Special Collections

Finding Aid for the Grover H. Catt Collection
(MUM00695)

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Finding Aid for the Grover H. Catt Collection

Administrative Information

Acquisition Information

Received from Michael Catt, 2003

Processing Information

Collection processed by Audrey M. Uffner, 2003-2005. Finding aid encoded by Kathryn
Michaelis, December 2011.

Additions

No further additions are expected to this collection.

Alternative Formats

The photographs from this collection have been digitized and made available online:
https://clio.lib.olemiss.edu/cdm/landingpage/collection/cattg

Subject Terms

Formats

Biographical Note

Grover Hickman Catt was born in Monticello, Miss. He attended Hinds Junior College
and later joined the military. Catt eventually joined the 509th Bomb Wing of the United
States Air Force (the unit formed to drop the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan)
as a supply specialist. After World War II ended, Catt was one of a handful of soldiers
assigned to fly home on the Enola Gay, the plane that dropped the atomic bomb.

Catt married Winnie Bethea in 1941. The two corresponded regularly during the time
they were separated by Catt’s military service.

Grover Catt graduated from the University of Mississippi School of Pharmacy in 1948.
The Catts eventually operated a drugstore in Pascagoula, Miss.

Scope and Content Note

The collection includes correspondence of both Winnie and Grover Catt between 1940
and 1945. Boxes 1-6 and Boxes 7-14 are arranged chronologically by date of letter
(postmark), as well as by number on letters as marked by the writers themselves. The
collection contains code in letters; censored letters; information regarding conditions
of the home front during the war; references to movies, music, and radio programs;
information regarding women at home and at work, birth control, and pregnancy; Winnie
Catt’s contraction/recovery from Bright’s Disease; and information regarding transportation
by train, bus, and automobile.

The collection contains three boxes of photographs. The photographs document the Catts’
family life in Mississippi; Grover Catt’s time spent on Tinian Island in preparation
for the Enola Gay’s atomic bomb mission to Hiroshima; Catt Pharmacy in Pascagoula,
Miss.; the Catt family in Nebraska; and other topics.

User Information

Preferred Citation

Grover H. Catt Collection, Archives and Special Collections, J.D. Williams Library,
The
University of Mississippi

Access Restrictions

The Grover H. Catt Collection is open for research. The photographs that were removed from this collection are stored at an off-site facility.
Researchers interested in using this collection’s photographs must contact Archives and Special Collections at least two business days in
advance of their planned visit; however, researchers are strongly encouraged
to use the digitized photographs rather than originals.

Copyright Restrictions

The copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code) governs the
making of photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted material. Under
certain conditions specified in the law, libraries and archives are authorized
to furnish a photocopy or other reproduction. One of these specified conditions
is that the photocopy or reproduction is not to be “used for any purpose other
than private study, scholarship or research.” If a user makes a request for,
or
later uses, a photocopy or reproduction for purposes in excess of “fair use,”
that user may be liable for copyright infringement.

Related Material

Resources at the University of Mississippi

The photographs from this collection have been digitized and made available online:
https://clio.lib.olemiss.edu/cdm/landingpage/collection/cattg

Separated Material

Three boxes of photographs have been removed from the collection and transferred to
cold storage.

Arrangement

This collection is arranged in four series: two correspondence series (arranged by
author, then chronologically within each series), a series of miscellaneous materials,
and photographs.

Container List