.D. dissertation. Produced under the direction of the noted Harvard scholar, George Lyman Kittredge, the dissertation was published as
In the years that followed, Cox prepared an extensive body of additional folk songs for publication. These materials remained in manuscript until they were published in 1939 by the National Service Bureau in two mimeographed volumes:
From Cuthbert, John A. "John Harrington Cox." e-WV: The West Virginia Encyclopedia. 20 April 2015. Web. 17 March 2017 (see link in External Documents)
[Description and date of item], [Box/folder number], John Harrington Cox, Collector, Papers regarding West Virginia Folklore, A&M 0883, West Virginia and Regional History Center, West Virginia University Libraries, Morgantown, West Virginia.
Papers of John Harrington Cox, collector of West Virginia folklore material. Includes manuscripts, typescripts, printed material, sheet music, and newspaper clippings regarding folk songs and folk tales collected by John Harrington Cox and the West Virginia Folklore Society. Some of this material was used by Cox in his Harvard University dissertation of 1923, titled
Series include:
Series 1. Folklore Research Papers (ca. 1915-1930), boxes 1-13
Series 2. Dissertation Draft (ca. 1923), boxes 14-18
Series 3. Correspondence (ca. 1915-1930), boxes 19-21
Series 4. Oversize (1916-1936 and undated), box 22
Permission to publish or reproduce is required from the copyright holder. For more information, please see the Permissions and Copyright page on the West Virginia and Regional History Center website.
This series includes manuscripts, typescript, and printed folk songs, ballads, and folk tales collected by John Harrington Cox. Folk songs and ballads include lyrics and some sheet music. There are also riddles, superstitions, poems, counting-out rhymes, singing games, ghost stories, and folklore notes. Some of the material in this series was sent to Cox by members of the West Virginia Folklore Society, English class students, and various other interested persons.
Boxes 7, 8, and 9 contain what may be typescripts for a book draft, which include non-religious and religious songs, Black lore, ballads, etc. Box 9, folder 1 contains materials pertaining to the West Virginia Folklore Society. Box 13 contains folklore research papers, most of which are contained in envelopes, with the name of the contributor written on the outside. Box 13 includes songs, stories, correspondence, etc.
The reason for the original numbering scheme of folders in boxes 1-6 is unknown, but may indicate a proposed order for publishing.
This series includes a duplicate typescript of the doctoral dissertation that Cox submitted to Harvard University. He was granted his Ph.D. in 1923. Cox then used some of the material in this typescript to compile Folk-Songs of the South, published by the Harvard University Press in 1925.
On the upper left corner of the folders in boxes 14-17, the second number in parentheses might indicate the intended order of items in the final draft.
Page 120 begins Prose Tales/African American Tales. Page 138 begins Singing Games. Page 227 begins Traditional Ballads. Page 286 begins Miscellaneous Songs. Pages 398-446 are missing.
This series includes letters written to Cox. Most of the letters contain folklore research, including folk songs, ballads, and other material collected by various individuals for Cox and the West Virginia Folklore Society.
This series includes sheet music and clippings. Clippings include original newspaper and magazine clippings, as well as photocopies of the originals. Topics of the clippings include folk songs, folklore, and the Hatfields and McCoys.