National Willa Cather Center News

The Nebraska Center of the Book recently honored National Willa Cather Center Executive Director Ashley Olson with the 2025 Mildred Bennett Award!

Created in 1991 to recognize "an individual who has made a significant contribution to the fostering of the literary tradition of Nebraska," the Mildred Bennett Award has paid tribute to an impressive list of Nebraska's literary champions including Matt Mason, Ron Hull, Ted Kooser, and Susan Rosowski, to name a few. 

"There we have short, bitter winters; windy, flower-laden springs; long, hot summers; triumphant autumns that last until Christmas—a season of perpetual sunlight, blazing blue skies, and frosty nights. In this newest part of the New World autumn is the season of beauty and sentiment, as spring is in the Old World."

The Cather Project of the University of Nebraska–Lincoln’s Department of English, in partnership with the Willa Cather Archive of the UNL Libraries and the National Willa Cather Center (NWCC) in Red Cloud, has announced the availability of 2026 research grants for visiting scholars.

October is American Archives Month, a time when archivists across the country focus on educating patrons and the general public about the value of archives. It’s easy to connect the archives to local history and, in our case, literary history, but the very idea of a centralized, publicly accessible archives is foundational to American ideas—after being ushered in by our revolutionary partners, the French. As we start to think about America250 next year, it's time to celebrate archives!

Willa Cather may not have been Richard Harris’s first choice for a 20th-century American novel seminar paper in 1971, but he’s been choosing her ever since. Harris recently joined the Cather Legacy Society. As he applauds the Foundation’s growing archival collection and preservation work, he shares his hopes that his future gift will support the continuation of events like the annual spring conference for the next generation.

The collections and archives at the National Willa Cather Center have always, since our founding, played a critical role in helping our visitors gain a deeper understanding of Willa Cather. Our museum's collections rotate through our historic sites, providing context and helping readers, teachers, and students to imagine the settings of Cather’s many works set in Red Cloud.

As students of all ages return to the classroom, we look back at some of Cather's best known essays.

The Humanities Internship at the National Willa Cather Center offers an experiential learning opportunity for an advanced undergraduate (completed at least forty credit hours) or a graduate student in the humanities at the University of Nebraska (UNL, UNK, or UNO). It is funded through a collaboration between the University of Nebraska and the National Willa Cather Center.

The National Willa Cather Center is pleased to announce members of the third cohort of writers of the Willa Cather Writers Residency in Red Cloud, Nebraska. The cohort of five women writers will gather October 5-19, 2025. The Willa Cather Residency aims to inspire new work by emergent writers. 

About the Residency

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