| Description | <p>Manuscript. Contains 111 letters to Karl Pearson, and 6 letters addressed to Maria Sharpe Pearson.</p>
<p>Letters to Karl Pearson consist of:</p>
<p>One letter dated 1901 enclosing soldier and snail data on behalf of her husband (Walter Frank Raphael Weldon, referred to as "R" in these letters) following his bicycle accident</p>
<p>Telegram and letters from 1906 to 1909. Telegram dated 14 April 1906 announces the death of her husband in the night on 13 April; letters in 1906 on sending Karl measuring instruments of Weldon's; reassuring him about her finances; sorting through his working papers (Pearson was the Literary Executor for his estate), and research into childhood for memoir; enquiries with friends, peers, former tutors and acquaintances about Weldon's academic career; homes for the mice; subscription to the Weldon Medal; continuation of work on mice breeding and editing memoir on Weldon; on Lister succeeding W F R Weldon as Elector to the Cambridge Zoology Professorship; completing sex ration cards and correlation tables for the mice; encloses schedule of work; enclosing correspondence with A D Darbishire about missing mice records; receiving books from Darbishire; progress of Hope Pinker's work on the Weldon Bust; mice pedigrees; regarding A E Shipley's Weldon obituary for The Royal Society; on the Mendelian influence at Cambridge University; inconsistencies between Weldon and Darbishire's mice data, and reworking correlation tables; letters in 1909 on seeing a proof copy of W Bateson's forthcoming book, quoting an extract from the preface attacking biometric study of heredity and variation; scheme for reworking the index; and sending mice information to Karl.</p>
<p>Letters dated 1912 to 1936, regarding result of enquiries about a portrait of Sir William Sedley and the Sedleian Professorship, enclosing replies from A E H Love and Rachael Poole; Karl's election to the first Weldon Prize, candidates for the following year; Karl's refusal of the Prize, subsequent election of Dr Heron; identifying notation on mice index; on whether to elect Schuster to the Weldon Prize, and eventual election of C Goring in 1914; building collection of oaintings; thanks Karl for his article on German culture; on sadness at Harry Moseley and J B S Haldane going to "the front" in October 1914; possibility of doing war work; enclosing cutting on A D Darbishire's death, enquires about action to take with his mice books; offers donation to <i>Biometrika</i>; transporting Bourne's bone casts to London for Karl; on university strategy of allowing vacant Professorships to lapse during the war; further donations to <i>Biometrika</i> to assist with rising print costs; vacancy for new Linacre Professor at Oxford in 1921; finding Galton letters in 1923; invites to Galton Dinners; informing she would not like her portrait done for UCL; enclosing the speech by the Public Orator, 7 February 1928, on the conferment of an MA Degree for her donation of art to the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford University; on death of M S Pearson; failing to obtain a copy of the Public Orator's speech in 1894; on her art collecting; asks Karl to keep Weldon's papers; about reference to her in a letter from Karl to F Galton, published in the <i>Life, Letters and Labours of Francis Galton</i>; on value of her art collection; performance of her stocks and shares; pleasure at hearing of Egon Pearson's Professorship; inviting Karl and Margaret to see the Weldon Room; on Executors of her Will; and a final letter dated 6 January 1936 thanking Karl for his help, particularly after the death of her husband.</p>
<p>Letters to M S Pearson consisting of letters between 1906 and 1908 on Weldon's acting as demonstrator for Balfour prior to taking his degree; her family's wish for her to move from Oxford; taking up mice work; postcard from her trip to Bruges in 1908; and letter in 1919 on auctioning artwork, selling jewellery, and purchasing more art.</p> |