News & Events

Letter from Robert Lynd to Sylvia Lynd (1909) from the Sylvia and Robert Lynd Correspondence (C1554)

New finding aids include the following:

A.C. McClurg & Co. Letters from F. G. Browne to C. F. Cazenove (C1553)

Consists of 47 letters from F. G. Browne on behalf of the Publishing Department at Chicago-based American publisher A.C. McClurg & Co. to the firm’s London literary agent C. F. Cazenove, regarding the sale of American titles in England, financial transactions, and other business matters related to publishing.

Ambrose Serle Essays on North America (C1556)

Includes seven essays (likely unpublished) on American affairs and economic opportunities, dating from 1768-1780, by British colonial official, Ambrose Serle (1742-1812).

Aurelio Cortés Collection of Reinaldo Arenas (C1562)

The Aurelio Cortés Collection of Reinaldo Arenas contains a small collection of letters and correspondence with Reinaldo Arenas and others, as well as typewritten drafts of Arenas’ articles and essays, some of which are dedicated to Cortés, a personal friend. Also present are typewritten drafts of Cortés’ own work on his friendship with Arenas.

Cole Family Papers (C1548)

Consists of 12 letters from William, E. B., and Robert Patten to their brother-in-law and sister, George N. and Olivia Cole about their experiences in San Francisco during the gold rush, along with additional Cole family documents.

David Gelston Family Correspondence (C1547)

Primarily includes correspondence kept by merchant and politician David Gelston during his time as Collector of Customs for the Port of New York (1801-1820) along with some correspondence of Floyd and Delafield family members.

Frederic Dennis Papers on Sylvia Beach (C1540)

This collection consists of selected papers of Frederic Dennis regarding his aunt Sylvia Beach, the founder and owner of the bookstore Shakespeare and Company. Recent additions consist of letters (1977-1988) to Dennis from Beach scholar Noël Riley Fitch regarding the Beach family.

Granville Austin Papers (MC287)

Granville Austin (1927-2014) was an independent scholar and political historian known for his work on India’s constitution. The collection is composed of Granville Austin’s research files on India, mostly in the form of published articles or book excerpts that Austin collected and often annotated. The majority of the research files, notes and drafts relate to Austin’s second book, Working a Democratic Constitution, but some files relate to his first book, The Indian Constitution: Cornerstone of a Nation. Topics documented in the collection include the Indian constitution, center-state relations in India, Indian politicians and political parties, U.S. foreign relations with India, cases tried before the Indian Supreme Court, and various other subjects related to India’s political and legal systems. Research material on the Middle East, material relating to Austin’s other writings, professional and personal correspondence, including State Department files, as well as U. S. Information Service photographs and negatives compose additional parts of the collection.

Louis Jefferson Collection on John Foster Dulles (MC291)

Louis Jefferson (1927-2006) served as John Foster Dulles’s personal security guard for five years until Dulles’s death in 1959. The collection is composed of scrapbooks created by Jefferson documenting his travels with Dulles.

Philip Ten Eyck Letters to Philip J. Schuyler (C1551)

Consists of over 40 letters from New York City bookseller and politician Philip Ten Eyck to Philip J. Schuyler that primarily document local, regional, and national politics as well as other prominent current events around the turn of the 19th century.

Sylvia and Robert Lynd Correspondence (C1554)

Consists of three decades of correspondence between married Irish writers Sylvia and Robert Lynd, comprising over 260 letters written in English and Gaelic, that span most of their relationship from 1905 to 1937.

Thomas Colchie ’64 Papers (C1552)

Thomas Colchie (Princeton University alumnus, Class of 1964), is a translator, editor, and literary agent with a specialization in Latin America. His papers consists of correspondence from Jorge Amado, António Lobo Antunes, Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Carlos Drummond de Andrade, Oswaldo França Júnior, Ignácio de Loyola Brandão, Manuel Puig, Murilo Rubião, Ernesto Sábato, José Saramago, Moacyr Scliar, João Ubaldo Ribeiro, José Luandino Vieira, Néstor Almendros, Adolfo Bioy Casares, Elizabeth Bishop, João Cabral de Melo Neto, Joaquim Cardozo, Philip Roth, and Alan Warner.

