WorldCat

Brown University Library Collections

History (United States) Collections

Thomas Nast. Civil War Scrapbook. 1861 - 1866

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  • ACT UP Rhode Island
    The ACT UP Rhode Island (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) records contain minutes of meetings, correspondence, financial records, reports, booklets, handbooks, pamphlets, clippings, mailings, newsletters, conference material, publications, lists of members and contacts, ACT UP/RI circulars and posters, photographs and clippings of ACT UP demonstrations, documentation of Rhode Island legislation, regulations, and policies concerning AIDS. Also included are AIDS-related materials from other ACT UP groups, especially New York, and various gay and lesbian groups, both in Rhode Island and nationally. Topical files document developments in AIDS treatment, public health issues, government policy, AIDS activism, and various gay/lesbian issues. There are also three painted plywood panels and one cloth banner in the collection. ...more information

  • Adams (George James)
    George James Adams (1812-1888) had a long career as a textile manufacturer and agent in Rhode Island. He was the treasurer of the Greenwich Print Works (1856-1882); a business associate at the Arkwright Cotton Mills (Fiskeville, R.I., circa 1836); an employee at Adams Print Works (Fiskeville, R.I.), Kent Print Works (East Greenwich, R.I.), Orion Cotton Mills (Providence, R.I., circa 1860s-1870s), Bristol Print Works (R.I.), and Clyde Bleaching and Print Works; a part owner of the Rhode Island Bleach and Dye Works, Adams and Butterworth (Providence, R.I., 1862-1882); and the chief agent at Narragansett Print Works (East Greenwich, R.I., 1848-1854). The collection includes family letters and business correspondence (mostly letters to Adams), invoices and receipts, inventories, payroll and supply lists, deeds and contracts, and photographs. A large number of letters are from Thomas P. Richmond, a banker of Bristol, Rhode Island, probably affiliated with the Bank of Bristol. They communicate Richmond’s strong abolitionist feelings and include descriptions of slave uprisings such as the insurrection on the ship La Amistad in 1839, meetings of abolitionist societies, etc. Also discussed are Richmond’s other interests, including phrenology, electricity, epidemiology, mesmerism, animal magnetism, and ships. Another large part of the collection comes from Adams’ time as chief agent at the Narragansett Print Works. This material includes correspondence with textile dealers and related business agents, mostly from Rhode Island, Hartford, Boston, New York, and Philadelphia. Invoices, receipts, as well as accounts for advertising, raw materials, and shipping, are also included. The collection also contains documents related to other businesses, mostly in textiles, run by Adams throughout Rhode Island. The remainder of the collection relates to the extended Adams family, including George Harvey Adams, Mary Hodges Adams, Sarah Martindale Adams, George William Brown, and others. This material includes correspondence as well as legal documents, bills and receipts, inventories of estates, financial documents, correspondence, and photographs. ...more information

  • Ames (Robert S. and Margaret A.)
    The Robert S. and Margaret A. Ames Collection was assembled over a thirty year period and built around three distinct but related ideas; the history of illustration, particularly nineteenth century books illustrated with woodcuts, wood or steel engravings or by lithography; the literature of travel and exploration, with a preference given to the North American continent; and pictorial representations of areas in which the Ames family lived before their arrival in Providence in 1970. The Ames Collection is notable for the degree to which it adds new titles to the Brown Library, the extent to which it complements other Brown holdings both in the John Hay Library and in Government Documents, and for its superb physical condition. ...more information

  • Anne S.K. Brown Military
    The Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection is the foremost American collection of material devoted to the history and iconography of soldiers and soldiering, and is one of the world's largest collections devoted to the study of military and naval uniforms. It was formed over a period of forty years by the late Mrs. John Nicholas Brown (1906-1985) of Providence and is still growing. It contains approximately 12,000 printed books, 18,000 albums, sketchbooks, scrapbooks and portfolios, (containing thousands of prints and drawings), and over 13,000 individual prints, drawings and water-colors as well as a collection of 5,000 miniature lead soldiers.

    Formerly in the Brown family residence (the Nightingale-Brown House, 1791), the entire collection (which was probably the largest private military collection in the world), was presented to Brown University and transferred to Special Collections located in the John Hay Library in 1982. ...more information

  • Anthony (Richard H.)
    Richard H. Anthony was a Providence, Rhode Island native and Brown University graduate, class of 1925. His distinguished career included working as a journalist in Paris for the European edition of the New York Herald Tribune, where he covered the landings of Charles E. Lindburgh and Richard E. Byrd on their respective transatlantic flights in 1927. These papers include letters, family memorabilia, and a collection of autographs of Richard E. Byrd, and co-pilots Bernt Balchen, Bertand B. Acosta and George O. Noville, who accompanied him on his historic flight from New York to the coast of Normandy on July 1, 1927. ...more information

  • Backus (Isaac)
    The Isaac Backus papers consist of a variety of items which include family letters over the years 1750-1806, travel journals, a listing of his library, church minutes, drafts of chapters of his book, sermons, and family genealogy. Backus was a Colonial minister in New England. The collection supplements the small, but important, group of Isaac Backus manuscripts in the Sidney S. Rider collection. ...more information

  • Bakst (M. Charles)
    These papers date from 1927-2009 and include the personal papers and materials of Merrill Charles Bakst, Brown '66 and journalist for the Providence Journal. Includes manuscripts, correspondence, notebooks, ephemera, photographs, audiocassettes and videotapes related to his student days at Brown and his career as a reporter and columnist. ...more information

  • Barrett (Ellen M.)
    Ellen M. Barrett, a scholar specializing in medieval monastic history, was the first openly gay person, and one of the earliest women, to be ordained priest in the Episcopal Church. Beginning in 1975, when she was ordained deacon, through 1977 when she was ordained priest, the collection documents her path to ordination and the far reaching international reaction to her ordination. The collection covers her subsequent, nearly thirty-year career as priest in the Episcopal Church and her eventual postulancy in an Anglican women's monastic community. ...more information

  • Beckwith (David)
    The David Beckwith papers is a significant collection of organizational records, correspondence, publications, training and funding materials relating to community development and organizing on both the local and national levels. Most of the material dates from 1980 to 1999 and represents the work of a wide range of community organizations, advocacy-based coalitions, governmental agencies and private organizations devoted to fulfilling social needs such as housing, transportation and education. The Papers also include a small but noteworthy collection of counter-culture newspapers from the mid-1960's and early 1970's. ...more information

  • Bianchi (Martha Dickinson)
    Consists of the papers of the family of Emily Dickinson, along with the 3,000 volume family library from "The Evergreens," the Dickinson home in Amherst Massachusetts. In addition to the personal papers of Martha Bianchi (including family and editorial correspondence, diaries, notes, worksheets, typescript poems, stories, plays, photographs, articles, books, and clippings) the collection includes the personal papers of Alfred Leete Hampson and his wife, Mary Landis Hampson, and includes much secondary material relating to Emily Dickinson. Supplemented by gifts from Barton St. Armand and George Monteiro, of additional items from the same source. ...more information

  • Broadsides
    The Broadsides Collection houses broadsides (single-sheet imprints), posters, bookplates, prints, valentines, greeting cards, postcards, and photographs. From a nucleus of 8,000 pieces in 1928, holdings have increased to over 40,000 items. Largely ephemeral by nature, broadsides are collected by only a few major libraries and historical societies in the United States. Originally issued primarily by governmental, religious, and political bodies, broadsides were later used for advertisements, programs, notices, ballad verses, elegies, and comments on contemporary events. More recently, they have become popular as exemplars of fine printing. Includes holdings of the Harris, Rider, Lincoln, Koopman, Military and general library collections. Notable areas within Harris include slip ballads and carriers' addresses. ...more information

  • Bromsen (Maury A.) Lincoln

    In 2006, the Hay Library received a large bequest of materials relating to Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War from the estate of Boston book dealer Maury A. Bromsen. The collection included a significant array of prints and ephemera from the period, along with books, pamphlets, sheet music, sound recordings, period newspapers, portraits, and manuscripts. Among the key items included in the bequest were the original copper plates and full sets of prints from the Confederate War Etchings series by Maryland artist Adalbert Volck, substantial sets of manuscripts of Confederate General P.T.G.Beauregard and Union General George B. McClellan, and a set of the copy plates made by George Ayres from the original glass plate negatives created during an 1860 photo shoot by Chicago photographer Alexander Hesler.

