University of Pennsylvania Finding Aids

Raymond Pace Alexander (1897-1974) and Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander (1898-1989) were pioneers among African Americans in the legal profession and leaders in public affairs, politics, and government throughout the middle half of the twentieth century. Raymond Pace Alexander was a graduate of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in 1920 and from Harvard Law School in 1923. Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander earned all three of her degrees (A.B. 1918, M.A. 1919, and Ph.D. 1921) from the University of Pennsylvania. The Alexander Papers constitute a highly significant resource for the social and political history of the city of Philadelphia and, in particular, for the history of the city's black professional and political elite, black civic organizations, and institutions concerned with race relations and civil rights.

The American Section was one of the first to evolve during the early development of the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. The University Archaeological Association established in 1887 and later, the American Exploration Society, established in 1892, exhibited several small collections in College Hall before the building campaign for the museum began. Charles Abbott was the first curator of the section succeeded by Henry C. Mercer and then Stewart Culin who was also named Director in 1899. Each succeeding curator was responsible for adding collections, many of them representing their own expeditions in the United States, Alaska, Mexico, Central America and South America. Records in the files are dated from 1826 through the 1980s. The transfer of materials to the Archives took place piecemeal and without a central organization. The current re-processing placed the files into three series, Deaccessions and Loans, Collectors and Collections and Exhibits.

This collection consists of manuscripts and papers relating primarily to seveententh and eighteenth century Ireland and Great Britain formerly owned by A.C. Elias, a literary scholar who wrote extensively on Jonathan Swift and his circle.

Founded in 1907, the Charlotte Cushman Club was originally intended to provide respectable lodgings for actresses appearing in Philadelphia theaters. In the years of World War II the Club ceased to provide residential services, becoming a favorite gathering place of theater lovers as well as of the many actresses and actors visiting the city with their touring companies. The Charlotte Cushman Club Records offer insight into the activities, the administration, and the membership of the Club during the whole life of the organization, until its closure in 1998. The collection also includes part of the holdings of the former Club’s museum and library.

The Chestnut Hill Hospital School of Nursing Records consist of 20.45 linear feet of hospital records, school administration records, faculty and student files, yearbooks, photographs, and some artifacts. The records extend from the school's creation in 1908 until its closing in 1987. The collection comprehensively documents the growth of a suburban community hospital nurse training program.

The Curriculum and Lecture Notes Collection was created by the University Archives in the 1950s to assemble individual manuscripts and small groupings of archival material relating to courses taught at the University of Pennsylvania throughout its entire history. This collection documents the teaching methods used in the various schools of the University of Pennsylvania throughout its history.

David Y. Cooper was a graduate and later faculty member of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, well known for his research work in a number of fields. This collection primarily documents his work and reserach into topics relating to the history of medicine and the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

The Frazer Family Papers span over 200 years of an American family. The collection provides insight into five generations of University of Pennsylvania alum as well as three generations of educators, all in the field of chemistry, at the University of Pennsylvania and contains the papers of Persifor Frazer, Robert Frazer, John Fries Frazer, Persifor Frazer, Robert Frazer, John Frazer, John Frazer, Jr., and Tench Frazer, as well as a range of other family members and relatives. The collection is particularly strong in representing the professional and personal activities of Persifor Frazer (1844-1909) and his son John Frazer (1882-1964) from the 1860s to the 1950s.

The Gotham Book Mart (1920-2006) was one of New York City’s most iconic bookstores during the 20th century. Founded by Frances Steloff (1887-1989), the daughter of poor Russian-Jewish immigrants, the Book Mart became a social center for the New York literati and a focal point for literary modernism in the United States. Steloff’s successor, independent literary manuscript dealer Andreas Brown (1933-), maintained the store’s focus on avant garde and small press publications while incorporating his own interests in postcards and genealogy. This collection contains 91 boxes of material relating to the daily operation of the Book Mart; correspondence, biographical, and legal material from both Brown and Steloff; postcard and genealogical material collected by Brown; photographs of the store, its employees, and events which took place there; and manuscripts and ephemera offered for sale.

