Sylvia Plath and her Amherst Men

When Sylvia Plath was at Smith College, she spent her fair share of free time going out on dates and socializing with Amherst College boys/young men. Some of them she knew from her high school days in Wellesley, too. One of the pleasures of editing her letters was identifying these young men but until recently I really only knew what one of these people looked like: Gordon Lameyer.

Due to the wonders of archives and digitization projects, and even resources like Ancestry.com, more and more "information" (however you wish to define it) is becoming available. This post presents "information" on the young men Plath mentions in her letter. Information as in: what they looked like.

The Amherst College Olio has been digitized and is online for anyone to see. Thank you, Amherst! Using Plath's letters, I then went to each respective yearbook and simply saved an image of the page with the person's senior photograph. I have edited the jpgs to cover up faces and biographies of those that were not relevant to the person who knew Plath. One image depicts a professor Plath met. Beneath photo is a reference to the volume and page number in Plath's letters. There are also references in Plath's journals to some of these fellows, too.

Class of 1951:

William A. Gallop, Jr.

I: 185, 190, 193, 206, 209, 227, 271–2; SP’s dating of, 183, 202, 214, 216, 220

William D. Nichols

I: 237n; SP’s dating of, 237–9, 245, 249

Class of 1953

Corbet S. Johnson, Jr.

I: 220

David N. Keightley

I: 155, 168, 182–3, 236, 242, 283

Gordon A. Lameyer

I:559–60, 562, 576, 587, 592, 600, 657, 685, 697, 703, 725, 744, 844–5, 850, 862, 875, 945, 1007, 1016, 1040, 1052, 1075, 1096, 1099, 1102, 1104, 1127, 1132, 1140–1, 1143, 1151, 1157–8, 1160, 1230, 1238; Dear Sylvia, 652n; SP’s correspondence with, 644–7, 649–53, 659–63, 668–72, 677–83, 685–6, 689–93, 705–8, 714–23, 740–3, 758–72, 774–9, 783–97, 801–3, 805–8, 814–18, 828–33, 836–7, 846–7, 857–60, 868–70, 894–5, 918–21, 931–2, 942–3, 946–8, 951–3, 955–8, 964–5, 987–9, 1041–5, 1086–8, 1108–10, 1121–3, 1144–6, 1310n; SP’s dating of, 563–4, 600, 781, 811–12, 827–8, 834–5, 854, 867, 936–7
II: 34, 114, 229

Russell T. Moro

II: 108, 153, 182–3, 282

Class of 1954

Austin W. Kenefick, Jr.

I: 191–3, 215; SP’s dating of, 191

A. George Gebauer

I: 699n, 703, 705–6, 724–5, 728, 730, 731–3, 736, 938, 940–1, 943, 946

Guy W. Wilbor

I: 227, 249, 253, 278, 696; SP’s correspondence with, 247; SP’s dating of, 227, 248, 262–3, 271, 298, 300

Jon K. Rosenthal

I: 834, 848, 1013; SP’s correspondence with, 840–2, 849–51, 1054–6, 1110

Maurice A. Longsworth, Jr.

I: 696

Nicholas H. Safford

I: 145

Ralph D. Powell, Jr.

I: 206

Robert G. Blakesley

I: 227, 696
See also "Dr Blakesley" in The Bell Jar

Class of 1955

Andre Jules Marie Pierre

I: 733

David C. Ferner

I: 732, 747, 754, 758–9, 782, 794, 852

Frank D. Mayer, Jr.

I: 1099n

Malcolm H. Brickett

I: 696

Richard D. Baughman

I: 696
II: 19-20

Class of 1957

Robert E. Bagg

II: 137, 153

Other: Professor Oscar Schotté, professor of Biology

I: 678–9, 696

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