    Bromsen was an assiduous collector, and his own papers, which comprise part of the bequest, reveal his collecting activities as well as his efforts to place important items in public institutions. ...more information

  • Brooks (William H.) Family
    The Brooks family papers consist almost exclusively of correspondence from the period 1861-1865 of members of the Brooks family of Little Falls, New Jersey. While most of the letters are primarily concerned with family matters and relationships, some portion of the content relates the military activities of William H. Brooks and Jesse S. Comac, who enlisted in the Union Army at the rank of private early in the war. Camp life and battle scenes are described. ...more information

  • Brown (John Nicholas), (1900-1979)
    Personal and professional papers of John Nicholas Brown, son of John Nicholas Brown (1867-1900) and Natalie Bayard Brown, Nephew of Harold Brown (1869-1900) and husband of Anne Seddon Kinsolving Brown. The papers comprise a wealth of material on the visual arts, art collections and collecting activities, and public service at the state, national and international levels, as well as the history of Brown University and the State of Rhode Island during the twentieth century. ...more information

  • Brown ACLU
    Collection includes two 3-ring notebooks containing information regarding the Committee to Review Non-Academic Discipline, Fall 2001 and one accordion binder. One 3-ring notebook contains discipline information from other universities. The other 3-ring notebook contains list of committee members, copies of previous Brown policies and reports, a copy of the Report on Sexual Misconduct (April 1997), memos, Brown ACLU proposal for disciplinary system reform, report drafts, and minutes and notes of meetings. The accordion binder contains Brown ACLU minutes (1998-2000), files regarding non-academic discipline at Brown, and files concerning the David Horowitz controversy. Brown ACLU Minutes, 1998-2000 are restricted. Permission to review these minutes must be granted from the Brown ACLU president. ...more information

  • Brown University Archives
    The Archives collection contains copies of the official records and publications of the University, dating from 1763, along with the papers of many of its faculty, departments, and officers. A vital part of the collection are the records student groups and organizations. The Archives also encompass papers of Brown and Pembroke alumni/ae. The collections include Brown theses and dissertations, as well as printed, manuscript, graphic, and audiovisual material about the history of Brown University. ...more information

  • Brown University Archives - World War I Correspondence
    Letters from Brown University alumni and students in the armed services, written to persons at the University including President William H. P. Faunce, Assistant to the President, Thomas B. Appleget, Professor James Quayle Dealey, and Dean Otis E. Randall. ...more information

  • Butler Hospital
    The Butler Hospital records contain many of the hospital's records from its founding in 1841 to approximately its 50th anniversary in 1891. These records document the changing attitudes toward the mentally ill in Europe and the United States in the early 19th century as well as communal responsibility for the less fortunate, the responsibility of the wealthy for sharing both their wealth and their expertise, the financial practices of the period, detailed specifications on the construction of the first hospital of any kind in Rhode Island, the hospital's expansion, and the day-to-day expenses of such an institution. ...more information

  • Cameron (William H.) Civil War
    The William H. Cameron papers consists of approximately 100 items, most of which pertain to Cameron's service in the Union Army during the Civil War. ...more information

  • Canfield (Eli Hawley)
    This collection consists of over 1100 sermons, letters, and other personal manuscripts of the Rev. Eli Hawley Canfield. The letters are mainly to his son, James Hulme Canfield, the educator, and are largely personal in nature, but the papers also include 500 of his sermons which amply illustrate many of the religious and social beliefs and issues of the forty year period following 1845. As would be expected, the sermons are essentially religious in nature, but although Canfield exhibited a stronger interest in the spiritual aspects of life than the political and moral, he does comment frequently upon life. His comments upon the Civil War, the administration of Andrew Johnson and his various Sermons to the children are of particular interest. ...more information

  • Carroll (Michael R.)
    The collection consists of documents relating to Michael Carroll's pension for Civil War military service, letters written to him about slavery and the impact of emancipation by Victor Chambers, and the book "Born at the Battlefield of Gettysburg" written by Carroll's great-grandaughter, Harriet Rinaldi. ...more information

  • Chace (Elizabeth Buffum)
    This collection includes correspondence, Elizabeth Buffum Chace’s commonplace book and diary, family albums, scrapbooks, photographs, an album of familial hair locks, needlework (cross stitch samplers), newspaper clippings, and other material relating to the Buffums, the Chaces, the Cheneys, and the Tolmans. The papers also contain letters in response to Chace’s book "Anti-Slavery Reminiscences." Elizabeth Buffum Chace was an activist for prison reform, the rights of orphans, peace, and temperance. ...more information

  • Civil War Manuscripts
    Comprises more than 26 collections (more than 2,000 letters in all) covering the period from 1858 through 1879. Includes correspondence, diaries, photographs, prints and graphics and other related materials pertaining to all aspects of the Civil War, from the lives of enlisted Union soldiers and their families back home, to camp life and battlefield medicine, and the political issues that gripped the nation. ...more information

  • Cohen (Robert F., Jr.)
    The Robert F. Cohen, Jr. papers relate to his activist work as a student at Brown from 1964-1968, and as a community organizer in Providence and other Rhode Island communities, and New York City around welfare rights, housing discrimination and education between 1968-1972. The collection contains original materials created in the context of this work, including press releases, research notes, minutes of meetings, leaflets, and other organizing materials, as well as news clippings covering the actual events. There is also an extensive collection of publications from progressive organizations. ...more information

  • Corbett (Scott)
    The Scott Corbett papers contain a variety of material related to his career as a writer as well as personal memorabilia from his childhood and service in the United States Army during World War II. These papers also include Elizabeth Corbett's personal and business papers and artwork by the illustrator and author Don Freeman. ...more information

  • Cox (Samuel Sullivan)
    The Samuel Sullivan Cox papers consist mainly of correspondence sent and received by Samuel Sullivan Cox from his constituents while serving as a Democratic Congressman from Ohio (1857-1865) and later from New York (between 1869-1889). In addition there is correspondence to and from his wife Julia A Cox and other Cox family members. Most of the correspondence is political in nature, consisting of the office correspondence of a U.S. Congressman and diplomat. ...more information

  • Crost (Lyn)
    Eleanor Elizabeth (Lyn) Crost graduated from Pembroke College as part of the Class of 1938, and went on to a distinguished career in journalism. The Crost papers relate Lyn Crost's experiences as a war correspondent covering the 100th/442nd Regimental Combat Team (an all Japanese-American unit) in Europe during World War II. The collection includes correspondence, photographs, draft literary manuscripts, scrapbooks of news articles written by Crost during the war as a reporter for the Honolulu Star Bulletin, and later materials she compiled to use in writing Honor by Fire(1994). The collection also includes incomplete runs of the serials Go for Broke and Puka Puka Parade, videocassettes of various movies and documentaries about the Nisei, and personal artifacts such as her World War II theater campaign ribbon and her war correspondent's hat.
    ...more information

  • Denison (Frederic) Baptist Biograpies
    The Denison Collection consist of letters, manuscripts, and printed matter that contain biographical information about individual Baptists in Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts. ...more information

  • Dexter (Robert C. and Elisabeth A.)
    Records and personal papers of sociologist and Unitarian minister Robert Cloutman Dexter (Class of 1912) and his wife, the noted historian Elisabeth Anthony Dexter. An important focus within the collection is the significant role played by the Dexters -- co-founders of the Unitarian Service Committee with Rev. Waitstill and Martha Sharp in 1937 -- in working to expedite the release of war refugees from Nazi-occupied Europe between 1938 and 1944. The collection also includes personal writings by the Dexters, as well as much information on the history of the Anthony family. ...more information

  • Dickson (James C.)
    These papers document the career of James C. Dickson (Class of 1968) as an activist and organizer for disabled individuals, primarily with the VOTE! 2000 Campaign, an effort to increase the number of voters with disabilities. Includes materials Dickson used in his efforts to increase the voting rights of disabled persons and their access to polling places. The materials contain information on poll accessibility, black voters, gay and lesbian voters, voting statistics, the motor voter law, election reforms, methods of voting, and the registration of potential voters when they apply for food stamps, Medicaid or a driver's license. Also consists of material documenting other organizing efforts involving the rights of children, especially children with disabilities, and the medical care of the elderly and people with disabilities. ...more information

  • Dixon (Nathan Fellows) Family
    The Nathan Fellows Dixon family papers consist of letters, legal documents, personal and political memorabilia and photographs relating to a Westerly, Rhode Island, family of great prominence in state and federal politics during the 19th century. The majority of the collection represents the domestic and political lives of three generations of men named Nathan Fellows Dixon, all of whom graduated from Brown University and went on to serve in the United States Congress. ...more information

  • Dorr (Thomas Wilson)
    The Library holds the papers of Thomas Wilson Dorr, 1805-1854, lawyer, politician, reformer, and central figure in Rhode Island's "Dorr War" of 1842. The Dorr collection contains letters and speeches on suffrage, elections, banks, and state politics. They are supported by 60 scrapbooks of Dorr's personal and political correspondence, law practice and other items relating to the Suffrage Party and Providence history in the Rider Collection. The collection includes a box containing personal effects relating to Dorr's prison stay. ...more information

  • Downs Family
    The Downs family correspondence consists of letters written by four brothers (Albert, Edward, Frederick, and Willie Downs) to their family in Westville, Connecticut, while the four were serving in the Union Army during the Civil War. The letters, which date mainly from 1861-1865, cover topics such as camp life, military operations, family matters, and the Union naval blockade of the South. ...more information

  • Dr. Bob
    The collection consists of over five thousand items, including two hundred books, dozens of pieces of memorabilia, and several hundred manuscripts (original and photocopied) and photographs once the property of "Dr. Bob," the legendary co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous. The collection was purchased in November 1999 from Sue Smith Windows, Dr. Bob's daughter and donated by Esmond Harmsworth, James Abernathy, Christopher Ohrstrom, Mark Ohrstrom, and Richard Ohrstrom. Books, all from Dr. Bob's personal library, deal with religious and spiritual topics as well as the problems of addiction and recovery. Manuscripts include the notes of Dr. Bob's wife, Anne, who jotted down the spiritual principles that eventually influenced the AA movement's twelve steps; a looseleaf binder containing the mimeographed instructions on how to set up an AA meeting sent out to chapter secretaries; and some pages of Dr. Bob's letters and notes. Among the notable items in this collection are the coffee pot that Dr. Bob and Bill W. first used to sober up in 1935.

