In the family series are papers of the Hench and Michie families from the 19th century to the 1970s. They consist chiefly of correspondence documenting family events and the family tanning business, and a miscellaneous assortment of legal documents, souvenirs, advertisements of the Michie Co., Charlottesville, Va., memoirs, speeches, school work, autograph albums, short stories, poetry, genealogy of the Showalter, Ickes and Dromgold family, and Presbyterian Bible lessons. Of interest are papers, 1935-1950, chronicling the work of Virginia Bedinger Michie Hench with the Albemarle Child Welfare Association, the Community Chest and the Red Cross; clippings about his brother Philip Showalter Hench; and papers, diaries, and photographs, from his World War I duty in France at Base Hospital no. 7. Diaries, 1885-1966, describe life in Pittsburgh, 1885-1923, trips to Europe, 1887, and the West, 1915, a fight against cancer, and especially, life at the University of Virginia in the 1930s and 1940s. The series of professional papers reflect Hench's lifelong interest in lexiography and are chiefly concerned with his classes, his publications, and organizations to which he belonged. He belonged to The American Dialect Society, the American Name Society, American Speech, Britannica Book of the Year, College English Association, the English Institute, the Modern Language Association and the Virginia Quarterly Review. His dissertation, Ratio: Allegory, and research he continued on the topic are included as are published and unpublished articles by Hench and other scholars, lecture notes, student theses and University committee reports. There is correspondence about his teaching, the Virginia Department of English, the Raven Society, his alma mater Lafayette College, his year in Austria as Fulbright professor, and his dictionary advisory work. Edmund Wilson is a correspondent.
