Administrative Information

Access Restrictions

There are no restrictions.

Use Restrictions

There are no restrictions.

Preferred Citation

Beard Family Papers, 1870-1932. Accession 51442. Personal papers collection, The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia.

Acquisition Information

Purchased.

Biographical Information

Lois Menita Landes was born in Staunton, Virginia on 26 July 1906. She was the daughter of Homer H. and Esther Elizabeth Landes. She graduated from Robert E. Lee High School in Staunton in 1924, and then attended Marion Junior College. Following her graduation in 1926, Lois Landes taught in various high schools in Augusta and Highland Counties, Virginia. On 21 October 1930, she married Gleaves Crockett Beard, Jr. in Staunton. He was born on 5 July 1903 and was the son of Gleaves Crockett Beard, Sr. and Anna Price Fretwell. Following their marriage, they lived in Fort Defiance where he was employed as a clerk in a general store. Gleaves C. Beard, Jr. died on 22 April 1955. Lois M. Beard died on 9 December 1969. They are both buried in Oak Lawn Cemetery in New Hope, Virginia.

Scope and Content

Papers, 1870-1932 of the Beard family of Augusta County, Virginia, namely Gleaves C. Beard, Jr. (1903-1955) and his wife Lois Menita (Landes) Beard (1906-1969). The collection includes an account book, autograph book, correspondence, diaries, greeting cards, ledgers, photographs and negatives, postcards, programs, report cards, and wedding invitations.

The bulk of the collection consists of letters covering the period 1918 to 1932. The majority of those written prior to 1926 are to Gleaves C. Beard, Jr. from numerous female acquaintances who were teaching school in various places in Virginia. Following 1926, most of the correspondence is written between Beard and Landes just prior to their marriage in 1930, while she was teaching in Crabbottom (now Blue Grass), Highland County, Virginia, and he was living in Fort Defiance and New Hope in Augusta County and working in his uncle's general store. Topics include health, weather, school activities and teaching duties, attending religious services and church activities, movies, concerts, and sporting events, courtship and marriage, day trips and picnics, and visits back to Landes' hometown of Staunton. Many of the letters also detail the activities of her fellow teachers and boarders in Crabbottom, as well as the families with whom they were living.