A four-decades-long search ended on the afternoon of January 17, 1995, when a FAX from Mr. Nelson Shreve, of Kailua, Hawaii, was received at the John Hay Library:
I found among my deceased sister-in-law's papers, what seems to be the original ms. of "The Shadow Out of Time" by H. P. Lovecraft.
Dated February 22 and 24, 1935, it's written in pencil in a child's notebook and in very fragile condition! I have no idea how my sister-in-law came into possession of it.
With it was a cryptic postcard (dated March, 1966) from an August Derleth of Arkham House in Sauk City, WN, saying: "The John Hay Library has an extensive Lovecraft collection and would welcome any further material offered them."
You would appear to be the proper stewards for such a manuscript. If so, please let me know the consignee and address and I'll send it for donation to the library from Lucille Shreve in the name of June Evelyn Ripley.
By the end of that day, a signed Deed of Gift had been exchanged. Ten days later, the manuscript itself arrived at Brown.
Robert H. Barlow, a friend of Lovecraft's, had transcribed it during the summer of 1935, but it was not found among his papers when he died in 1951. So the quest for this legendary "lost story" had begun, because it was the only one of his major works for which there was no surviving manuscript or typescript. Additionally, the story had never been printed exactly as written. The version in Astounding Stories was "corrupt."
A brief note in the author's Commonplace Book contains the initial conception of the story: "In an ancient buried city a man finds a mouldering pre-historic document in English in his own handwriting telling an incredible tale." Starting in November, 1930, Lovecraft began to develop the plot in a series of letters to Clark Ashton Smith, adding: "a sort of idea of very simple nature floating around in the back of my head ... that a race in primal Lomar ƒ gained a knowledge of all arts & sciences by sending thought-streams ahead to drain the minds of men in future ages - angling in time, as it were."
On November 10, 1934, Lovecraft hesitantly began to write "The Shadow out of Time." He destroyed his first attempt and continued to struggle with the rewriting, but finally, on March 14, 1935, he announced that he had finished, "but doubt whether it is good enough to type. Somehow or other, it does not seem to embody quite what I want to embody ... and I may tear it up and start all over again."
In June of 1935, Lovecraft took the manuscript with him when he left for Florida to visit Barlow. Lovecraft wrote to Donald Wandrei in mid-August that "Bob has just copied my 'Shadow out of Time,' so that I may show it to you." This typescript was also read by Julius Schwartz, editor of Fantasy Magazine, who offered to act as Lovecraft's agent. The author agreed, and in December, 1935, he wrote to J. Vernon Shea that "I've had a bit of unexpected good luck - both my 'Mountains of Madness' & the new 'Shadow out of Time' having been accepted by Astounding Stories." However, he was greatly disappointed by the poorly edited versions that were printed in 1936.
Barlow still had the original manuscript in his possession when he secured a teaching position at Mexico City College, where he later became Chairman of the Department of Anthropology and met June Ripley. She enrolled as a student and eventually received a post-graduate grant to study the Nahuatl language, Barlow's specialty. Apparently they became friends, as he entrusted the manuscript to her before his suicide. She remained in Mexico for seven more years before returning to the United States, teaching in various places until her retirement in 1993. She died on December 28, 1994, and the manuscript was discovered.
The manuscript, 65 1/2 pages long, includes a tipped-in sheet containing four revised paragraphs over the original opening lines. On that page is the notation, "Begun Nov. 10, 1934," and on the final page is written, "Finished Feby. 22, 1935" and "Revised Feby. 24, 1935." There are numerous word and paragraph differences between it and the printed version, as well as two full sentences of previously omitted text. So, as a result of this gift, we can now read "The Shadow out of Time" exactly as Lovecraft wrote it.