University of Pennsylvania Finding Aids

The Biddle family has a long history on American land with Quaker ancestors emigrating in 1681 and settling in Philadelphia around 1725. This collection documents the family relationships, and to a lesser extent, the work and military service of six generations of one branch of that family, starting with Clement Biddle (1740-1814), and following the descendants of two of his sons: Thomas Alexander Biddle (1776-1857) and Clement Cornell Biddle (1784-1855). These papers tell the stories, to varying degrees, of more than 30 individual Biddle family members through correspondence, financial records, professional papers, diaries, scrapbooks, and photographs.

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.

This is a collection of Book-of-the-Month club news, mailings, and offers along with a few examples of other book-seller related materials such as advertisements, catalogs, lists, and financial and business documents, mostly receipts. The bulk of the collection is from the years 1850 to 1961 with a few outlying documents from the 1820s to 1840s.

Jeremy Duncan Nicholson (born 1948) was a community organizer for the gay and lesbian community at the University of Pennsylvania and in Philadelphia, from roughly 1975 to 1982, when he was a graduate student at the University of Pennsylvania. This collection includes material from several organizations of which Nicholson was a part, such as the Christian Association of the University of Pennsylvania (CA), the Philadelphia Lesbian and Gay Task Force (PLGTF), Gay Peer Counseling (GPC), Gays at Penn, and Philadelphia community health organizations, including Lavender Health and the Eromin Center.

The Hedgerow Theatre Company was established in 1923 by Jasper Deeter, a New York based actor and director. Located in the Rose Valley Arts and Crafts Community of Delaware County, Pennsylvania, Hedgerow holds the distinction as the longest serving Repertory Theatre in America. The Hedgerow Theatre Company records contains a wide variety of materials, from business records and show materials to member ephemera and photographs. The collection provides both a practical and intimate look into the workings of this repertory theatre.

Otto Edwin Albrecht (1899-1984) was an internationally known music bibliographer and professor of romance languages and musicology at the University of Pennsylvania. This collection documents his professional career and contains extensive information on his research relating to the history of music in Boston, New York and Philadelphia, the location of European music manuscripts in the United States, and his work identifying sources for Répertoire International des Sources Musicales; his work with music organizations including the American Musicological Society and the Music Library Association; and his work at and for the University of Pennsylvania's Music Library.

Comprising nineteen series, the Mumford papers provide extensive documentation of Mumford's professional life over a period of approximately seventy years. Predominant are correspondence and drafts of and notes for Mumford's writings, which include publications of over forty books and pamphlets and approximately one thousand articles and book reviews.

Originally established in 1950 as the National Society for the Study of Communication, the International Communication Association (ICA) has grown to be the largest worldwide academic organization devoted to the systematic study of communication. The collection is composed primarily of administrative records created and/or collected by various officers from 1946 to 2016, and serves to document the association’s development over the years. Materials include correspondence, board meeting minutes and reports, bylaws and constitutions, conference proceedings, division records, financial records, membership records, and publication records.

Harold Dies (1914-2012) was a trustee of the Dreiser Trust from its establishment following Helen Dreiser's death in 1955 to his own death in 2012. The Dreiser Trust managed the income and approved contracts for sale of Theodore Dreiser's published works. This collection documents Harold Dies' work with the Dreiser trust and includes financial information; agreements, copyright, correspondence, and royalty statements relating to the works of Helen Dreiser, Theodore Dreiser (bulk), and Paul Dresser; correspondence relating to the Trust and the estates of family members; legal and court records relating to estates of family members; some personal material of Harold Dies and members of the Dreiser family (including Gertrude A. Hopkins Dorn (niece of Theodore Dreiser), Helen Dreiser, Theodore Dreiser, Vera Dreiser, and Paul Dresser (brother of Theodore Dreiser)); and publications using Dreiser material or Dreiser-inspired content.

Papers supplementing the Marian Anderson Papers, comprising correspondence (general and fan mail); business correspondence, records and contracts; manuscript and typescript biographical materials; some materials belonging to her sisters Alyse Anderson and Ethel DePreist, her mother Anna D. Anderson, and her husband, Orpheus H. Fisher; Anderson's notes, journals, calendars, and financial documents; correspondence and memorabilia from James DePreist; programs and publicity materials; clippings; awards and tributes; and memorabilia.

Clement and Sophie Winston lived and worked in Washington, DC from the 1930s to the 1980s. Clement Winston (1902-1986), a Russian Jewish immigrant worked as an economist at the United States Bureau of the Budget. This collection documents the couple's personal and professional lives through their creative and professional writings, correspondence, household accounts and personal documents, dating from 1903 to 1990.

This collection includes material related to the lives and work of Helen (1901-1985), Ira (1908-1997), and Michael Wolfert (1936-2001). It contains correspondence between the family and others; manuscripts by all three subjects, as well as others; financial documents; personal documents; photos taken by and of the family; newspaper clippings collected by Helen and Ira; and notes and miscellanea from all three subjects.

This 46-item collection (1972-2017, undated) consists of documents and artifacts identified by Stuart Teacher as significant to the history of Running Press. Founded by brothers Stuart and Lawrence Teacher in Philadelphia in 1972, Running Press grew to be one of the most successful independent publishers in the nation by the mid-1980s. This collection represents, in the words of Stuart Teacher, "two parallel themes" in the company's history: a creativity-centric publishing philosophy and a strong, collaborative employee culture.