    Visitors should note that there is no permanent display of materials from the Dr. Bob Collection, although the memorabilia can be paged upon request.

    NOTE: Researchers using this collection are asked to abide by the Anonymity Guidelines for the Brown University Library AA Collections. ...more information

  • Drowne Family
    In 1940, the personal library of botanist and physician Dr. Solomon Drowne, Class of 1773, plus over 1,000 documents and letters relating to members of the Drowne family (1770 through 1940) were moved from Mt. Hygeia, Dr. Drowne's home in Foster, Rhode Island, to Brown. This fine example of an 18th century American private library is preserved intact within Special Collections. ...more information

  • Ellsworth (Elmer Ephraim)

    The Elmer Ephraim Ellsworth papers, covering the period 1854-1861, consist of correspondence, a journal fragment, drafts of his writings, and sketches concerning Ellsworth's involvement with the Illinois Militia, the United States Zouave Cadets, and the New York Fire Zouaves, along with memorabilia about Ellsworth and his military career that was produced some time after his death. ...more information

  • Fales family letters
    The Fales family letters number thirty six, most of them sent by Stephen (who often signed himself "Esteban") Smith Fales from his Cuban plantation to his sister Lydia (Fales) French in Bristol, Rhode Island. Although the earliest letter dates from 1806, most of the letters were written between 1813 and 1834 from various locations in Cuba. ...more information

  • Farnham
    The Christine Dunlap Farnham Archives records contains office files arranged by topic and correspondence, which is arranged alphabetically. The topical files include materials related to women's history sources, oral histories, various women's organizations and conferences, newsletters and reports. The files are dated from circa 1973 to 1993. ...more information

  • Fells Library
    A collection of books compiled by the family and descendants of John Milton Hay (1838-1905) at the Hay family summer home on Lake Sunapee near Newport, New Hampshire. The collection represents the taste and reading habits primarily of John Hay and his son, ethnologist Clarence Leonard Hay (1884-1969), as well as John Hay's wife Clara and daughters Alice and Helen (a poet and children's book author), and Clarence Hay's wife Alice Appleton and son John (born 1915, a renowned nature writer). Many titles were author presentation copies to members of the Hay family, and a some contain personal inscriptions. A few volumes may have been added later by staff at the Fells as references on the Hay family and their social circle. ...more information

  • Feminist Press
    The Feminist Press was founded in 1970 by Florence Howe as an independent nonprofit literary publisher of feminist literature. The records include correspondence relating to books published and in progress; in-house reports, memos, and other items; book manuscripts and proofs, files dealing with the production of books, permissions, and domestic and international projects; general subject files; correspondence etc. about rejected manuscripts; and documentation of the founding (1971) and history of the press, including minutes and reports. Editorial files for authors published by the press include, among others, those for Alice Cook, Elizabeth Janeway, Meridel Le Sueur, Paule Marshall, Louise Meriwether, Naomi Mitchinson, Robin Morgan, Toni Morrison, Tillie Olsen, Grace Paley, Jo Sinclair, Alice Walker, and Dorothy West. There are also contracts with authors; royalty statements and related papers; fundraising records; files dealing with marketing, customer service, and foreign rights; proposals and rejections for new books; and general administrative, business, and financial records. In addition there are printed catalogs and publicity items; reprints; book design and examples of covers and dust jackets; and tapes, slides, photographs, and miscellaneous printed items. Filed separately are records of Women's studies quarterly from its beginning in 1972. ...more information

  • Fenner (Edward)
    The Edward Fenner papers consist of correspondence, family records, deeds, accounts, receipts, orders, invoices, and other documents relating to Fenner's family background, his life and his service on the Town Council of Johnston, Rhode Island during the latter half of the eighteenth century. ...more information

  • Fradkin (Irving A.)
    The Dr. Irving A. Fradkin papers date from 1956 to 2002 and relate to the founding and development of the Citizens' Scholarship Foundation of America, now Scholarship America. ...more information

  • Frost Currency
    The bank notes and documents in this collection were collected by Michael Freezy Frost. He was born in 1932 in Tulsa, Oklahoma and died on February 08, 2012 in McAllen, Texas. This collection contains examples of 26 pieces of currency, of varying types, issued in Rhode Island between 1775-1929, one bank note issued in Delaware in 1759, and 5 documents related to the fiscal history of 18th century Rhode Island. ...more information

  • Glass (Jodi L.)
    The Jodi Glass papers provide rich documentation of the inner workings of feminist organizations and movements in Rhode Island and beyond. Included in the collection are the correspondence, essays, news clippings, legislation, agendas, and minutes of a number of groups and movements, including the Rhode Island Feminist Chorus, Feminist Resources Unlimited and the anti-pornography movement. ...more information

  • Gleeson (Alice Collins)
    The Alice Collins Gleason papers consist of scripts and preparation sheets for radio plays about early Rhode Island history written for elementary and junior high schools in Rhode Island. The plays date from 1935-1937. ...more information

  • Goff family papers
    The Goff family papers number seven items in all. The collection includes a letter from Daniel H. Goff, a Rhode Island native, sent from San Francisco, in 1849 to his family in Rhode Island. It includes military commissions of him and his son William M.Goff, in 1849 and 1865-1867 respectively. The collection also includes the wills of William's brother, Daniel. C. Goff, probated 1852, and the latter's wife, Martha Hall Goff, dated 1946. ...more information

  • Gorham

    Archival records (approximately 6,200 linear feet, dating from 1831 to 2005) of the company founded in 1831 by silversmith Jabez Gorham in Providence, Rhode Island, and expanded under the leadership of his son John in the 1840s. At various times the company was the largest manufacturer of silver products, producer and distributor of ecclesiastical wares, and art bronze foundry in the United States.

    The collection features many thousands of drawings and photographs of Gorham products, reflecting American taste from Victorian times to the present. It also contains corporate, personnel, costing, sales, and advertising records, as well as blueprints, plaster casts, and copper printing plates. Incorporated into the collection are the records of fourteen companies acquired by Gorham prior to its acquisition by larger companies, first by Textron Inc., then by Dansk International, and finally by Brown-Forman Corporation in 1991.

    The Gorham Manufacturing Company records are not processed. A small portion of the records is accessible. See the Research Guide and the Inventory of Accessible Records linked below for further information.

    ...more information

  • Green (T.F.)
    T.F. Green (class of 1887) was at different times a lawyer with Green, Hinckley and Allen and with Green, Curran, and Hart. He was an instructor in law at Brown University and served as Governor of Rhode Island. The collection consists of personal and professional correspondence; legal case files; financial files; family history; political files ...more information

  • Guild (Emmons Dexter)
    The Emmons Dexter Guild papers comprise some 100 items, the bulk of which are letters he wrote to his family in the course of his service in the 1st Rhode Island Cavalry during the Civil War. The collection includes financial papers of the Improved Order of Red Men, Pokanoket Tribe No. 38, a fraternal organization to which Guild belonged, along with items that relate to Guild's role as Aide-de-Camp in the Grand Army of the Republic. ...more information

  • Gurney (Warren S.)
    The Gurney papers consist of forty-three letters pertaining to the Civil War, written between December 1863 and July 1865 by Warren S. Gurney, a bandmember of the 56th Massachusetts Regiment to his family in Massachusetts. The letters describe military life, the regiment's campaign in Virginia, and family matters. ...more information

  • Hall-Hoag

    Contains documents representing a broad spectrum of militant political, social and religious dissent in the United States, from the post-World War II period to the present. The Collection currently exceeding 168,000 items emanating from over 5,000 organizations, constitutes the country's largest research collection of right and left wing U.S. extremist groups, from 1950 to 1999.

    The collection began when Gordon Hall, a young veteran of the Pacific Theatre during the war, first encountered the printed propaganda issued by domestic hate-your-neighbor organizations/groups in the late 1940's. He supported his investigations and research of these organizations by giving public lectures about them. Materials from all corners of the country were collected, enabling him to document statements made in lectures as well as in a growing number of expository articles written for newspapers and magazines.

    Grace Hoag, an alumna of Smith College, began collaboration with Hall during the 1960's, assisting the research and investigation and expanding the collection beyond its initial emphasis.

    Includes publications of Anti-Abortion organizations; Anti-Integrationist organizations; Anti-Semitic and Racist political parties; Christian Identity organizations; Communist organizations; Communist political parties; Communist publishers; Congressional investigating committees; Cults and Alternative religions; Extreme Left-Wing publishers; Ku Klux Klan organizations; LaRouche organizations; Marxist-Leninist organizations; Militant Anti-Communist organizations; Militant Populist organizations; Neo-Nazi organizations; Pacifist organizations; Pro-choice abortion organizations; Racial and Ethnic Consciousness organizations; Right-Wing Christian religious organizations; Right-Wing publishers; Socialist organizations; and Women's movement left and right organizations

    Please Note: The Library has temporarily suspended digitization requests for materials from the Gordon Hall and Grace Hoag Collection of Dissenting and Extremist Printed Propaganda, Parts I and II, 1926-2000.The Library is in the process of digitizing large portions of the collection over the next 3 years (2022-2025). In order to complete this significant digitization project the Library must close large portions of the collection for periods of time.

