Pulitzer Prize winning Poet, Marianne C. Moore (1887-1972) is buried in Gettysburg’s Evergreen Cemetery. Here she is throwing out the first pitch for 1968’s Opening Day in Yankee Stadium. Opening Day starting pitcher Mel Stottlemyer was supposedly impressed by Moore’s curve ball and asked her for some tips (which was probably what is asked of everyone who throws out the first pitch). Her “tips” may have helped as the Yankees defeated the California Angels 1-0. 1968 was Mickey Mantle’s final season. He was the highest paid player on the Yankees at $100,000 a year. Marianne Moore once said that she would given much to have invented the admirably intricate stitch pattern of baseballs. Not many days after throwing this pitch, Moore suffered a stroke. During the summer of 1968, Moore suffered a series of strokes, and was a semi-invalid for nearly two years before she died in her New York City home. This image was taken on April 10, 1968.

This map shows the location of where our Evergreen Cemetery videos were produced. Videos #1- #24 were shown in our previous Evergreen Cemetery posts and are shown on other maps. Video #35 was taken at the memorial stone for David Myers. Video #36 was taken at the gravestones of David and Catherine Wills. Video #37 was taken at the grave of David Kendlehart. Video #38 was taken at the grave of Marianne Moore. This map was created facing north at approximately 7:30 PM on Friday, November 19, 2010.

Gettysburg Licensed Battlefield Guide Deb Novotny is standing by the gravestone to David Kendlehart, the President of the Gettysburg Town Council on June 26, 1863. This view was taken facing northeast at approximately 6:00 PM on Thursday, September 2, 2010.

In Video #37 (Videos #1-#36 were shown in our previous Evergreen Cemetery posts) Gettysburg Licensed Battlefield Guide Deb Novotny is in Evergreen Cemetery at the gravestone for David Kendlehart. She reads the “grocery list” that Confederate Brigadier General Jubal Early presented to David Kendlehart on June 26, 1863. This view was taken facing southwest to northeast at approximately 6:00 PM on Thursday, September 2, 2010.

The wooden pump on Baltimore Street by which Confederate Brigadier General Jubal Early tied his horse and made his demands to the citizens of Gettysburg on June 26, 1863. The pump was removed in 1910. This view, courtesy of Gettysburg National Military Park, was taken facing north circa 1900.

In addition to being President of the Gettysburg Town Council, David Kendlehart served as the director of the Bank of Gettysburg from 1852 until the day of his death in 1891. He was said to be “gifted with a wonderful and accurate memory. He was a storehouse for information, and a very interesting and entertaining gentleman.” This image from the History of the Bank of Gettysburg was taken circa the late 1800s.

Licensed Battlefield Guide Deb Novotny is standing by the headstone to Mary Warner Moore and her daughter, the poet Marianne C. Moore. Marianne Moore was raised by her grandfather, John R. Warner, whose headstone is on the left. She never knew her grandmother, Jennie Craig Warner, whose headstone is in the left. Jennie Craig Warner died three months following the Battle of Gettysburg. From 1858-1867 (and therefore during the Battle of Gettysburg), John Riddle Warner was the Minister for the Presbyterian churches in the Gettysburg area. Those churches included the Gettysburg Presbyterian Church on Baltimore Street, the Great Conewago Presbyterian Church (located in Hunterstown), and the Marsh Creek Presbyterian Church. According to the 1860 federal census, he was a resident of Gettysburg. In 1867 the Reverend Warner moved with his daughter, Mary Warner Moore, to Kirkwood, Missouri. There Mary Moore, who was separated from her husband, had a daughter, Marianne Craig Moore. This view was taken facing northeast at approximately 6:00 PM on Thursday, September 2, 2010.

In Video #38 Licensed Battlefield Guide Deb Novotny is in Evergreen Cemetery at the grave of Marianne C. Moore, the only Pulitzer Prize winner buried in Evergreen Cemetery. Moore was awarded the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award in 1952 for her book, Collected Poems. This view was taken facing northeast at approximately 6:00 PM on Thursday, September 2, 2010.

In 1947, Marianne’s mother, Mary Warner Moore died. Following her death, Marianne Moore, at the age of 59, she began wearing the tricorner hat and cape as her personal trademark. Her mother had fashioned the first cape in 1905, and Marianne had worn a cape in college at Bryn Mawr. Moore would say that she liked tricorn hats because they concealed the defects of her head, which, she stated, resembled that of a “hop toad.” This view was taken circa the 1950s.

Marianne C. Moore’s father, John Milton Moore was a construction engineer and inventor who left the family before the birth of his daughter Marianne. Marianne Moore wrote eleven books of poetry, edited a literary and cultural journal, The Dial, and had poems published in numerous journals. She also served as an unofficial hostess for the mayor of New York City during the 1950s. This view was taken facing northeast at approximately 6:00 PM on Thursday, September 2, 2010.

Marianne Moore was known as a modernist poet. In general, modernist poets were united in their free verse “by a dislike of cliches and grandiloquent language. Instead, they used everyday but precise speech to write about unsentimental subjects.” Here is a group of literary celebrities at New York City’s Gotham Book Mart for a December, 1948 party for Osbert and Edith Sitwell, who are seated at the center of the photograph. Clockwise from W. H. Auden, on the ladder at the top right, were Elizabeth Bishop, Marianne Moore, Delmore Schwartz, Randall Jarrell, Charles Henri Ford (cross-legged on the floor), William Rose Benet, Stephen Spender, Marya Zaturenska, Horace Gregory, Tennessee Williams (whose employment at the Gotham Book Mart lasted one day), Richard Eberhart, Gore Vidal, and Jose Garcia Villa. This photo was taken in December, 1948.