Date:  ca. 1969

Image Number:  JM01cdJM01

Comments:  Virginia Moore was born in Omaha, Nebraska, July 11, 1903, of Virginia parents and was raised as a Virginian.  Her mother was Ethel Daniel, daughter of a Charlottesville physician; her father, John Allen Moore, was a graduate of the University of Virginia Law School.  Virginia attended the Grenau School for Girls in Gainesville, Georgia.  In 1923, she took a B.A. from Hollins College, and later an M.A. and Ph.D. from Columbia.  Virginia held the Hollins Medal and was a member of Phi Beta Kappa

Early in her career, Virginia was a free-lance writer in New York City, writing poetry, critical reviews, and articles.  She also lectured on literature from coast to coast.  She traveled widely on five continents, going around the world twice.  Virginia once interviewed the noted Swiss psychologist Jung in Zurich at his invitation because they both shared an interest in the poet W. B. Yeats.  She had a lasting impression of Jung, her first sight of him after she had arrived early at his home.  "I saw him approaching through flowering cherry trees in a big black hat.  I was expecting a visit of a half hour or so, but he saw me for three hours.  Although his books sound clinical, Jung was a very easy man to talk to." Virginia often spent winters at a second residence in Alexandria, Virginia, but Cliffside in Scottsville -- an old Federal-style house on the Virginia and National Registers of Historic Landmarks -- was always home.

Virginia's publications include: three early books of poetry, Not Poppy, Sweet Water and Bitter, and Homer's Golden Chain; a number of short stories; The Life and Early Death of Emily Bronte, a documented critical biography; Distinguished Women Writers, a book of short biographies; Virginia is a State of Mind, the "biography of a state;" Ho for Heaven about changing attitudes toward death through the ages; Scottsville on the James, a history written for the 225th anniversary of the founding of the old Albemarle river town; The Unicorn: William Butler Yeats' Search for Reality, a documented critical biography; The Madisons, a documented dual biography of James and Dolley Madison; and The Liberty Bell Papers, which grew out of talks with several Albemarle residents.  She left a new cycle of poems and a manuscript biography of Thomas Chatterton, with the wish that they might see publication.

Virginia was the past President of the Board of the Scottsville Museum Foundation, served on the Albemarle County Library Board, and was past President of the Board of the Charlottesville's Jefferson-Madison Regional Library (whose name she selected to commemorate the 50-year friendship and collaboration between the two statesmen). She was a member of the Virginia Writer's Club, Virginia Poetry Society, Anthroposophical Society, Albemarle Historical Society, and St. Anne's Episcopal Parish.  Virginia attended Christ Church in Glendower.  Her work was known nationally, and her death was noted in the New York Times, Washington Post, and several Chicago-area and Virginia papers.

Her first marriage was to author and anthologist, Louis Untermeyer, of New York and Connecticut.  Since her father had no male heir, she legally changed her son's name to John Fitzallen Moore II after a divorce in 1929.  Virginia later married John Jefferson Hudgins, who had been a submariner during WWII.  He retired as a Navy captain and was a Washington attorney, long head of the Ocean Shipping Division of the Department of Agriculture; he died in 1992.  Dr. Moore always used her maiden name in correspondence and as her pen name; she was known widely as "Miss Virginia."

Virginia Moore is survived by her son, John, of Libertyville, IL; six grandchildren, Robin Brooks Moore of Fremont, CA, Sheila Moore Price of Potomac, MD, Marjorie Moore Fish, of Cataumet, MA, Laurel Moore Duda of Pocasser, MA, Jonathan Michael Moore of Washington, DC, and Cristopher David Moore of Santa Fe, NM; and nine great grandchildren.

At the time of her death of cancer on June 11, 1993, exactly one month short of her 90th birthday, Dr. Moore had lived 62 years at Cliffside.  She will be remembered for her high principles, her spiritual faith, and her deep love for Albemarle County and Virginia.

The photo of Virginia Moore is a copy of a family-owned oil painting that was acquired through the efforts of Raymon Thacker and in consultation with Virginia's son, John Moore.