    Hall-Hoag materials that are not actively being digitized are available for in-person research. Please complete the Ask Us form if you are interested in looking at particular organizations or need information about scheduling a reading room visit.

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  • Hamilton (Henry D.)
    These papers date from 1836-1968 with the bulk between 1837-1942. Henry D. Hamilton was a lawyer and politician who also served as the Adjutant General of New York and Rhode Island. His papers include, but are not limited to, correspondence, business papers, subject files, diaries, certificates, photographs, scrapbooks, and artifacts. Most of the material dated before 1894 belonged to Henry Hamilton's father, B.B. Hamilton, a Baptist minister. The collection also includes genealogical information about the Hamilton family, writings and correspondence by Henry's elder brother John B. Hamilton, a medical doctor, and material related to the military careers of B.B. Hamilton, Henry D. Hamilton and Henry's son Warren Hamilton. This collection is useful for the study of the participation of Illinois in the U.S. Civil War, Baptist ministers, the Antislavery movement in Illinois, and the work of lawyers and politicians during the 19th and 20th centuries. ...more information

  • Hawkins (Rush)
    The Rush Hawkins collection (1750-1951(bulk 1830-1917)) contains personal, family, financial, and military correspondence and documents; photographs; and a variety of museum objects ranging from dinnerware and household items to clothing and personal accessories belonging to the Hawkins and Brown families. Most of the collection reflects the life and interests of Hawkins himself, with some items related to his wife Annmary Brown Hawkins and her family. Included in the papers are two significant sub-collections of correspondence: a collection of antebellum historical letters and documents from earlier generations of the Brown family, as well as individual letters from Thomas Jefferson, Nathaniel Greene, Edgar Allan Poe, and Napoleon I; and a collection of Civil War-related correspondence and documents that contains records of Hawkins' Zouaves and much Confederate material, including a subseries of Jefferson Davis's communications to the Senate of the Confederate States. ...more information

  • Heath (Royal Vale)
    Papers include his mathematical drawings and magic squares designed on number patterns. Also printed volumes from his personal library and several museum objects, including three-dimensional mathematical puzzles. ...more information

  • Hill (Walter Nickerson)
    American chemist. Letters and manuscripts; letterpress books; scrapbook; notebooks; documents; pamphlets; photographs; and memorabilia. The bulk of the written material (to, from, and about Hill) dates from 1870 through 1884. It consists of personal letters between Hill and his wife; letters between Hill and leading scientists and ordinance specialists; letters to and from important political, scientific, and military figures regarding Hill's application for appointment of Professor of Mathematics in the Navy; business correspondence; Hill's patents and pamphlets regarding explosives, demagnetization, etc.; newspaper clippings of Hill's death in an explosion. ...more information

  • Hovan (John)
    John Hovan fought against fascist forces during the Spanish Civil War, then fought in WW II. After returning to Rhode Island, he was was questioned in front of congress as a part of McCarthy-era red-scare hysteria. This collection consists of materials related to the activities of the Communist Party in the U.S. Included are brochures, pamphlets, books, official correspondence, and advertisements promoting recruitment and activities of the U.S. Communist Party. ...more information

  • Hunt (E. Howard)
    The collection comprises correspondence between E. Howard Hunt (Brown University, Class of 1940), W. Chesley Worthington (Brown University, Class of 1923), Bruce M. Bigelow (Brown University, Class of 1924), and Elmer M. Blistein (Brown University, Class of 1942). The correspondence with Worthington and Bigelow chiefly dates from Hunt's military service during and immediately following World War II. The bulk of the collection comprises correspondence between Hunt and Blistein, commencing in 1969 when Blistein asked Hunt to speak at a retirement dinner honoring I.J. Kapstein, and continuing through 1993, the year of Blistein's death. The two wrote frequently, if irregularly, on wide-ranging topics including personal and professional news, reminiscences, and their mutual affiliation with Brown University. Materials include typescript and autograph correspondence, postcards, and clippings. ...more information

  • Jenckes (Thomas Allen)
    One box, chiefly correspondence to Thomas Allen Jenckes, Congressional Representative from Rhode Island, about legal matters and legislative affairs for the period of 1837 to 1870. ...more information

  • John Hay (1838-1905)
    The John Hay collection documents the life of John Milton Hay (1838-1905), Brown Class of 1858, and consists of three major components: A collection of books, Hay's personal papers, and Hay's desk.

    The John Hay book collection comprises approximately 2,000 books by or about Hay and his period. Much of this material was given by members of the Hay family.

    The John Hay Papers consists of over 9,100 items encompassing Hay's correspondence with his family and with literary, diplomatic, and political contemporaries; diaries kept by Hay as Lincoln's White House aide and as Secretary of the Legations in Paris, Vienna, and Madrid, 1866-1870; manuscript poems; galley proofs; personal letterpress copy books. Subjects include: Civil War; Lincoln and his administration; Reconstruction; court life in Paris; the bi-metal monetary standard; the Canadian boundary settlement; the fur seal question; Japanese naval activity; Chinese-American relations; the Spanish-American and Philippine-American Wars; British and American politics. A microform copy exists of this material.

    The desk used by John Hay is a partner desk with space for 2 people to work opposite each other. It was a gift to the Brown University Library by Betsey Cushing Roosevelt Whitney (Mrs. John Hay Whitney). Her husband, John Hay's grandson, had inherited the desk and used it as his own. The John Hay desk is on view in the Bruhn Room (2nd floor) at the John Hay Library (as of August 2024). ...more information

  • John Hay (1838-1905)
    In July of 1905, John Milton Hay (Class of 1858, perhaps the most famous Brown graduate of his day) died in office as U.S. Secretary of State. The following year his widow, Clara Stone Hay, presented 400 books and manuscripts from Hay's personal library to Brown. These books include many volumes which are inscribed to John Hay. ...more information

  • Jones (Samuel)
    These papers consist primarily of correspondence from James Manning, first president of Brown University, discussing issues relating to the founding of the college, such as fundraising, the charter, and the use of University Hall as barracks by the United States government during the American Revolutionary War. ...more information

  • Just Say No Campaign collection
    This collection contains material, chiefly photographs, related to the "Just Say No" campaign against drug use from 1985 to 1996. It also includes some correspondence to and from the Just Say No Foundation and Just Say No International, slides, negatives, videocassettes and a workbook. ...more information

  • Keddy (Jane L.)
    The Keddy papers contain correspondence, research notes on index cards, brochures, museum handbooks, photocopies of entire chapters from books being used for research, maps and other illustrations along with extensive drafts of a proposed 1000 plus page biography of Samuel de Champlain. Other material includes personal correspondence on topics as diverse as feminism, safe drinking water and theology, professional correspondence in Jane Keddy's capacity as the editor/owner of Parameter Press and a folder of correspondence with potential publishers of the Champlain manuscript. ...more information

  • Keely (George Washington)
    These papers primarily consist of correspondence concerning events leading to the resignation of President Asa Messer and the educational developments in Providence between 1829 and 1833. ...more information

  • Keen (William W.)
    Surgeon and professor of surgery. Brown class of 1859. Consists of scientific papers (manuscript articles, pamphlets, reprints); autobiographical notes; memorabilia; family papers and correspondence; professional correspondence; diplomas and certificates; military orders and passes; clippings; photographs and glass photographic plate; calling cards. ...more information

  • King (Rufus)
    Rufus King was a lawyer and a national leader of the movement to decriminalize narcotics. He also wrote extensively about organized crime, drug laws, and gambling. This collection contains general correspondence, newspaper clippings, personal notes on specific drugs and their effects, legal notes, drafts and correspondence regarding his book The Drug Hang Up and several of his articles, along with Congressional bills and reports. ...more information

  • Korff (Baruch)
    Personal papers of Providence rabbi and Jewish communal activist who became known as "Nixon's Rabbi" for his defense of the President during the Watergate affair. The collection includes materials pertaining to Korff's efforts on behalf of European Jewry during World War II, through the creation of the Emergency Committee to Save the Jewish People of Europe, as well as his post-war advocacy for the State of Israel. ...more information

  • Kowalski (Barry F.) (Class of 1966) Vietnam oral history
    This collection contains the oral history interview of Barry Kowalski, Class of 1966, by Professor Beth Taylor of Brown University for the Vietnam Veterans Archive collection and related documents and objects. The interview was by telephone, on February 21, 2011. The interview draws on Barry Kowalski’s recollections of his years at Brown (1962 to 1966, graduating with a B.A. in Political Science), and his military training and experiences in Vietnam. He enlisted in the United States Marine Corps in the fall of 1966, and attended the Officer Candidate School in Quantico, Virginia before receiving his commission. He wanted a non-combat position as a transport, communications, or supply officer—Military Operations Specialists (MOS), but he and his whole class were given commissions as infantry officers. He was in Vietnam from November 1967 - Summer 1968. Barry was stationed at Camp Lejeune, N.C. for his second and final year of service. There are some recollections about his return to the United States during the war era. In 1973, Barry earned his JD from Catholic University Law School. Since 1980, he has been a lawyer for the Criminal Section of the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice. He has helped prosecute cases including the Rodney King beating and the last Department of Justice investigation of the Martin Luther King Assassination. ...more information

