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America's greatest sonneteer

https://collections.lancasterhistory.org/en/permalink/lhdo17172
Author
Sneath, E. Hershey
Date of Publication
1928.
Call Number
811.49 M633s
More detail
Responsibility
by E. Hershey Sneath.
Author
Sneath, E. Hershey
Place of Publication
Columbia, Pa
Publisher
Clover Press (Geo. D. Hall)
Date of Publication
1928.
Physical Description
95 p. front. (port.) 20 cm.
Notes
"Sonnets by Lloyd Mifflin": p. [75]-95.
Autograph : To Ruth G. Kauffman with compliments of Houston Mifflin, Norwood, October 24, 1928.
Subjects
Mifflin, Lloyd, - 1816-1921.
Sonnets.
Location
Lancaster History Library - Book
Call Number
811.49 M633s
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Archive

https://collections.lancasterhistory.org/en/permalink/11fc9b5c-d0a9-49c2-918d-579705492345
Collection
David B. Landis Collection
Title
David B. Landis Collection
Object ID
MG0158
Date Range
1812-1954
Archaeology Sonnets Street and Road Committee, Lancaster Cycling Club Unitarian Laymen’s League Vigil Village Vigil Wickersham Printing Company YMCA Young Men’s Christian Association Related Materials: Processing History: Cataloged by DT, JM, and HST, 1998-2008. This collection has been documented, preserved
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  1 document  
Collection
David B. Landis Collection
Title
David B. Landis Collection
Description
The David B. Landis Collection consists primarily of his personal and business correspondence, as well as his poetry and writings. Of special interest are a booklet with a synopsis autobiography of his life and his picture. There are also family papers, genealogy, membership cards, and obituaries.
Admin/Biographical History
David Bachman Landis was born in Landisville, Pennsylvania on 12 February 1862, the son of Israel C. and Mary M. Landis. As a school boy, he worked in his father's dry goods store and published a paper for boys titled Keystone Amateur. He began his printing career by apprenticing at the Inquirer Printing and Publishing Company in Lancaster in 1878, and in 1883 he opened his own job printing office in Landisville where he published the Village Vigil.
Mr. Landis moved to Lancaster in 1888 and started Pluck Art Printery. He started out in Lancaster by publishing Pluck, a magazine dedicated to the fields of printing and photography, but soon devoted his business to commercial and society printing. The name was changed in 1914 to Landis Art Print.
Printing, however, was not his only passion. He was an avid bicyclist and belonged to the Lancaster Cycling Club and the League of American Wheelmen. Through these organizations, he helped to improve the condition of roads in Pennsylvania. He was active in the Lancaster County Historical Society, the Pennsylvania German Society, the Ben Franklin Club, and Grace Lutheran Church. He wrote poetry and essays, and dedicated many pieces to friends and family.
David B. Landis married Nora K. Baker of Landisville in 1885. They had four children. Nora passed away in 1910. David married his second wife, Bertha L. Cochran, in 1914.
Date Range
1812-1954
Year Range From
1812
Year Range To
1954
Date of Accumulation
1812-1954
Creator
Landis, David Bachman, 1862-1940
Storage Location
LancasterHistory, Lancaster, PA
Storage Room
Archives South
Storage Wall
Side 04
People
Baer, Frank
Baker, Catherine
Baker, Emma W.
Baker, P. W.
Barrett, W. W.
Benner, Henry
Brown G. W.
Camp, Edward N.
Carr, George M.
Chamberlain, Frank N.
Cochran, Ada
Cole, Will T.
Conyngham, Redmond
Denlinger, D.
Diehl, H.
Diffenderffer, Frank Ried
Diller, S.
Donaldson, W. M.
Dunbar, William H.
Ely, Alfred
Forshey, E. L.
Frederick, George W.
Garretson, G. R.
Gay, Ed. C.
Grout, J. W.
Gould, J. J.
Greider, Mary Carolyn
Greider, Joseph Landis
Griest, William Walton
Hains, Wilson R.
Haldeman, Victor Macholski
Haldy Gertrude Hensel
Hardy, E. W.
Heister, A. V.
Hershey, Harvey S.
Hershey, J. B.
Hess, Barbara K.
Holbach, George H.
Hood, Jesse A.
Hostetter A. K.
Hostetter Albert K.
Jackson, A. C., Jr.
Johnston, R. A.
Kramer, Donald
Keen, Robert H.
Kreider, A. B.
Krick, William T.
Landis, Benjamin
Landis, Bertha L. Cochran
Landis, Christian
Landis, D. M., Dr.
Landis, David Bachman
Landis, Elvin G.
