Items

• A page from the final manuscript of the book The Climate of Monastic Prayer (more widely known as Contemplative Prayer) written by Thomas Merton and published posthumously. The page begins Chapter XV in the manuscript and in the published edition.
• Thomas Merton's handwritten notes on the book La philosophie bantoue (Paris, Présence africaine [1961]) by Fr. Placides Temples.
• Excerpt from "The (Almost) Final Days of Thomas Merton: A Conversation with Harold Talbott." Interview conducted by Bonnie B. Thurston.
  Harold Talbott describes how he came to know both Thomas Merton and the Dalai Lama. After having met Merton 10 years earlier at Gethsemani Abbey, Talbot met Merton again in New Delhi and brought Merton to meet the Dalai Lama at Dharamsala. Bonnie Thurston interviews Harold Talbott.
• RG2001-12-10 - Giroux Photograph Collection
  Abbey of Gethsemani: tall grass in foreground, wooden fence and big tree on right, water tower partially obscured by tree, pre-1966 steeple to left of center.
• RG2001-12-27 - Giroux Photograph Collection
  A cropped version of this photograph was used in Merton's book, The Waters of Siloe. Abbey of Our Lady of the Holy Trinity (active 1947-2017): rounded roof structure in flat valley, trees in distance with snow-capped mountains in background. On back: “Trappist Monastery at Ogden, Utah.” [Monastery was nearer to Huntsville, Utah.] Blue cropping marks in margin.
• Authentics (certificates of authenticity for relics) for two relics of St. Thérèse of Lisieux (Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face, O.C.D.) in Thomas Merton's possession
  Two certificates for relics kept by Thomas Merton of St. Thérese of Lisieux, one relic from her bone and one of dust from her body.
• Letter to Thomas Merton from James H. Forest. No date but likely between 1962/08/16 and 1962/09/22 letters
  Correspondence with James H. Forest who was involved in the Catholic Worker movement and started the Catholic Peace Fellowship. This is a two-page letter from Forest to Merton discussing a recent visit with Tom Cornell. The CNVA abbreviation is the Committee for Nonviolent Action.
• 1964-10-12: Letter from Thomas Merton to Chris McNair
  Thomas Merton writes his condolences and sends his poem "Picture of a Black Child with a White Doll" to the father of Carol Denise McNair, one of the girls killed in the 1963 bombing of 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. Merton references, in the letter and his poem, the photographs by Chris McNair of his daughter published in LOOK magazine, March 24, 1964, pages 23-25.
• 1965-10-06: Letter from Lewis Mumford to Thomas Merton
• 1962-02-02: Letter from Lewis Mumford to Thomas Merton