  • Langdon (William Chauncey)
    Collection of pageants directed and organized by Langdon, founder and President of the American Pageant Association, and also includes scripts, correspondence, photographs, and memorabilia relating to other pageants of the early 20th century. Some pageants are classified in the Harris Collection, but most of them are part of the Langdon Papers. ...more information

  • Lewis (David C.)
    The David C. Lewis papers contain information on his efforts to collect historical collections concerning alcoholism and his work at the local, state and federal level concerning alcoholism and addiction, as well as administrative materials on the founding of the Center for Alcohol and Addiction Studies at Brown. The collection contains correspondence, legal papers, memoranda, writings, printed materials, meeting minutes, audiovisual materials and financial papers including appraisals of collections which David Lewis had acquired or was exploring acquiring for the Brown University library. ...more information

  • Lincoln (Abraham)

    A collection, comprising 30,000+ items in various media, of materials by and about Abraham Lincoln, 16th president of the United States, and about the historical and political context of his life and career, chiefly the U.S. Civil War and its causes and aftermath. The collection of Charles Woodberry McLellan (1836-1918), one of five great Lincoln collectors at the turn of the 20th century, was acquired for Brown University in 1923 by John D. Rockefeller, Jr., Class of 1897, and others, in memory of John Hay, Class of 1858, one of Lincoln's White House secretaries; in the ensuing 75 years it has been increased to more than five times its original size.

    The books and pamphlets include 85-90 percent of the titles in Jay Monaghan's Lincoln bibliography, 1829-1939 (many in multiple editions and variant copies), as well as many thousand volumes of contemporary and later publications relating to the Civil War and the slavery controversy. In conjunction with the Harris Collection, the John Hay Library holds probably the largest collection anywhere of poems about Lincoln. There is also a good selection of representative titles of books that Lincoln read.

    The manuscript collection includes original letters, notes, and documents, over 950 written or signed by Lincoln; material relating to Lincoln's family and associates; and facsimiles of manuscripts held by other institutions. The broadsides include song sheets, political sheets, ballots, and posters; also 27 of the 52 printed editions listed in Charles Eberstadt, Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. There is a selection of newspapers for 1860-1865; an index to the 11,300+ entries for Lincoln items in all existing files of Illinois newspapers to the end of the Civil War; and photocopies of the clipping files of the Louis A. Warren Lincoln Library and Museum, Fort Wayne, Ind.

    The prints, arranged according to Meserve numbers, include most of the known photographs of Lincoln, engravings, and Currier & Ives prints. There are also original oil portraits by artists of Lincoln's day, most notably the portrait by Peter Baumgras, 1827-1903; some original drawings, as well as a scrapbook of Thomas Nasts's Civil War sketches. The statuary includes two Rogers groups, an original Truman Bartlett plaster statuette, and replicas of Leonard Volk's work. The sheet music comprises every known piece relating to Lincoln, including funeral marches, memorial songs, and campaign songs. The museum objects include over 550 medals, mourning and campaign badges, coins, postage stamps, etc. ...more information

  • Littlefield (Katherine Frances)
    The Katherine Frances Littlefield papers chronicles the early professional life of a 1902 graduate of Pembroke College at Brown University through letters to her mother from 1905-1909. The letters focus on the establishment of her professional career and family matters. ...more information

  • Lord (Augustus Mendon)
    The Augustus Mendon Lord collection includes correspondence, documents, and autographs of prominent figures from the period 1778 through 1908. The bulk of the correspondence pertains to American politicians, particularly members of Congress, and dates from 1876 through 1908. However, the collection also contains autographs and documents from American and European military, scientific, literary, and artistic figures. ...more information

  • Lovell family
    The Lovell family papers were compiled by Malcolm R. Lovell, Jr. They range in date from 1790 to 1911, with the primary focus being the period between 1800 and 1860. The range of subjects covered is equally broad, including religion and spirituality, slavery, family life, and student life at Brown University. Religion is at the core of this collection. The story depicted in the collection of nearly 850 letters, journals, clippings, sermons and other materials is that of a family struggling with its convictions about religion. These convictions are apparent in nearly all portions of the collection, from the sermons of Shubael Lovell to the letters and journals of his children. ...more information

  • Lownes (Albert Edgar) on Henry David Thoreau
    The Albert E. Lownes Collection on Henry David Thoreau was received in 1967 as a gift from Albert E. Lownes, Class of 1920. It consists of over 1,000 items, and includes books by Thoreau, later editions of his writing, biographical and critical works, and books from his personal library. It contains first editions for each of Thoreau's separately published books and pamphlets as well as a virtually complete selection of his contrib utions to periodicals. Of particular note are a number of annotated volumes from Thoreau's personal library and original manuscript fragments from his Journals, The Maine Woods, and A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers.

    There are also periodicals, engravings, photographs, a striking original sketch of Thoreau, maps, broadsides, museum objects, and other memorabilia. The Collection includes a number of Thoreau letters, college papers and journal excerpts.

    Especially noteworthy is an album entitled "Concordia", a collection of autograph letters, portraits, and original sketches of Concord personalities, compiled by Rev. Moncure Daniel Conway. ...more information

  • Mann (Horace) family
    These papers consist primarily of correspondence dating from 1829 to 1856. Letters discuss topics of teacher institutes, women�s issues, and Mann�s work in the House of Representatives. The majority of the letters were written by Horace Mann, Charlotte Messer Mann, Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, and James Stuart Holmes. ...more information

  • Manning (James)
    The James Manning Papers consist primarily of correspondence dating from 1765-1791 with prominent British and American Baptist ministers. Much of the correspondence involves the early history of Brown University or various issues regarding the Baptist religion and the growing tide of religion in Providence, Rhode Island. ...more information

  • Martensen (Augustus)
    The Martensen Papers are comprised of letters and documents; including fifty-five Civil War letters in German by Martensen and letters received by Martensen and members of Martensen's family. ...more information

  • McConoughey (Artha May)

    The Artha May McConoughey Papers consist of travel diaries, temperance speeches, law school assignments, photographs, and personal artifacts. All of the written material is from McConoughey's own hand; most of it was composed during the first quarter of the 20th century when she came of age and became active in the temperance and women's suffragist movements in the Chicago area. ...more information

  • McLoughlin (William Gerald)
    Professor William Gerald McLoughlin taught history at Brown University from 1954-1992 and was an active and vocal participant professionally and personally in all of the issues and events during those years: freedom of speech, civil rights, racial equality, gender equality (Louis Lamphere sex discrimination case), nuclear energy, improving the Providence education system, the Vietnam War, divestment from South Africa, and US intervention in Nicaragua during the 1980s. His papers are particularly useful for studying the changes in America and their effect s at Brown University during his tenure. His major areas of scholarship were religion in America (particularly Baptists and Evangelicals), the Cherokee Indian Nation, antislavery movement, African Americans, and Rhode Island history. This collection contains research notes and subject files for his many research topics, drafts for some of his published books, correspondence with colleagues and friends, minutes for meetings of the various committees at Brown and in the community on which he served, and newspaper clippings for topics of importance to him. ...more information

  • Meshanticut Park Community Baptist Church
    The Meshanticut Park Community Baptist Church in Cranston, RI was founded in 1905 when the Rhode Island Baptist State Convention bought the church building from the Congregational Society. The congregation struggled during their first decades, and it was not until the 1920s that they hired a settled minister. The 1940s ushered in a dramatic increase in the population of Cranston and the Meshanticut Park Community Church. They outgrew the old chapel on Cranston Street, so they built a new meetinghouse at 180 Oaklawn Avenue in 1950. The congregation prospered until the 1970s when the church declined somewhat, paralleling the experience of the Baptist denomination. By 2000, the church had various problems and issues of conflict. The last pastor, who took over in September 2004, was Robert Lancia who drew his inspiration and models from Robert Schuller (the Crystal Cathedral) and Rick Warren (Saddleback Baptist Church). Lancia sought to remake Meshanticut Park including renaming it “The Orchard Church” in 2008. The church dissolved in 2011 and the building was sold to the Evangelical Euphrates Armenian Church. The records date from 1932-2010 and contain Board of Trustee minutes, Church Council minutes, newsletters, documents about the church building, scattered membership records, and photographs dating from the early 2000s. This is part of the Rhode Island Baptist Heritage Center collection. ...more information

  • Metcalf
    An extraordinarily diverse collection of pamphlets donated by the Hon. Theron Metcalf, Class of 1805. It is the Library's principal collection of American, English and Irish pamphlet literature of the 17th through the 19th centuries.

    A distinguished jurist and author on legal subjects, Metcalf was an avid collector of pamphlet literature. He added periodically to the collection after giving it to Brown and, at his death in 1875, it included well over 10,000 items.

