Louis Untermeyer correspondence

Louis Untermeyer (1885-1977) was an American poet, anthologist, critic, and editor, and was the fourteenth Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress (appointed 1961). For the most part self-educated, Untermeyer resigned from his father's jewelry firm in order to focus on literary pursuits. He married Jean Starr in January 1907. The couple had one son, Richard, who committed suicide in 1927. Untermeyer and Starr divorced in 1926, but reunited in 1929, and adopted two sons, Laurence and Joseph. Untermeyer married poet Virginia Moore in 1927, and the couple had one son, John Moore Untermeyer, who was renamed John Fitzallen Moore after his parents' divorce in 1929. Untermeyer married Esther Antin in the 1930s (divorced 1945), and Bryna Ivens in 1948. In 1950, Untermeyer was a panelist during the first year of the What's My Line? television quiz show. Untermeyer was forced to leave the television series after lending his signature to a number of communist publications. Untermeyer authored and/or edited close to 100 books. In 1956 he was awarded a gold medal by the Poetry Society of America.