Correspondence and business records supplementing the main collection of records. These supplementary records include applications for membership; minutes for the committees on admissions and relief and for the Musical Fund Hall; programs and other materials related to the history of Musical Fund Hall (1848-1982), including material relating to performances of soprano Jenny Lind; financial records; correspondence; histories; memorabilia; and late 20th-century records of annual meetings, special and standing committees, and the Musical Fund Society Foundation. The supplementary records cover the same years as and should be used in conjunction with Ms. Coll. 90, Musical Society Fund of Philadelphia Records.

Mary Colum (nee Maguire) (1884-1957) was a literary critic known for her memoir, Life and the Dream, the posthumously published Our Friend James Joyce, as well as contributions to such magazines as Scribner's, The Saturday Review of Literature, and The Forum, where she also served as literary editor. Padraic Colum (1881-1972) was a poet, playwright, novelist, biographer, and folklorist, known primarily for his collections of myths and folktales for children, his novels Castle Conquer and The Flying Swans, a volume of collected poetry, and several plays. This collection contains 20 boxes of material relating to the works and careers of Padraic and Mary Colum, the management of Padraic Colum's estate following his death, and the life of Emmet Greene, nephew of Padraic and Mary Colum and executor of Padraic Colum's estate.

The Sophia Wittenberg Mumford papers contain, correspondence, writings, diaries, photographs, memorabilia, audio-visual material, financial and legal material documenting the private and public life of Sophia and her husband Lewis Mumford. A large majority of this collection is remnants of Lewis Mumford's papers that remained in their house upon his death in 1990 and were finally transferred to the University of Pennsylvania after her death in 1997.

The Marian Anderson Papers are comprised of correspondence; business records and contracts; manuscript and typescript biographical materials; notes, journals, calendars, and financial documents; programs and publicity materials; awards and honorary degrees; clippings; scrapbooks; memorabilia; and some materials belonging to her sisters Alyse Anderson and Ethel De Preist, her mother Anna D. Anderson, and her husband, Orpheus H. Fisher.

Beginning in the late eighteenth century, the Levis family of Delaware County, Pennsylvania owned and operated mills, manufacturing first paper and then cotton. This collection of Levis family papers contains a variety of documents including correspondence, bills, contracts, estate records and newspaper clippings, dating from 1770 to around 1932. When possible, the papers have been arranged by the creator of the material, or the Levis family member to whom they most directly relate.

This collection (1880-1924) contains documents that relate to the business dealings of A. & W. MacKinlay, Limited, a bookselling company founded by Andrew and William MacKinlay in 1827, and based in Halifax, Nova Scotia.The bulk of the collection consists of invoices charged by A. & W. MacKinlay to H & A. Locke or to D. Y. Stewart and Son, two regional businesses. A few pieces of business correspondence are also included, along with a pair of ledger books which were printed and sold by A. & W. MacKinlay, but which contain the handwritten financial accounts of two unidentified businesses.

Mark Jan Dresden (1911-1986) was a Dutch-American Iranist who studied Indology. He taught Persian and Old and Middle Iranian Languages at the University of Pennsylvania from 1949 until his retirement in 1977. Dresden’s work on Khotanese, Persian and Iranian languages and texts is widely published. This collection, dating from 1930 to 1994 contains correspondence, ephemera, event files, lectures, financial documents, funding and grants files, project files, research and writing, and personal documents.

The Maine, New York, chapter of the Ku Klux Klan appears to have been guided by Charles B. Lewis, whose titles included "Imperial Representative" and "State Director Reclamation and Extension," and who operated out of Syracuse New York. This collection contains bulletins, newsletters, and correspondence relating to the "Realm of New York," specific records of the Maine, New York, chapter of the Ku Klux Klan, and Pro-Klan literature relating to the Ku Klux Klan, generally.

Paul Schrecker (1889-1963) was a philosopher and professor. There is little information on Schrecker's life during World War I, except that he appears to have been a civilian in Vienna. This collection documents a Viennese citizen's home front experience during World War I. Shrecker saved ephemeral material relating to German propaganda, German efforts to finance the war, German war heroes and memorialization of Germany's participation in World War I, prisoner of war experiences, and rationing, as well as election material from 1919.

Personal papers of Wanda Gág, including correspondence to and from Wanda, as well as letters to and from Alma Schmidt Scott, a biographer of Gág, and letters among Gág family members; writings, such as diaries, children’s books, autobiographical works, and juvenilia; notes for talks and for writings; artwork; exhibition catalogs and related publicity material; writings about Gág, including obituaries, biographical pieces, and book reviews; financial records; materials regarding the Estate of Wanda Gág; newspaper clippings; memorabilia; photographs; and examples of Happiwork, a product for children created by Gág.

Gilbert Luber (1918-1999) and his wife Shirley Luber collected and sold traditional and contemporary Japanese prints at the Gilbert Luber Gallery in Philadelphia from 1980 to 2000. They also founded and ran the Japan Group II, an interest group relating to the arts and culture of Japan. This collection documents the administration of the Japan Group II and includes records relating to event planning, financial planning, group chronology, legal records, meeting minutes, member obituaries, membership lists, newsletters, notices and group correspondence, and photographs.

Felix E. Schelling (1858-1945) was a professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania, an expert on Shakespeare, and an author of scholarly works on Shakespeare and Elizabethan literature. This collection documents Schelling's life as a student, a professor, a scholar, and an author. It also documents the University of Pennsylvania through the eyes of an individual who was a student and a faculty member over a period of more than fifty years.