    The collection includes ordination, election-day and dedicatory sermons, Fourth of July orations, plus pamphlets on the Civil War and slavery, the Irish question, Mormonism, agriculture, medicine and women's suffrage to name but a few categories. Pamphlets were bound into thematic volumes, and the call numbers represent the individual volumes. ...more information

  • Metcalf Peaceana
    During WWI, Isabel Harris Metcalf, a Rhode Island pacifist, began compiling clippings as "an endeavor to find in the written word an answer to the heart-searching questions" evoked by the war "in the economic, cultural and emotional life of womankind." Over the course of more than two decades, she collected and indexed material relating to the international peace movement, resulting in 50 scrapbooks of newspaper clippings, along with loose clippings and correspondence relating to the League of Nations and the World Peace Movement. Her collection was deposited at the John Hay Library in 1935 and bequeathed to the Library at her death in 1943 as a tool for teaching about "the growth of the Spirit of Peace on Earth." ...more information

  • Morse (Carleton D.) Whaling
    The Morse Collection of books, manuscripts and periodicals relating to the whaling industry was presented as a memorial to Carleton D. Morse (Brown Class of 1913), by his widow and daughter in 1958. It includes personal narratives and classics of whaling literature, along with correspondence; manuscript logbooks and journals; commercial papers; legal documents; memoranda; reports; personal memoirs; photographs; engravings; clippings and ephemera. Among the commercial papers are invoices and receipts for ships' outfits, merchants' records for repairs, freight, passengers, fuel, and taxes; Charter Party documents; as well as correspondence of a personal nature.

    The books have been catalogued individually, and can be identified through JOSIAH. To pull up a title list, do an "author" search for "Morse Whaling." The manuscripts have been arranged and described as a collection, and an EAD finding aid is available. A link to the finding aid is provided below.

    (NOTE: Two manuscript collections that arrived with the Morse materials are the papers of Malvina Pinkham Marshall and the Pinkham family and the Papers of Marshall Johnson. These have been arranged and described separately because they had no apparent connection to whaling.)

    The Morse Collection, in combination with whaling collections at the Providence Public Library and the New Bedford Whaling Museum, provides an outstanding resource for studying the economic, historic and social influences exercised by whalers on the development of 18th and 19th century New England.

    ...more information

  • Needmor Fund
    The Needmor Fund is a family foundation established in Toledo, Ohio in 1956 by Duane and Virginia Stranahan with income from the Champion Spark Plug business. It focuses on funding community organizing efforts to create a more equitable and just society. The records document the activities of the Needmor Fund from the the 1970's to the early 21st century and include correspondence, grant applications, pamphlets, seminar brochures, notes from site visits, speeches, and publications. Within the Needmor Fund Collection, the Kathy Partridge papers include material related to gay and lesbian issues. ...more information

  • Niantic Baptist Church
    The records of the Niantic Baptist Church include annual reports, treasurer's reports and expense records, membership lists, minutes, contracts for the pastors and miscellaneous documents. These records document that last years of the church from 1987 to 2012. This is part of the Rhode Island Baptist Heritage Center collection. ...more information

  • Ogden (Peggy)
    This collection consists of the personal papers of Peggy Ogden, Pembroke College class of 1953, and primarily document the Stephen A. Ogden Jr. '60 Memorial Lecture Series at Brown University named posthumously after her brother. Materials include Peggy Ogden's diplomas and family photos as well as correspondence and DVDs related to the lecture series. The collection dates from 1949-2018. ...more information

  • On Our Backs
    The archive of the lesbian periodical, On Our Backs. The library also holds a run of the periodical. See Josiah record. ...more information

  • Oral history interviews concerning ACT UP of Rhode Island an
    Oral history interviews conducted in 1993 by Peter Cohen with AIDS activists who were involved with the group ACT UP in Rhode Island and New York. The interviews were used as part of Peter Cohen's dissertation research at Brown University and used extensively in his subsequent publication: Love and Anger: Essays on AIDS, Activism, and Politics (Haworth Press, 1998). ...more information

  • Parsons (Usher)
    Usher Parsons (1788-1868) was a professor of anatomy and surgery in Brown University's early medical school. Parson's medical experience is legendary in the annals of military surgery as he was the only surgeon at the Battle of Lake Erie on September 10, 1813. The collections cintains diaries (1831-1866), surgical notes, travel journals, and account books. ...more information

  • Pinkham family correspondence
    The Pinkham family correspondence consists of letters between members of the Pinkham family, a prominent Nantucket family in the whaling business, and with their acquaintances. The letters, dating from 1855-1877, cover topics including family and social life in Nantucket, New Bedford, and Providence, with some discussion of national politics. This collection was originally part of a larger collection on whaling donated by Carleton D. Morse (Brown University Class of 1913). ...more information

  • Providence Black Repertory Company
    The Providence Black Repertory Company (Black Rep) was a 501c3 non profit arts organization based in Providence, Rhode Island, USA. It offered programming inspired by the cultural traditions of the African Diaspora in Theater, Education, and Public Programs. It operated from 1996 until 2009. ...more information

  • Providence Milk Commission
    The records of the Providence Milk Commission consist of financial and business records related to the Commission's activities from 1931 to 1985. The series concerning Hillside Farms contains reports on the health of its employees and the results of tests to determine the quality of the milk produced there. ...more information

  • Reynolds Family Correspondence
    Collection consists almost entirely of personal letters written by Alfred C., Charles E., and James W. Reynolds to sisters and parents detailing Civil War experiences in the 128th Regiment, New York Volunteers and the 11th Light Artillery Regiment, New York. Of particular interest are accounts of the capture of Fort Morgan (1864, Aug.-Sept.), reflections on the Copperheads, Afro-American troops, General Lee, and slavery. ...more information

  • Rhode Island Baptist Heritage Center
    The Rhode Island Baptist Heritage Center, an affiliate of the American Baptist Churches of Rhode Island [ABCORI], was established in 2004 to create an official Baptist presence in Providence, Rhode Island. It provides substantive information regarding early English and American Baptists and documents traditional forms of worship and doctrine in the Baptist Church. The collection includes a wide array of church materials documenting organizational and administrative operations, religious practices and beliefs, and the history of the Baptist Church in Rhode Island. It includes registers, reports, correspondence, photographs and church publications dating from as early as 1867 to the late 1980s. The churches and organizations included are: Arlington Baptist Church, Bethany Baptist Church, Cranston Street Baptist Church, Eighth Baptist Church, First Free Baptist Church, Fourth Baptist Church, Jefferson Baptist Church, Olneyville Church, Park Street Baptist Church, Phenix Baptist Church, Rhode Island Free Baptist Association, Roger Williams Free Baptist Church, Trinity Baptist Church, United Baptist Church, United Community Church, United Presbyterian Church. ...more information

  • Rhode Island College Miscellaneous
    A collection of early historical documents of Brown University from the petition for a charter in 1763 to the change of name from Rhode Island College to Brown University in 1804. Titles of the papers and folder numbers are taken from the two volumes in which the papers had previously been mounted. ...more information

  • Rhode Island Society for the Collegiate Education of Women
    The records of the Rhode Island Society for the Collegiate Education of Women (RISCEW) consist of the organization's meeting minute records, correspondence, news clippings, organizational histories, membership lists and financial ledgers from 1895-1971. Additional materials within the collection are reports by various committees, such as the Building Committee, Evaluation Committee, and the War Service Committee of 1918-1919. ...more information

  • Rider

    The Sidney S. Rider Collection on Rhode Island history, the largest private collection of materials related to Rhode Island, was presented to the library in 1903 by Marsden Perry. Rider was a leading Providence bookseller, publisher and antiquarian who had amassed a collection of manuscript and printed materials from the 18th through the early 20th centuries. The collection includes books, pamphlets, manuscripts, broadsides, ephemera, scrapbooks and newspapers compiled over 50 years of collecting. Notable among the ephemera are posters, cartoons, playbills, ballots, carrier's addresses, theater programs, tax bills, lottery tickets, death notices, and funeral invitations. Significant sections of the collection pertain to the Dorr Rebellion of 1842 and to the life and career of Rhode Island lawyer and Congressman Thomas Allen Jenckes.

