Massachusetts

  • Special Collections
    This collection consists of assorted eighteenth, nineteenth, and some twentieth-century New Hampshire newspapers, mostly from Dover, Exeter, and Portsmouth. These are rarely complete runs, and often only individual issues. Also included in the…
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    Isadore Zack (11 October 1912-January 8, 2011) was born in Quincy, MA. He served in the U.S. Army from 1941-1945 and was assigned as Special Agent in Charge of the Counter Intelligence Group/Subversive Squad, First Service Command, Boston, CIC from…
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    The Willis family took root in New England when Job Willis emigrated from England and settled in Massachusetts. Individuals in this collection include Nellie Willis, her husband Eugene Willis, their daughter Lela Willis, Clarence Willis, Daniel Willis…
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    Martin V. B. Tewkesbury (1834-1900) of Danville, New Hampshire was primarily a farmer who grew potatoes, corn, and wheat, and also raised sheep and pigs. He supplemented his income by means of a saw and cider mill which were constantly in use…
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    Franklin Norvish (1911-2010) was a professor of English at Northeastern University and an espionage agent for the United States Army during World War II. In 1943, Norvish was dispatched to Nazi-occupied France to catalog pro-German collaborators and…
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    The photographer(s) are anonymous. The collection consists of glass lantern slides mostly from the period 1900-1920. Most of the 331 images are of forestry and lumbering activities in Northern New Hampshire.
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    Rober Manton, noted composer of choral, piano, and orchestral works, was born in Dorchester, MA in 1894. He studied music at Harvard University under W.C. Heilman, Dr. A.T. Davison and Dr. E.B. Hill and with Harris S. Shaw in piano and organ,…
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    Elizabeth Knowlton, mountaineer and writer, was born October 23, 1895 in Springfield, Massachusetts and began climbing in the White Mountains at age seven. The endeavor which proved central to her life and work was her attempt on Nanga Parbat in…
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    John Arthur Hogan was born in Idaho in 1909 and educated at the University of Washington and Denver University. He received a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1952. In 1947 he came to work at the University of New Hampshire, retiring in 1974. Hogan…
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    David W. Hill was born in Swanzey, N. H. on April 4, 1838 (1837?), the son of David Hill, a veteran of the War of 1812, and Keziah Franklin Hill. He died 28 February 1931. David W. Hill’s diary entries run from January 1858 until January 1863 and…
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    Lance Hidy, freelance designer of posters and books and co-founder of the Godine Press, was born in Oregon in 1946. He studied art at Yale and has become known for his silk screen posters. Hidy lives in Newburyport, Massachusetts. This collection…
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    Joseph Foster was a colonial MA ship captain who served in the American Revolution. Lyman Spauling was a doctor in Portsmouth around the same time. Their families (including Elizabeth Coues, Adelade Spaulding, and Joseph Foster III) intermarried over…
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    Little is known about the Farley family beyond the fact that they resided in Ipswich, Massachusetts. A Michael Farley built a textile mill in the town in 1830, but his relationship to the Farleys of these letters is unclear. James Farley moved to…
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    Gloria Berchielli was a contra dancer, and was particularly involved with programs at Pinewoods Camp and weekends at Hudson Guild Farm. The Gloria Berchielli collection contains photographs of various dance events from May 1952 until 1986. The…
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    Edwin Terry was a peddler from Granby, Conn. He was born in Harford 22 Oct. 1832, married Maryette Allen in June 1856, and died 6 Aug. 1893 in Springfield MA. His parents were Harmon Terry and Emeline Ellis. Account book kept by Edwin Terry between 1841 and 1878. Terry frequently travelled to New…
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    Moses Humphrey, son of Moses Leavitt and Sarah (Lincoln). Humphrey was born in Hingham, Mass., October 20, 1807, and died in Concord, N. H., August 20, 1901. He was a businessman, Mayor of Concord, N.H., state representative, and President of the N.H. Board of Agriculture, largely responsible for…
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    David Lockhart of Tenerife, Portoratava, Canary Islands An April 25, 1740 letter written by David Lockhart of Tenerife, Portoratava, Canary Islands sent to John McCarrick and George Simpson. It instructs the two men how to smuggle Canary wine into Massachusetts. The ship Oratavo set sail from…
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    Kenison (1919-1971) was born in Methuen, Massachusetts and was a graduate of Kennett High School in Conway, N.H. and the University of New Hampshire, where he received a B.S. in entomology in 1940. He served with the Naval Intelligence Office in India…
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    Susan Wilbur Jones, wife of Llewellyn Jones, a former literary editor of the Chicago Evening Post and later editor of the Christian Register, a magazine associated with the Unitarian Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts, took short-story writing courses from May Sarton at Radcliffe College. The…
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    Free Will Baptist roots can be traced to England as early as 1611. In 1780, under the leadership of Benjamin Randall, Free Will Baptists were established in the northeast at New Durham, New Hampshire. Free Will Baptist churches voluntarily organized…
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    Professor and biologist, retired in Durham, NH 1972. The Jackson Estuarine Laboratory is named for his father, C. Floyd Jackson. The four field notebooks (Nov. 1971-Nov. 1995) concern the operation of the sailboats WAH-WHO I and II in New Hampshire’s…
