Ithaca Festival records, 1962-1984.
Collection Number: 2593

The Ithaca Festival (previously Summer-Ithaca and the Ithaca Festival of the Classics) incorporated in 1964 as a center for the performing arts in Ithaca and Tompkins County, New York.

Records concerning the organization and development of the Festival include agendas and minutes of the Board of Trustees and the Executive; minutes and reports of various other committees; fund raising and public relations consultants' reports, the report on a space and accommodation program prepared by Fairchild and Dubois, Toronto architects, and a statement on the Festival by the Department of Speech and Drama at Cornell University; correspondence, memoranda, resolutions, financial statements, and rough notes; four versions of a promotional brochure outlining the purpose of the Festival, giving information on the major figures concerned and on the size and geographical distribution of the potential audience, projecting estimates of revenue and expenses for a typical season, and including a section by Alan Schneider entitled "The Idea of a Festival Theatre in Ithaca..." and a file of correspondence, minutes, and memoranda pertaining to the earlier organization; an incomplete run (1965-1966) of the newsletter "From the Wings," newspaper clippings, and other printed matter.

Also, tapes and transcripts (1965-1971) of the Cornell University Oral History Program's Ithaca Festival Documentation Project conducted by Marian Hodges, Gould Colman, Katrina Morse, David Harry Watrous Smith, Edwina Devereux, and Edward Devereux, including interviews with Kit Boynton, Walter G. Bruska, Ralph N. Campbell, Marvin A. Carlson, William R. Carpenter, Joseph F. Daine, Edwina Devereux, Howard I. Dillingham, Leonard Edelstein, Henry Guerlac, Francine Herman, Mary W. John, Jean F. Lynch, Beatrice MacLeod, Steven Muller, Thomas Niederkorn, Norbert H. Schickel, Jr., William F. Schmidt, Alan Scneider, Randall E. Shew, John Summerskill, Charles Treman Jr., and Walter Wiggins, mainly concerning their interest in and support for the Ithaca Festival, but also referring to Summer-Ithaca, and an interview with J. Wesley Zeigler concerning his role as manageing director. Among the other persons represented in these records are David Ketchum, Robert Mueller, Leverett Saltonstall, Jr., and Alvin H. Reiss.

Ithaca Festival records, #2593. Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University Library.

Access to tapes and transcripts restricted to permission of the archivist.