Samford, Aileen Maxwell

Scope and Contents

Typed draft, heavily revised by hand, of Samford's letter to Barbara Norman of the Alabama State Council on the Arts and Humanities (final version: OPL010_008). The typed signature reads "Aileen Samford, Chairman, Whirlwind Project." Handwritten notes at the foot of the second page record a call to Southern Living and the Progressive Farmer Company in Birmingham, and that Julia Hamilton will notify travel editor Les Thomas.

Scope and Contents Handwritten draft, with strikethroughs and corrections and no signature. Samford welcomes Woodham and Mr. Blumgarten (written "Baumgarten"), reports that invitations have gone to Woodham's guest list, and asks for a photograph of Woodham suitable for framing to hang near the "Whirlwind Terrace," and for a portfolio of her works. A struck passage concerns a work to be purchased by the Twentieth Century Club for the library in memory of Mary Denson Samford. The draft concludes on the reverse....

Scope and Contents Handwritten list of thirty numbered guests for the September 20, 1977 luncheon, with locations, identifying notes, and red-ink RSVP marks and tallies. Guests include James Blumgarten, Woodham's daughter Elizabeth Caraway, her brother John W. Woodham, John and Alice McClelland, Mayor Robert McCullough, the city commissioners, Fob James, Leonard Randolph of the National Endowment for the Arts, Les Thomas of Southern Living, and Laura Holloway of the Opelika Daily News. The entry for Mr. and...

Scope and Contents Samford writes to Barbara Norman of the Alabama State Council on the Arts and Humanities at the suggestion of Larry Rosenbaum. She encloses photographs, Woodham's résumé, and a newspaper clipping, asking that the photographs be returned for local publicity. She gives a history of the Azalea Garden Club, organized in 1946 with thirty members, and of the commission, which Woodham accepted before the Arts Center was built. Woodham conceived Whirlwind after...

Scope and Contents

Handwritten notes assigning club members to committees for the dedication: publicity (Mrs. Inez Searcy, Mrs. William Samford, Mrs. Taylor Hurby [?]), luncheon (Mrs. Edward Jones, Mrs. R. L. Wilson, Mrs. Eden [?] Andrews, Mrs. Whittelsey), terrace (Mrs. Frank Boyd, Mrs. George Dyar), hospitality and invitations (Mrs. Judson Salter), telephone (Mrs. R. L. Wilson, Mrs. Julian Palmer, Mrs. W. B. Whatley), and treasurer (Lurine Floyd).

Scope and Contents

Photocopy of Samford's letter to Barbara Norman (OPL010_008), identical in text.

Scope and Contents Samford's handwritten notes on index cards. For the 11:30 presentation, she presents "this bronze fountain sculpture called Whirlwind" to the City of Opelika on behalf of the Azalea Garden Club, noting the library was dedicated in September 1976. For the luncheon, she welcomes guests and quotes the "six impossible things before breakfast" exchange from Through the Looking-Glass, then recognizes guests by...

Scope and Contents

Typed statement on Samford's letterhead giving the history of the Azalea Garden Club, the commission, the origin of the Whirlwind idea, and the schedule for September 20, 1977. The text matches the body of Samford's letter to Barbara Norman (OPL010_008), without salutation or signature, with "unusual" corrected by hand to "unique." Probably prepared for publicity.

Scope and Contents

Handwritten transcription of the "six impossible things before breakfast" exchange from Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass, which Samford quoted in her luncheon remarks (OPL010_032).

Scope and Contents This series documents the commission, fabrication, and dedication of Whirlwind, a welded bronze fountain sculpture by Alabama-born sculptor Jean Woodham, presented to the City of Opelika by the Azalea Garden Club on September 20, 1977, and installed on the terrace of the Lewis Cooper, Jr. Memorial Library and Arts Center. Most of the material was created or gathered by Aileen Maxwell Samford, who chaired the club's Whirlwind Project. The records follow the...