Landis, Felix
Landis, Florence D.
Landis, Frances
Landis, Henry G.
Landis, Irene Janet
Landis, Israel Christian
Landis, James B.
Landis, Johannes
Landis, John
Landis, John C.
Landis, Mary M. Musselman
Landis, Michael Bachman
Landis, Nora K.
Landis, Priscilla R.
Lehman, Eliza Ann
Lehman, Emma Bachman
Lincoln, Abraham
Marrow, Paul Harding
McBride, Sarah C.
McClain, Frank B.
McGinnis, J.
Merrill, W. J.
Missemer, J. R.
Morrison, Neale
Moyer, Albert,
Moxley, C. A.
Musselman, David
Musselman, Edward M.
Musselman, Sarah
Myrtle, M.
Neale, Fred
Neale, John C.
Nissley, H. L.
Reynolds, Howard
Rial, Abram S.
Rial, S.
Rial, Susan Ann
Shields, R. I.
Shirk, John Kohr
Simon, Daniel B.
Smith, Edwin Hadley
Stein, George
Stephen, Samuel
Taft, William Howard
Thompson, C.
Trout, J. H.
Wager, D. Y.
Walsh, M.
Walsh, Thomas
Washington, George
Weber, Otto E.
Weidel, Melba Landis
Weidman, Joel
Wenaugh, W. L.
Wickersham, J. Harold
Wolf, B.
Wolf, D. Dorsey
Wolf, Edna Kempton
Other Creators
Landis, Bertha L. Cochran, d. 1959
Subjects
Genealogy
Letters
Poetry
Search Terms
Advertising
Ben Franklin Club
Correspondence
Family reunions
Finding aids
Franklin Institute
Genealogy
Invitations
Invoices
Lancaster Board of Trade
Lancaster Chamber of Commerce
Lancaster County Agricultural Society
Lancaster County Historical Society
Lancaster Cycling Club
Landis Art Press
League of American Wheelmen
Letters
Manuscript groups
Pageant of Liberty
Pennsylvania German Society
Pennsylvania State Agricultural Society
Pluck Art Printery
Poetry
Society for Pennsylvania Archaeology
Sonnets
Street and Road Committee, Lancaster Cycling Club
Unitarian Laymen's League
Village Vigil
Wickersham Printing Company
YMCA
Young Men's Christian Association
Extent
1 box, 26 folders, .5 cubic ft.
Object Name
Archive
Language
English
Object ID
MG0158
Location of Originals
LancasterHistory, Lancaster, Pennsylvania
Notes
Preferred Citation: David B. Landis Collection (MG0158), Folder #, Insert #, LancasterHistory, Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
Access Conditions / Restrictions
Please use photocopies when available.
Copyright
Collection may not be photocopied. Please direct questions to Research Center Staff at research@lancasterhistory.org.
Permission for reproduction and/or publication must be obtained in writing from LancasterHistory.
Credit
Courtesy of LancasterHistory, Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
Accession Number
1957.MG0158
Other Numbers
MG-158
Classification
MG0158
Description Level
Fonds
Custodial History
Cataloged by DT, JM, and HST, 1998-2008. Added to database 29 July 2021.
Documents
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Finding Aid

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Archive

https://collections.lancasterhistory.org/en/permalink/44a8170c-e467-452e-8cdb-075997491039
Collection
Lloyd Mifflin Collection
Title
Lloyd Mifflin Collection
Object ID
MG0059
More detail
Collection
Lloyd Mifflin Collection
Title
Lloyd Mifflin Collection
Description
This collection contains the papers of Lloyd Mifflin, including diaries, his poetry, typescripts, galleys with marginal notes, Mifflin family material, and a scrapbook of newspaper clippings. Lloyd Mifflin was a poet and painter from Columbia, Pa. He is best known as a writer of sonnets, publishing over 500.
Admin/Biographical History
Lloyd Mifflin (1846-1921), artist of landscape and portraiture, was also "America's greatest sonneteer." He was born and lived much of his life in Columbia, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania where he was free to wander the banks of the Susquehanna River and its tributaries.
His father, J. Houston Mifflin, of English Quaker descent, was Lloyd's first teacher in drawing and sketching. His mother, Elizabeth A. Heise, came from German heritage. She was born in Columbia and died when Lloyd was very young. His father, a kind and patient man, noted that Lloyd was a rather weak child and provided equestrian and water sports to improve his health.
Lloyd was taught in the public schools in Columbia, including the Washington Classical Institute. The Mifflin family supported local education by bequeathing two houses from their estate, the cottage known as "Norwood" and the grand house, "Cloverton," as well as the estate itself. The school district annually planted a flower on his birthday, September 15, and read one of his sonnets, "A Picture of My Mother."