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    Annie Adams Fields, author and wife of James T. Fields, was born in Boston, MA in 1834. She traveled extensively with her husband and formed intimate friendships with some of America’s most well-known 19th century writers and intellectuals. She died in 1915, having outlived many of her…
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    James T. Fields (1817-1881), author, poet, and publisher, was born in Portsmouth, NH in 1817. At the age of fourteen, he became a clerk in a bookstore in Boston, MA and later a partner in the publishing house of Ticknor and Fields. He edited the Atlantic Monthly, which was published by his firm,…
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    Benjamin Penhallow Shillaber, humorist, newspaperman, and poet, was born in Portsmouth, NH in 1814. He moved to Boston, MA in 1833, where he became a journeyman printer. He worked as a printer and editor of several papers, including the Carpet Bag, a…
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    Joseph Rowlandson was born in England in or around 1631. He served as a Congregational minister, living for a time in both Lancaster and Ipswich, MA, before finally settling in Wethersfield, CT. He was the husband of Mary Rowlandson, whose Indian captivitity narrative made her a famous figure in…
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    Martin Snow, Civil War sailor, was born in Boston, Mass. in 1839 and died in Blair, Neb. in 1891. He married Caroline Augusta Barker in 1860 and was buried in Pittsfield, N.H., where he once lived and where his daughter, Lena Snow Sargent, resided. Contains a 92-page diary kept by Martin Snow from…
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    Daniel Berkeley Updike, printer and publisher, worked for the Merrymount Press of Boston, Mass. He was a recognized authority on the history and use of print types, and he played an important role in the development and improvement of typography in…
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    Daniel Webster (1782-1852) was an American lawyer who served in the governments of New Hampshire and Massachusetts. Speech of the Hon. Daniel Webster, of Massachusetts, at the dinner given to him by the merchants and other citizens of Philadelphia, December 2, 1846. Published in 1847 in Washington…
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    This seems to be the only written record for this particular Horance Wilson. Three page letter (ca. 1845-1849) begun aboard the ship "Areatus" and completed after the writer’s arrival in San Francisco. Wilson writes to James C. Steel, Andover, Mass of his experiences on the voyage around South…
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    Joseph Woodman Sanborn was born on March 10, 1801 in New Hampton, N.H. and died on Aug. 9, 1868 in Bridgewater, MA. He resided for some time at Benicia, California where his sons died. He was a cordwainer in 1850, resided at "Sanborn's Corner" in a house that stood at the N.E. corner of Hancock and…
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    Reverend John Lowell, 1704-1767, was the first pastor of Newburyport, Mass. A one page letter from Reverend Lowell to Joshua Brackett of Portsmouth New Hampshire. In the letter of March 13, 1758 Reverend Lowell describes the late arrival of spring and rumors concerning British troop movements…
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    Edith Nelson was born in Malden, Mass. in 1894. An experienced secretary, Nelson became a field clerk in the U.S. Army Intelligence Section during World War I. She was charged with investigating German nationals and subversives in the Boston area. She…
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    John Greenleaf Whittier (December 17, 1807 – September 7, 1892) was an influential American Quaker poet and ardent advocate of the abolition of slavery in the United States A four page letter to Sarah Orne Jewett, London, England, July 3, 1882 in which Whittier expresses delight at the fact that…
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    Francis Wainwright (1687-1772) was the son of Col. John Wainwright and Elizabeth Norton, born in Essex MA. He married Mary Dudley in 1713 and died in Boston in 1772. Letter written by Francis Wainwright of Portsmouth, NH to his brother. In the letter, Wainwright notes that he is uneasy about the…
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    Ted Sannella (1928-1995) was a square and contra dance caller from Boston, later moving to Maine. Ted began teaching New England dancing as a professional caller in 1946. He was the author of Balance and Swing (1982), and Swing the Next (1996). Ted…
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    Dunkin' Donuts founder William Rosenberg (1916-2002) was born in Dorchester, Massachusetts. The bulk of the William Rosenberg Collection contains newspaper and magazine clippings and photographs collected by him, business associates and family members…
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    Luther Locke (1820-1892) was a dentist and physician who had been trained at Harvard Medical School. He also served as a Union Army surgeon in the American Civil War. This collection is mostly comprised of papers from his Civil War service.
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    Dudley Laufman (b. 1930) is a folk dance caller, band leader, musician, composer, author, and poet from Canterbury, NH. He was heavily influenced by the late caller Ralph Page, and was awarded a National Heritage Fellowship Award in 2009. Without…
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    Writer Harold Witter Bynner (1881-1968) was born in Brooklyn, N.Y. In 1898 he began his studies at Harvard University where he served on the editorial board of the Harvard Advocate (1900-1902). After graduating in 1902, Bynner worked for four…
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    Moses Brown was born in 1742 and was a prominent merchant and citizen of Newburyport, MA. He first worked as a chaise maker in 1766. After 25 years, he purchased a wharf and invested his money in Newburyport’s lucrative shipping industry. Brown…
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    The Balch family first came to the United States in 1623 and resided in northern Massachusetts and New Hampshire. The best known member of the family was the author Elizabeth Arabella Balch (1851-1934), daughter of Wesley P. (1794-1856) and Elizabeth…