Thomas Howard “A Sketch of the Interest of Great Britain in her American Colonies, with Some Remarks upon the Policy, Trade, and Commerce of America” Manuscript and Letter (C1555)

Consists of an unpublished manuscript treatise, dating from the late 1760s, most likely authored by British military officer, Thomas Howard (1735–1778), as well as an 8-page letter from Howard written while he was commander of the Grenadier Guards during the American Revolution.

New additions to existing collections were added to the following finding aids:

Charles Ruas Papers (C1372)

Charles Ruas is an American author, interviewer, editor, literary and art critic, and French translator, who served as the Director of the Drama and Literature Department for New York’s Pacifica radio station WBAI-FM in the late 1970s. Additions to the papers include recordings and descriptions of his radio programs, a public television program proposal, and materials related to artists and authors with whom he worked.

Princeton University Library Collection of Albert Einstein Materials (C1022)

A recent addition to this assembled collection of material by or about physicist Albert Einstein consists of four 1941 photographs of Einstein in Princeton taken by photographer Roman Vishniac (1897-1990).

Princeton University Library Collection of John Ruskin Materials (C0196)

A recent addition to this assembled collection of material by or about 19th century English art critic, social reformer, and educator John Ruskin consists of six signed autograph letters from Ruskin to Professor Henry Attwell, discussing Albrecht Dürer’s Knight, Death and the Devil, abstracts of his work, photographs of his pupils, geological specimens, and other matters.

Princeton University Library Collection of Lawrance Thompson Materials (C0479)

Recent additions to this collection of selected papers of author and former Princeton University Library Curator of Rare Books and Manuscripts Lawrance Thompson include typescripts of his lectures on Ralph Waldo Emerson, as well as for his “Four American Authors” course.

Robert H. Taylor Collection (RTC01)

Some recent additions to this collection of modern English and American literary manuscript materials include manuscript drafts of “The Mistakes, or The Happy Resentment, A Comedy” and “Undkan King of Tartary” by Henry Hyde, Viscount Cornbury (1710-1753); and a collection of 46 loose manuscript verses collected by members of the Hyde and Villiers families (Earls of Clarendon).

Toni Morrison Papers (C1491)

New additions to the finding aid include speeches and lectures; diaries, logbooks, and address books; photographs; awards and memorabilia; and audiovisual materials. Additional writings (short fiction, poetry and lyrics, dramatic works, non-fiction, children’s literature, and personal and miscellaneous writings) are also now described in the finding aid and will be available via digital access in the reading room pending the completion of digitization.

Updates to existing collections were made to the following finding aids:

Diamela Eltit Papers (C1457)

The correspondence series has been re-opened after a restrictions review. Correspondence features personal and work-related correspondence addressed to or from Eltit. Only a select portion of the correspondence remains closed until 2041.

Photograph of activist Robert Sundance (left) and photographer Marc Gaede (right), circa 1991-1993, from the Marc Gaede Papers (C1436).

New finding aids include the following:

Marc Gaede Papers (C1436)

Marc Gaede (1946- ) is an American photographer, environmental activist, and teacher based in California. The collection consists of Gaede’s black-and-white photographs of the American West and Southwest, correspondence, contracts, and other working files primarily related to his books on photography, archaeology, and conservation, and a large group of working files, which include audiovisual and digital materials, for a biography project Gaede collaborated on with Hunkpapa Lakota Sioux activist Robert Sundance (1927-1993).

Princeton University Library Collection of J. A. Johnson Photographs (C1549)

Consists of an open collection of photographs by American photographer J. A. Johnson, who was active in the early 20th century. Subjects include American Indians, primarily chiefs from the Sioux Nation, and cowboys in the American West.

