Constance Fulmer Papers

Margaret Barfield first met Connie Fulmer in 1963 when she entered college as a freshman and Fulmer was a new professor at Lipscomb University in Nashville, Tennessee. Barfield graduated in 1966 and moved to Stamford, Connecticut, where she began her first job in psychological research. In 1971, Barfield returned to Lipscomb University to work in the President’s Office. In that role, she had frequent opportunities to interact with the faculty, and she often joined Connie and her colleagues for lunch. She remained at Lipscomb until 1977 when the university president retired, prompting her to return to my hometown of Atlanta, Georgia, where she worked at Trust Company Bank. In August of 1985, Fulmer called and offered Barfield a position as her Assistant Director in Medical Education. She accepted, and in September she moved to Lexington to join Fulmer. In 1990, Fulmer and Bardfield moved to Malibu, California as Fulmer had taken a full professorship with Pepperdine University At Pepperdine, Fulmer found strong encouragement and support for her scholarship. Her long-standing interest in George Eliot dates back to her graduate studies at Vanderbilt University, where she became a member of the George Eliot Fellowship. Barfield assisted her in transcribing Edith Simcox’s private journal, Autobiography of a Shirtmaker. They became increasingly fascinated by Edith's life. Edith was a member of the London School Board, a trade union activist, an international Congress speaker, and the author of three published books. She even established a cooperative shirt-making factory that employed only women. In 1992, Fulmer and Barfield learned about the British Women Writers Association (BWWA) Conferences when they were invited to Long Beach to visit with Kathleen and Bill Adams, Secretary and Chairman of the George Eliot Fellowship. The BWWA was an exciting new initiative, born from the vision of two graduate students at the University of Oregon, to highlight forgotten and marginalized 18th- and 19th-century British women writers. The first conference was held May 30–31, 1992, but it was too late for the two to register that year. However, they attended the following year and consistently for many years after that. In 2017, during the BWWA’s 25th anniversary celebration, they were recognized for having attended the most conferences over the years—a testament to our enduring passion and commitment to this field.