Jean Toomer Education & Community
Education and Training:
University of Wisconsin, agricultural program, Madison, Wisconsin, 1914-1915
American College of Physical training, Chicago, Illinois, 1916
Attended University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, 1916
New York University, New York, New York, summer school, 1917
City College of New York, New York, New York, 1917-1918
Gurdjieff Institute, Fontainbleau, France, 1924
Teachers and Influences:
The philosophers George Gurdjieff and P.D. Ouspensky; novelist and essayist Waldo Frank was Toomer's close friend and travel companion
Connection to Bucks County:
From 1936 to 1967 Jean Toomer resided on Burnt House Hill Road near Buckingham, with his wife Marjorie Content Toomer, a gifted photographer. Toomer was actively involved in Bucks County religious communities, organizing a Gurdjieffian center in Doylestown in 1937 and, subsequently, participating in the Buckingham Friends Meeting. He served as a clerk of the Ministry and Counsel Committee of the Bucks Quarterly Meeting between 1943 to 1948. In 1951 he gave a six-week lecture series to the Doylestown Friends. Literarily, Toomer during the 1950s participated in the New Hope Workshop with Stanley Kunitz, Josephine Herbst, and others
Colleagues and Affiliations:
Toomer was active with a literary group called The New Hope Workshop. Members included Marjorie Content Toomer, Jo Jenks, Stanley Kunitz, Josephine Herbst, and Jules Gregory. They met at different locations in New Hope to teach and read poetry.
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