At the age of 14, Lloyd undertook drawing and sketching with his father. He also had Thomas Moran as an instructor in painting and worked with Isaac Williams of Philadelphia for a short time. In 1869, he traveled to Europe where he studied with Henry Herzog at Dusseldorf, Germany. His adventures also took him to Italy, France, England, and Scotland. He returned to Columbia from Europe and continued painting scenes from along the Susquehanna-from Cooperstown, NY to the Chesapeake Bay. As did most other painters of the time, he earned money from portraiture.
In his paintings, he captured the natural with refined color and light, which yielded firm and balanced forms. He preferred to capture the peacefulness of a woodland path or other quiet spots, rather than the noise of an industrial area. Later in his life he liked seasonal paintings, since they gave him a chance to probe deeper into a philosophical spirit.
Mifflin turned to poetry at the age of 51. According to what he wrote in The Hills, his first volume of poetry (1896), he claimed that the fumes of the paint made him sick. In his lifetime he filled twelve books of verse with two hundred poems and more than six hundred sonnets. He wrote more sonnets than William Shakespeare, John Milton, and William Wordworth. John Keats, however, was his favorite. He preferred Keats for his expression regarding the love of beauty, both real and ideal; his forms were always poised and dignified. During this time he also taught himself the art of etching, using this technique to illustrate The Hills.
Mifflin stressed a strong love of beauty in his poetry as he did in his painting. His imagination and beautiful sense of harmony characterize his verse. The main source of his ambition, inspiration and consolation are clearly seen in The Invocation.
He devoted his greatest efforts to the category of the sonnet, considering it the most distinguished and exalted of all forms of English poetry. He enjoyed the structure, the metrical and rhythmic beauty, the plan of metrical rhyme and diction. Mifflin found it much like a musical composition.
Sonnets bipartite in structure usually have a combination of eight lines followed by six. The rhyme schemes and diction include many metaphors and an extensive vocabulary. His one hundred and fifty nature sonnets emphasize the descriptive, not the intuitional. To sample his poetic styles, one should turn to his three hundred and fifty collected sonnets, published in 1905 with a second edition in 1907. A large number came from earlier books.
As a poet, Mifflin was an idealist and respected the ideal of Greek mythological beauty. In the Echoes of the Greek Idylls and Slopes of Helicon, we find no roughness of spirit. There was a conscience of a spiritual presence. His religious sonnets were grounded in the faith of a personal God which related more to his aesthetic feelings than to traditional Christianity. Themes of life and death occur in many sonnets. His poetry inspired faith, hope and deep emotion. These sonnets were more descriptive than philosophical.
Mifflin's personal ambition was to excel; he wanted to write the perfect sonnet. Like the classical Greeks, he hoped his poetry would obtain an immortality. Mifflin thought the world had largely ignored him, even though his poetry received high praise. At his life's end he changed his opinion and credited his readers with more accolades than he had earlier thought. Perhaps he was too hard on himself. Lloyd Mifflin carried the name "Hermit of the hills" who walked the 'world as one entranced' and 'in life's turbid wave', dropped ' the crown-jewel of his melody.'"
E. Hershey Sneath. America's Greatest Sonneteer. The Clover Press (Geo. D. Hall): Columbia, PA.,1928.
Year Range From
1751
Year Range To
1965
Creator
Mifflin, Lloyd, 1846-1921
Storage Location
LancasterHistory, Lancaster, PA
Storage Room
Archives South
Storage Wall
Side 02
People
Howarth, Shirley
Mifflin, Houston
Mifflin, Lloyd
Stauffer, Nevin A.
Subjects
Artists
Painters
Search Terms
Artists
Columbia
Diaries
Illustrations
Painters
Poetry
Poets
Press reviews
Scrapbooks
Sonnets
Susquehanna River
University of Pennsylvania
Wills
Extent
2 box, 26 folders, 1 cubic ft.
Object Name
Archive
Language
English
Object ID
MG0059
Location of Originals
LancasterHistory, Lancaster, Pennsylvania
Related Item Notes
J. Houston Mifflin Collection, MG-150
Lloyd Mifflin paintings and other items in the Curatorial Collection
Photograph Collection
Access Conditions / Restrictions
No restrictions.
Copyright
Collection may not be photocopied. Please contact Research Staff or Archives Staff with questions.
Credit
Lloyd Mifflin Collection (MG-59), Folder #, LancasterHistory.org
Classification
MG0059
Description Level
Fonds
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