The Marshall Treatment

“There were apparently hidden subtleties to The Treatment…The Treatment, apparently, concentrated all of its power on a man’s strongest point—his pride in himself as a man. Could it be that that was also his weakest point?” -James Jones, From Here to Eternity (1951) 

“To test his strength of character, he gets what Lowney calls the Treatment. He does the dirty work, he speaks only when spoken to…She makes a selection of books and sets him to work on them. He does not just read them; he copies them, word for word…Most of the would-be writers give up under the Treatment.” -A.B.C. Whipple, “James Jones and His Angel,” Life Magazine (May 7, 1951)

“The greatest achievement of the Handy Writers’ Colony is that it was, like Lowney herself, a wholly original effort at creating something remarkable,” comments Marshall native Nathan Crews in his 2020 Eastern Illinois University master’s thesis entitled “‘There is Nothing Else Like It’: The Innovative Personality of Lowney Turner Handy.”

Spark! and the Innovations of Marshall, Illinois

Marshall Public Library will highlight what Handy’s innovative personality produced when it hosts Spark! Places of Innovation, the newest Museum on Main Street exhibition from the Smithsonian Institution and Illinois Humanities, February 24 to March 30.

“We’re going to create this 6’ x 9’ room that is going to be what it would have looked like and felt like if you were a member of the Handy Writers’ Colony,” explained library director Alyson Thompson.

Alyson continued, “Inside, we’ll have a very sparse setting with a World War II bed. We have an original typewriter—Lowney Turner’s actual typewriter. We’ll have a desk, some of the works that would have been copied. We’ll also have pictures, on the exterior, of James Jones and Lowney Turner, along with some oral histories that people can listen to while they’re looking at the cabin.”

Additionally, the library will conduct a silent auction for author-autographed copies of books written by colony participants. 

The Handy Writers’ Colony isn’t the only feature of Marshall that makes it a place of innovation. Marshall (population: 3,900) is among 30 communities—including seven in Illinois—profiled in Spark! as examples of small towns that have fostered and benefited from innovation in various fields.

Marshall Public Library’s collaboration with us is just one manifestation of the innovative spirit in which it pursues cultural and educational opportunities for its community. Recently, it hosted Americans and the Holocaust, an exhibition from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and the American Library Association, and presented thought-provoking public programs along with it.

Over the past decade, the library has augmented its substantial local oral history, newspaper, and visual image collections and digitized much of its content. Last year, Marshall Public Library obtained the collection of the now-closed Clark County Genealogical Library, creating an opportunity to draw visitors from beyond the immediate area for genealogical research, presentations, and seminars. 

“People were starting to come to us to ask questions about genealogy research and resources, so we thought, you know, we might be onto something here that’s bigger than just genealogy but that could help our community as a whole and bring people in,” Alyson noted.

To make room for the collection, the library is about to renovate part of the second floor of its building and install an elevator using a tourism incentive grant from the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity.

The remarkable Gaslight Art Colony has designed a mural for installation in the library. It will depict four buildings that have housed the library over its history, punctuated by the spines of books by authors associated with Marshall (including, of course, James Jones). Painting will begin at the Gaslight gallery on February 22. The finished product will be unveiled at the library on March 14, and then stored until the renovation is complete.

Still, another Spark!-adjacent event will be a February 29 performance by Illinois Humanities Road Scholar Chris Vallillo featuring his western Illinois-themed song cycle, Forgottonia, enabling Marshall residents to compare their region with another on the opposite side of the state. 

The Marshall Public Library Treatment

Rest assured that when you visit Marshall Public Library for Spark! Places of Innovation, you won’t undergo anything resembling “The Treatment” experienced by Private Prewitt or Handy Writers’ Colony participants (or even Cork Medical Center patients). The only “Treatment” to which Marshall Public Library patrons are subjected consists of a friendly welcome followed by an invitation to delve into the vast resources available for deepening their understanding of their own community and broadening their knowledge of the world beyond.

Plan your visit to Marshall to experience Spark! Places of Innovation and be sure to check out Marshall Public Library’s three companion exhibitions and six related events and activities! The celebration begins February 24 and runs through March 30, 2024.