Princeton University Library Collection of Reinaldo Arenas Materials (C1546)

Includes an assembled collection of Reinaldo Arenas materials purchased by Princeton University Library. Materials include correspondence between Arenas and his editor at Penguin, Kathryn Court, a correction list for Farewell to the Sea, publicity photographs taken by Arenas’ close friend, Lázaro Gómez Carriles, and a photocopy of Arenas’ last living will.

Robert B. Klausner Papers on Bill Bradley’s Presidential Campaign (MC288)

Robert B. Klausner (1926-2016) was a political activist who supported Bill Bradley’s bid for president in 2000. The collection consists of Klausner’s records related to the overall finances of Bill Bradley’s presidential campaign and to fundraising events in California.

Roberto González Echevarría Collection on Severo Sarduy and Other Latin American Writers (C1543)

Roberto González Echevarría is a Cuban-born critic and Sterling Professor of Hispanic and Comparative Literature at Yale University. This collection contains his correspondence with Severo Sarduy and other writers and critics including among them Alejo Carpentier, Miguel Barnet, Antonio Benítez Rojo, Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Nancy Morejón, Octavio Paz, Edgardo Rodríguez Juliá, Luis Rafael Sánchez, Mario Vargas Llosa, Calvin Trilin, J. Wright, Carlos Fuentes, Julio Cortázar, Rosario Ferré, and José Donoso. Also in the collection are typescripts, audio recordings, photographs, and printed materials particularly relating to González Echevarría’s work on Sarduy.

Revised finding aids:

Bruce and Beatrice Blackmar Gould Correspondence (C0673)

Bruce and Beatrice Blackmar Gould were co-editors at the Ladies’ Home Journal from 1935 to 1962. Their correspondence includes letters between Bruce and Beatrice about their co-editorship and co-authorship, letters with writers for the Ladies Home Journal, and letters from actresses about the Ladies Home Journal. Also included is a collection of letters about Marion Crawford’s book The Little Princesses, a few of Beatrice’s speeches, and miscellaneous printed matter. The finding aid now contains a complete folder inventory.

New additions to existing collections were added to the following finding aids:

Princeton University Library Collection of Andrew Fleming West Correspondence (C1102)

A recent addition to this collection of selected correspondence of former Princeton Dean of Graduate Studies, Andrew Fleming West, includes family correspondence, primarily letters from West to his sister, Clara L. West, and his son, Randolph West.

Princeton University Library Collection of Martha Gellhorn Materials (C1531)

Recent additions to this open collection of letters and memorabilia of American war correspondent, journalist, and novelist Martha Gellhorn (1908-1998) include approximately fifty letters from Gellhorn to her adopted son, George “Sandy” Gellhorn, written from Kenya, England, Germany, and the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s, along with a portrait sketch of Gellhorn and a group of badges, pins, and dog tags from her time as a war correspondent during the Spanish Civil War and World War II.

Princeton University Library Collection of Western Americana Photographs (WC064)

Recent additions to this open collection of Western Americana photographs include portrait photographs of Sioux chief Lone Elk, Pima Indian School Police private Erastus Cheroquese, and Arapaho leader Cut Nose by F. A. Rinehart; albumen cabinet cards of Fort Stanton, New Mexico; photographs of Navajo, Apache, and Yaqui Indians in Arizona by Kenji Kawano; and photographs of gold mining and lumbering activities in Siskiyou County, California.

Footnotes Sing-Off Official Graphic. Series 2: Public Website; 2016; Princeton Footnotes
Records, Princeton University Archives, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections,
Princeton University Library.

New finding aids include the following:

Blanckley Family Papers (C1542)

Consists of family correspondence and documents (1813-1890) of the Blanckley family, centering on Henry Stanyford Blanckley (1752-1820), British consul in Algeria and the Balearic Islands, and his children and grandchildren. Materials also document the Tonna, Philippides Cammenos, Androutsos, and Rogers families in Great Britain, Malta, the Balearic Islands, France, and Greece.

