The Kenneth Gale Crawford Papers span almost the entire life of Kenneth Crawford from a letter written about 1911 to obituaries printed after his death in 1983. Despite this apparent comprehensiveness, the collection is small, and given the events of his career, disappointingly fragmentary and incomplete. The majority of Crawford's writings are documented only by final, printed copies without the drafts and supporting material that would make the collection an outstanding source for research. There are, however, a number of valuable items in the papers including a complete run of his “Washington” column, clippings and correspondence concerning his brief tenure as president of the American Newspaper Guild, a typescript journal concerning his observations of Vietnam in 1962, and notes on an interview with Lyndon Baines Johnson in 1971.
The collection is organized as Personal and Biographical Material, Correspondence, Speeches and Writings, and Special Interest Files.
The Personal and Biographical Information contains miscellaneous material about Crawford and members of his family such as resumes, obituaries, biographical clippings, awards and honorary degrees, and a copy of his birth certificate. Also of note is a copy of a letter from Ernest Hemingway which mentioned Crawford and a brief autobiography and notes entitled “Episodes and People” concerning his observations of various celebrities, apparently a proposal for a book. Photographs received with the papers include documentation of various events in his career and members of his family.
Correspondence consists of a small general file which dates from letters of introduction written for Crawford in 1922 to responses to a 1977 article. The few letters of note which are included (from Dwight Eisenhower, Lyndon B. Johnson, Melvin Laird, Richard Nixon, and General George Patton) appear to have been selected for their flattering comments. Similar letters (including several from Harold Ickes) are included in the microfilmed career scrapbooks. More important among the general correspondence is a letter from Eleanor Roosevelt which included comments from her daughter Anna Boettiger about local ANG activities and Crawford's response when this letter was accidentally opened in the ANG offices. There is one additional outgoing letter from Crawford concerning the Guild. Also of note is an unsigned 1968 letter (apparently from Crawford) concerning Newsweek's departure from editorial objectivity on civil rights issues. A separate correspondence file relates to his book, The Pressure Boys. Included here are letters (one from Alben Barkley) and legal documents concerning alleged errors in the book and royalty statements.
Speeches and Writings contains a variety of the genres in which Crawford worked--articles, book reviews, books, columns, and speeches--arranged alphabetically by type. Because of their deteriorated condition the articles are available almost entirely on microfilm. Filmed among the articles are two career scrapbooks which not only contain copies of Crawford's writings but also include articles about him and his career. The first scrapbook deals primarily with The Pressure Boys and includes reviews, publishers' notices, editorials, and related correspondence. Clippings regarding his Guild presidency, public appearances, and PM are also included, as are several photographs. The second scrapbook is devoted almost exclusively to his coverage of World War II in Africa and Europe. Many of Crawford's articles, as well as correspondence, identification and press cards, and photographs are included. The second half of the volume is largely concerned with the reviews and responses to his book Report on North Africa. The scrapbooks were destroyed after filming, but the original photographs contained in them have been retained with other photographs in the Personal and biographical Information section.
Also on film is an additional volume of articles written by Crawford for the Washington Post after his retirement from Newsweek and a number of loose clippings. Although the unbound article clippings span the period 1937 to 1978 and represent the large number of journals and magazines for which he wrote, they probably constitute only a fraction of his total career output. Also available only on microfilm are several chronologically-arranged albums which contained a complete run of printed copies of his “Washington” column.
Other genres represented in the papers include book reviews; advertising material and a review for his book Report on North Africa; speeches; and published and unpublished transcripts from radio programs on which he appeared such as American Forum of the Air and Town Meeting. Although the collection does not include either of Crawford's books, a copy of The Pressure Boys is held by the SHSW Library.
The Special Interest Files were either kept by Crawford for his own use or represent groups of loose subject-related material arranged in the Archives. Present are materials concerning the 25th anniversary of the D-Day landings and a letter of introduction, a draft of his famous D-Day article, and other memorabilia concerning World War II. In the file on Vietnam is a day-by-day journal of observations, interviews, notes, and editorial comments on his visit to Vietnam in 1962. Miscellaneous documents entitled background material includes 1971 “off-the-record” remarks by Henry Kissinger, and a lengthy cablegram from Crawford concerning a telephone interview with President Johnson in 1971.