    Researchers should conduct an author search on "Rider, Sidney S." in order to locate items from the printed collection.
    ...more information

  • Robinson (Blondie)
    A collection of 77 vintage photographs, primarily from the early 20th century, the bulk of which is dated between the years 1915 and 1925, formerly owned by Blondie Robinson, an accomplished African-American vaudeville performer of that era. The heart of this collection is comprised of photographs directly associated with Robinson himself that represent a visual composite of his professional life on stage, both as a solo performer and in collaboration with others. It offers substantive documentation about Robinson's repertoire of stage acts and his versatility as a vaudevillian -- the various characters he portrayed on stage, including blackface caricatures, his comedic sensibility, the sheer physicality of his performances, and the various costumes and props that he used. This collection also contains a significant number of photographs of other vaudeville performers, primarily but not exclusively African American, all of whom were professional associates of Robinson. Also of note in this collection are a few informal photographs of Robinson, alone and with others, some of whom are presumed to be members of Robinson's family and may even include images of his wife and daughter. Last but not least, this collection also includes useful pieces of textual information found on some of the photographs in the form of signatures, inscriptions, photographers marks, and annotations. ...more information

  • Robinson (James J.)
    The James J. Robinson papers consist of legal documents, manuscripts, notes on legal cases, speeches, and research and drafts of a published book. The bulk of the collection pertains to the International Military Tribunal for the Far East (IMTFE). ...more information

  • Rodney (Thomas)
    Personal papers and records of Thomas Rodney, including letters, essays, notes on court cases in Mississippi and Delaware (1791 to 1810), a journal about personal matters and Delaware politics (1792-1800), and manuscript poetry. ...more information

  • Roger Williams Baptist Church
    The administrative records, committee minutes, publications, photographs and historical information documenting the history and activities of this Baptist church in Providence, RI. This is part of the Rhode Island Baptist Heritage Center collection. ...more information

  • Russell (Jonathan)
    The papers of merchant, diplomat, and Massachusetts Congressman Jonathan Russell, Class of 1791, provide information on an early critical period of American politics and diplomacy. Included are records, notes, and correspondence for the period 1795-1830, during which Russell was a member of the United States Commission to draw up the Treaty of Ghent following the War of 1812, and later, Minister to Sweden and Norway. There are also several hundred letters from Russell to President James Monroe, and 22 from Monroe concerning commercial and diplomatic relations between the United States and Europe. Some 120 letters which Russell exchanged with John Quincy Adams span the years 1798 to 1823. ...more information

  • Schirmer Anti-Imperialism

    This collection, assembled by Daniel Boone Schirmer, currently numbers 964 titles dealing with the Anti-Imperialist movement of 1898 and its repercussions in United States, Cuban, Puerto Rican, and Filipino history. It deals with the debate within the United States during and after the Spanish-American War over the appropriate relationship between the English-speaking and Spanish speaking Americas.

    Searching for AUTHOR "Schirmer Collection" in JOSIAH pulls up a complete list of titles in the collection.

    ...more information

  • Scholarship America
    This collection consists of the records of Scholarship America (formerly known as the Citizens' Scholarship Foundation of America) from 1960 and ongoing. ...more information

  • Schulze, Robert O.
    Robert O. Schulze was dean of the College at Brown University from 1964 to 1969. He joined the Brown faculty in 1955 as an instructor of sociology, specializing in historical and political sociology. The files contain speeches and correspondence relating to Brown and sociology. The files date from 1959 to 1967. ...more information

  • Sears (Barnas)
    Barnas Sears graduated from Brown University in 1825 and served as the fifth president of Brown from 1855-1867. This collection primarily consists of correspondence from Sears' service as president of Brown University. ...more information

  • Selle (Earl Albert)
    The collection consists of correspondence, newspaper articles, photographs, scrapbooks and other memorabilia from the life and career of Earl Albert Selle, a journalist who covered the Pacific theatre during and after World War II, focusing particularly on China and Hawaii. A significant component of the collection consists of materials Selle obtained from fellow journalist William Henry Donald, a friend and advisor to Generalissimo and Mme. Chiang Kai-shek, that document Donald's own career in China. These contributed to the publication of Selle's book Donald in China in 1948, shortly after Donald's death. ...more information

  • Shakespearian Advertiser printing blocks
    Wood engraving printing blocks created by Edward S. Jones to illustrate a booklet titled "The Shakespearian Advertiser" published by Harlen P. Boyce in Providence, RI in 1871. The images are comic illustrations of quotes from various plays by William Shakespeare. ...more information

  • Shapiro (Joe and Lil) Collection of Laundry Ephemera
    The Joe and Lil Shapiro collection of laundry ephemera is a collection consisting largely of small format ephemera that depict the history, artifacts and materials used in doing laundry over several centuries. Most of the material was produced by companies involved in the manufacture of laundry products. The collection includes, but is not limited to, advertising premiums, billheads, broadsides, brochures, calendars, greeting cards, labels, matchbooks, pamphlets, photographs, postage stamps, poster stamps, promotional booklets, puzzles, scrapbooks, shirt boards and trade cards. Much of the material in the collection is undated. The dated material is from 1805 to 2010. Most was produced between 1880 and 1955. ...more information

  • Sharp (Martha and Waitstill)
    Brown alumna Martha Dickie Sharp (Pembroke 1926) and her husband Rev. Waitstill Sharp were co-founders of the Unitarian Service Committee during World War II. The collection documents their strenuous efforts throughout the course of the war to provide relief and assistance to thousands of refugees in Czechoslovakia and France, under the most dangerous and difficult of circumstances. ...more information

  • Sharpe (Mary Elizabeth)
    Mary Elizabeth Sharpe (1884-1985) was a successful businesswoman (owner of a successful tea shop and candy room in New York City) when she married her husband Henry Sharpe in 1920. Mrs. Sharpe was a philanthropist with many interests but was best known for her efforts to beautify Brown University and the city of Providence, RI. A self-taught landscape architect, Sharpe established an annual tree fund and lead the fundraising efforts to create India Point Park, a Providence waterfront recreation area. This collection contains her personal files, blueprints, correspondence, day books, calendars, clippings, recipes, scrapbooks, records relating to landscaping and other community projects, gardening information, blueprints, and photographs. ...more information

  • Shawomet Baptist Church
    The Shawomet Baptist Church was officially organized in 1842 as the Old Warwick Baptist Church. The original congregation of "Six Principle" Baptists combined resources with Regular (Calvinist) Baptists, whose numbers were growing as a result of the Second Great Awakening, to occupy a small meetinghouse on the Warwick Neck peninsula in Rhode Island. In 1851 their name was officially changed to Shawomet Baptist Church. The word Shawomet is the Narragansett Indian name for Warwick Neck. The church closed in 2011. The records include founding documents, publications, meeting minutes, correspondence, financial records, membership lists, club and activity records and photographic materials documenting the 170-year history of the congregation. The bulk of the material covers the period from 1945 through 1999. This is part of the Rhode Island Baptist Heritage Center collection. ...more information

  • Sherman (Stuart C.)
    These papers consist of correspondence spanning his career and beginning with his time spent as Librarian at the Providence Public Library, and materials generated while he was Librarian in the John Hay Library, including President�s reports, Albert E. Lownes bibliography and personal library, notes on Lownes� History of Science Collection, and correspondence on Herman Melville (his bibliography and first printings). Also includes papers from the period when Sherman was Vice President of the Rhode Island Historical Society and later Trustee. His interest in whaling is well-represented by the papers, which include related correspondence from around the world, checklist of Whalemen, whaling records from the Island of Madeira, and notes on logbooks. The papers also include some personal material dealing with his resignation from Providence Public Library, as well as speeches and reviews. ...more information

  • Smith (Augustus William)
    Augustus William Smith was a school teacher, university professor (astronomy and mathematics), president of Wesleyan University and professor of Natural Philosophy at the United States Naval Academy. Smith's papers contain extensive correspondence with contemporary astronomers, mathematicians and meteorologists, along with several manuscripts. There is also correspondence between Smith and others concerning affairs of the Methodist-Episcopal Church. ...more information

  • Sorrentino (Mary Ann)
    The Mary Ann Sorrentino papers about her excommunication from the Catholic Church consist of correspondence, clippings, and other materials. These papers relate to the practice of abortion, the authority of the Catholic Church over its members, and general discussion of religion and morality with respect to abortion. The correspondence with Sorrentino (who was Executive Director of Planned Parenthood of Rhode Island from 1977 to 1987) includes responses from proponents of both the pro-choice and pro-life movements, Catholics, non-Catholics, public officials, and others. The collection also includes an oral history interview of Sorrentino recorded in 2012 and a Master of Arts in History thesis written by Rhonda J. Chadwick about Sorrentino's experiences. ...more information

  • Spooner (Edna Maine) Woman's Christian Temperance Union
    Edna Maine Spooner was a third-generation temperance worker, and a devoted lifelong member of the Rhode Island chapter of the Women's Christian Temperance Union. This collection comprises WCTU materials, from the Rhode Island chapter and the national organization, carefully compiled by Spooner during her lifetime. It was donated to the Brown University Library by her daughter, Lucille S. Votta, in her memory. ...more information

  • Sprague (Katherine Chase)
    This collection consists of correspondence and documents created and collected by Kate Chase Sprague and documents her life as a wife, daughter-in-law, mother, divorcee and socialite. Included are love letters from her husband William Sprague of the prominent Sprague family of Rhode Island. Documents discuss the American Civil War, politics, and family affairs. A diary and several literary works by Kate Sprague and newspaper clippings pertaining to the family are also included. The materials date from 1850-1900. ...more information

  • Starred Book
    Hay Star is the general rare book collection of the Brown University Library, covering a wide range of topics. The Hay Star collection is particularly strong for 18th and 19th century materials, as well as for 20th century ephemera, and includes occasional transfers from the general collections. Travel literature and historical narratives are particular strengths.