The H.H. Furness Memorial Library focuses on the study of Shakespeare and other Tudor and Stuart dramatists. Horace Howard Furness (1833-1912) and his son Horace Howard Furness Jr. (1865-1930) founded and edited the Variorum Shakespeare and their library was donated to the University of Pennsylvania in 1932. This collection contains personal correspondence to and from Rev. William Henry Furness (1802-1896), Horace Howard Furness, and Horace Howard Furness, Jr., largely relating to Shakespearean study and the H.H. Furness Memorial library; notebooks; copies of speeches and articles; and other assorted items relating to Shakespearean scholarship or to the Furness family.

Harold Scheie was a noted ophthalmologist at the University of Pennsylvania. The Harold Glendon Scheie Papers mainly document the professional contributions and achievements of Dr. Scheie in the field of Ophthalmology. There is a small group of personal papers, but these papers, in large part, still reflect in some way upon his devotion to his profession.

Hui-lin Li was educated at Soochow University and Yenching University in China and received his PhD in biology from Harvard University in 1942. After holding a number of research fellowship positions in both the United States and Taiwan, he came to the University of Pennsylvania as a research associate in 1952 and became a faculty member in the field of botany in 1963. The collections documents the professional career and life of Dr. Li as a professor of botany and researcher.

A Philadelphia native, Jane Wright Proctor Wallis (1875-1956) was the daughter of Sarah Jane Wright and Josiah Kendall Proctor (the founder and owner of several prominent city businesses) and a mother of ten children. The Jane Wright Proctor Wallis family papers provide a glimpse into early 20th-century family life through correspondence, scrapbooks, photographs, and memorabilia. The collection dates from 1833 to 2007, revealing a pride in the history and genealogy of the Proctor Wallis family across its many generations. In addition to familial topics, this collection features many materials documenting events of the early 20th Century as well as various Philadelphia-area social and charitable clubs.

The Miscellaneous Manuscripts Collection is a fluid one, consisting of manuscripts that are unidentified or too small for their own collection. Each sub-collection within the group is given a Miscellaneous Manuscript Number which corresponds to the collection.

The collection is divided into three major series: I. 18th and 19th century records, II. 20th century records, and III. John M. Okie papers. The first comprises correspondence, administrative records, and ephemera; the second, correspondence, committee records, financial records, proceedings, memorabilia, and collected agricultural material; the third consists of the papers of Okie, who served as assistant secretary of the Society from 1922 to 1928: he was responsible for the publication of Memoirs VI, a history of the P.S.P.A.

The Dechert family was involved in Philadelphia's legal, civic, and military history from the mid-nineteenth century through twentieth century. The Robert Dechert Family Papers primarily document the life of Robert Dechert, touching upon almost all of his activities.

This collection contains correspondence between Robert Montgomery Bird, his wife Mary E. Bird, their son Frederic Mayer Bird, and other family members. It provides accounts of daily life in New Castle, Delaware and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during the 19th century.

The Dental School Library Historical Collection documents the development of dental education in the University of Pennsylvania from the time the University created its dental department to the present.

This collection consists primarily of documents concerning government administration in Ireland during the tenures of Sir Robert Southwell (1635-1702) and his son Edward Southwell (1671-1730) as Secretaries of State for Ireland. The documents here are largely miscellaneous in nature but are clustered around a few themes. Highlights include lists of rents and financial transactions from the period after Cromwell’s invasion and before the Williamite war in Ireland, a 1689 eyewitness letter recounting the battle of Derry, a series of documents related to admiralty, smuggling, and collecting maritime revenue in the first decade of the eighteenth century, an inventory of maps of Ireland, and a substantive series of petitions relating to Richard Blake of Ardfry.