    Researchers should note that many "named" collections of printed books are subsumed in Hay Star, including the following:

    H. P. Lovecraft collection
    Damon Collection of Fantasy and Imaginative Literature
    Ames Collection of Illustrated Books
    Brown-Ives Shakespeare Collection
    Dated Books
    Egyptology Collection
    Author collections of works by Grotius, Machiavelli, Wells and Orwell
    Kirk Collection on Alcoholism and Alcoholics Anonymous
    Pillar Collection of Children's Literature
    Schirmer Collection on Anti-Imperialism
    Swan Antarctica Collection
    ...more information

  • Stillwell (Margaret Bingham)
    The papers of Margaret Bingham Stillwell, librarian of the Annmary Brown Memorial, 1917 - 1953, and professor of bibliography, 1948 - 1953. Includes personal correspondence, incunabula census correspondence, Annmary Brown Memorial correspondence, manuscripts, notes, poetry, talks, subject files, personal papers, Hroswitha Club Papers, specimen pages and galley proofs of Gesamtkatalog der Wiegendrucke. ...more information

  • Swearer, Howard Robert
    Consists of subject files dating from 1976 to 1990, most of which were created while Howard Robert Swearer was President of Brown University. Subjects documented in the collection include alumni and alumnae; athletics; admissions; the Bio-Med program; the Corporation; commencements; physical planning; faculty; libraries; students; the cooperative program between Brown University and Tougaloo College; and gifts to the University. Civil rights and minority affairs on the Brown University campus, including issues about status of women; Afro-American studies; Asian-American students; Hispanic American students; the American Civil Liberties Union; sexual harassment; and discrimination are documented. Student topics documented include the university radio station, WBRU; issues pertaining to Iranian students (ca.1978-1980); campus organizations; and protests about Central Intelligence Agency recruiting on campus. There are files on Richard Salomon, Thomas J. Watson, and Baruch Korff. ...more information

  • Tefft (Thomas Alexander) Architectural Drawings
    Architectural drawings by Thomas Alexander Tefft, Brown University Class of 1851. ...more information

  • Thatcher (Henry Knox)
    The Henry Knox Thatcher papers comprise three journals kept by Thatcher while he was on active duty as an officer of the U.S. Navy between 1839 and 1863, and cover his service on board the U.S.S. Brandywine (1839-1841), the U.S.S. Jamestown (1847-1849), the U.S.S. Shore Ship Relief (1851-1852) and the U.S.S. Constellation (1862-1863). The collection also includes Thatcher's naval commissions, a pamphlet that details his naval service, Thatcher's military insignia (including dress sword, admiral's hat and epaulets), and an 1862 painting of the Constellation by Italian artist Tomaso de Simone.
    ...more information

  • Thayer (Eli)
    This collection of correspondence, essays, articles, and newspaper clippings has as its chief focal point the Kansas conflict in the 1850's. The New England Emigrant Aid Company and similar organizations undertook to send settlers to Kansas from the North East to counteract the influence of the South in determining the free vs. slave status of Kansas on its becoming a state. The influx of immigrants to Kansas profoundly affected the indigenous populations living there. The materials provide insight into how the settlers did not give any thought to those populations. The Kansas theme runs throughout the collection in contemporary materials as well as in reminiscences and historical narratives written some thirty to fifty years subsequently. Other places important to the collection are West Virginia, Massachusetts, and New York. ...more information

  • Trickett (Homer)
    Collection contains sermons, materials used to create sermons, lectures, study courses, materials relating to the Dodeka society, personal correspondence, newsletters, newspaper clippings all created or collected by Homer Trickett. This is part of the Rhode Island Baptist Heritage Center collection. ...more information

  • Truesdell (Leon E.)
    Leon E. Truesdell graduated from Brown University in 1907 with both an A.B. and A. M degree. His papers consist chiefly of his personal and professional writings and correspondence. Most of the correspondence is related to his career as a statistician and demographer at the United States Bureau of the Census from 1919 to 1967. The papers also include biographical material about the Truesdell family. This collection is useful for the study of population statistics and census records and the history of Puerto Rico. ...more information

  • Turner (William Mason)
    Contains personal correspondence, legal documents, poetry, photographs, and sketches of William Mason Turner, a graduate of Brown University (1855), physician, Confederate surgeon, traveler and author. ...more information

  • Vanderboegh, Mike
    Michael Brian Vanderboegh (1953-2016) was a gun rights and Second Amendment activist. He was one of the founders of the Three Percenters movement pledged to protest and armed resistance against attempts to curtail constitutional rights to carry guns. During the 1990s he was the leader of a militia group called the Sons of Liberty. His papers detail his political and activism work relating to gun control, immigration, Operation Fast and Furious, and the Oklahoma City bombing. ...more information

  • Volck (Adalbert) Confederate Etchings

    In 1863, Adalbert J. Volck, a Maryland dentist and Southern sympathizer, produced a series of copper-plate etchings that caricatured Lincoln and the Union cause. The prints were published as a set and were very popular in the South during and after the war.

    The collection now at Brown was compiled by Boston book dealer Maury A. Bromsen and bequeathed to the John Hay Library. Though the prints are widely available in academic libraries today, the Bromsen collection of the Volck prints is unique as it includes the original copper plates from which the etchings were printed, as well as notes and reference material from Bromsen's research on Volck. ...more information

  • Watson (John Brown)
    John Brown Watson (Class of 1904) was among the earliest African American alumni of Brown University and had a distinguished career in the historically Black colleges of the South. After a teaching stint at Morehouse College, Watson moved into a career as an administrator. He became founding President of Leland College in Baker, Louisiana, in 1923, and later ascended to the presidency of Arkansas Agricultural, Mechanical and Normal School, later known as Arkansas A&M University (now: University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff).

    The Watson papers cover, among other topics, African American education; the role of the African American woman as Christian homemaker and as community leader in education; land reform (creation of farms and rental of property to poor African Americans); African American business; African American leadership of the early 20th century; and African American missions in Africa.
    ...more information

  • West Exeter Baptist Church
    Administrative and financial records, photographs, weekly bulletins for each Sunday service, and attendance records for a small Baptist congregation in Exeter, RI. This is part of the Rhode Island Baptist Heritage Center collection. ...more information

  • Wheaton (Henry)
    Henry Wheaton, Class of 1802, jurist, served as United States Charge d'Affaires to Denmark, and Minister to Prussia. This collection of 275 letters and manuscripts consists chiefly of the correspondence of Wheaton and his family in Europe and America and concerns personal, diplomatic, legal, and political affairs, especially during the War of 1812. Wheatons's diaries, 1827-1835, an 1835 diary kept by his daughter Abby, and biographical notes about Wheaton and his uncle, Dr. Levi Wheaton, Professor of Medicine at Brown, are also among these papers. ...more information

  • White (William Wurts) Family
    The William Wurts White family papers are comprised of correspondence and legal and financial documents related to settling the estates of William Wurts White (1841-1911), his sister, Ella C. White (-1904), and his son, Merwin White (1877-1920). ...more information

  • Whiting (Kenneth P.)
    Kenneth P. Whiting was employed from 1925 to 1926 at Thomas A. Edison Inc. in disc record manufacturing and development and distribution of demonstrating sample records. The Kenneth P. Whiting papers include a series of memoranda from Whiting to Edison himself, with Edison's replies. ...more information

  • Wyllys (Samuel)
    Annmary Brown Hawkins inherited from her father, Nicholas Brown, a collection of papers compiled by Samuel Wyllys (1631-1709), a Connecticut magistrate and public official who served from 1654 to 1684, along with papers of other members of the Wyllys family. The collection, covering the period from 1638 to 1757 (bulk 1663-1698), comprises half of the original collection; the other portion (covering 1694-1726) was acquired some time ago by the Connecticut State Library from the Estate of John Carter Brown. These early papers pertain to Indian affairs, colonial wars, civil and criminal cases. The witchcraft trials of 1692 to 1693, as revealed in the testimony of witnesses in the Oyer and Terminer Courts, are of particular interest. ...more information

  • Yaeger (Patricia)
    This collection contains the papers of Patricia Yaeger, University of Michigan scholar of English and women's studies, culture of the American south, trauma, and environmental humanities. Papers include correspondence, course lectures and related materials, talks, articles, book drafts, and subject files, dating from 1970 to 2014. ...more information

  • Yatman Family
    The Yatman Family papers include correspondence, diaries (including travel diaries), Republican campaign and other material, church subscription books, photographs, etc. The collection primarily consists of the papers of Thomas Laurie, reflecting his work as a missionary and minister; Martha Ellen Laurie Yatman, especially documenting her daily life and trips abroad; and Marion Fay Yatman, providing a cursory view of her work for the Republican Party in the 1940s and 1950s. The papers provide some information about other family members and document a variety of familial and spousal relationships as well as life in the Boston and Providence areas ...more information

  • Yoken (Mel)
    Personal collection of Mel B. Yoken assembled by the Brown University alumnus over a period of forty years. Receipt of the collection by the Brown University Library began in 1999 and is still in progress. It consists primarily of 20th century pieces of correspondence and literary works by American, British, French and Quebecois authors, artists and public figures. Numerous letters written by significant figures of the 18th and 19th century enhance the historical, literary and political interest of the collection. Notes, typescripts, photographs and personal papers complement the archive, as well as the many inscriptions, annotations and signatures in the book collection. ...more information

  • Young (John)
    These papers contain personal correspondence, business papers, writings by John Young and his daughter Harriet, maps and hand drawn diagrams of the Blackfeet Agency and it surroundings in Montana Territory. The personal correspondence from 1876 to 1884 provides firsthand accounts of life on the reservation during a crucial time in the tribe's history. ...more information

Image Source: Thomas Nast. Civil War Scrapbook. 1861 - 1866. McLellan Lincoln Collection. Gift of John D. Rockefeller, Jr., Class of 1897. see catalog record

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