Francis Catlin Collection on Princeton Bicentennial Celebration (AC452)

Francis Catlin was a member of the Princeton University Class of 1947. The collection contains materials distributed at the 1947 Bicentennial Convocation celebrating Princeton University’s 200th anniversary.

Frederick Quellmalz Jr. Papers on the Princeton Camera Club (AC451)

Frederick Quellmalz Jr. was a member of the Princeton University Class of 1934 and one of the founding members of the Princeton Camera Club, a student organization devoted to photography. This collection consists of print photographs and negatives primarily from the 1930s taken by Quellmalz Jr. and other Club members.

German medical miscellany (Princeton MS. 240)

Manuscript compendium of medical texts from mid-15th century Augsburg, Germany, composed of writings in Latin and German on gynecology, blood circulation, pharmacology, and other topics.

Gisèle Freund Correspondence (C1541)

Gisèle Freund (1908-2000) was a German-born French photographer and photojournalist best known for her portraits of writers and artists of the 20th century, as well as for her documentary photography. The collection consists of her correspondence from 1959 to 1986 with her New York-based literary agents, Marie Rodell, Frances Collin, and Joan Daves, as well as her literary agents’ correspondence with others involved in the publishing of her works and some related chapter drafts, publishing agreements, photograph lists, and publicity materials.

Holly Beach Dennis Letters to Frederic Dennis (C1540)

This collection contains personal correspondence between Holly Beach Dennis and her son, Frederic Dennis. Included in the collection are 37 letters and two photographs of Holly Beach, and her younger sisters, Sylvia and Cyprian.

Pedro Consuegra Papers (C1533)

Pedro Consuegra is a Cuban born French choreographer. His papers include postcard correspondence with Néstor Almendros, German Puig Paredes, Severo Sarduy, and others. The papers also include original issues of SIE, a handwritten underground tabloid, or zine, Consuegra edited for and about gay Latin American expatriates living in France.

Princeton Action for Chile Records (AC450)

Princeton Action for Chile (PAC) was a student organization established in October of 1976 following the assassination of Chilean diplomat Orlando Letelier in Washington, D.C. The collection consists of flyers, newspaper clippings, correspondence, and publications collected following the assassination that document resistance and responses to the Chilean junta under General Pinochet.

Princeton Footnotes Records (AC449)

The Princeton Footnotes is an all-male a cappella group at Princeton University that was founded in 1959. The organization that became the Footnotes emerged as a dispute within the Glee Club, which resulted in twelve of the Club’s members leaving the Club to form a separate group, the Prospectors. The Princeton Footnotes Records consists primarily of digitized recordings of former Footnotes albums released between 1961 and 1987.

Revised finding aids:

Francis C. Brown Collection on Slavery in America (C0605)

Consists of over 150 manuscript and printed documents related to the institution of slavery in America that were collected from various sources by Francis C. Brown (Class of 1958). Materials pertain to slavery in Louisiana and, to a lesser degree, in Tennessee, Kentucky, Maryland, Alabama, Virginia, Mississippi, Missouri, New York, New Jersey, and the Carolinas, with a few documents relating to the Caribbean and West Africa. While many documents relate to the slave trade and enslaved persons from the perspective of plantation owners and slave traders, others depict resistance to slavery and the lives of free people of color.

New additions to existing collections were added to the following finding aids:

Charles Ruas Papers (C1372)

Charles Ruas is an American author, interviewer, editor, literary and art critic, and French translator who served as the Director of the Drama and Literature Department for New York’s Pacifica radio station WBAI-FM in the 1970s. Recent additions to the papers include a group of photographic materials, including shots taken in the WBAI studio in New York City, as well as promotional photographs and portraits gifted to Ruas by authors and artists with whom he worked; also additional drafts of writings by Ann Arensberg, Marguerite Young, and others.

François Wahl Collection on Severo Sarduy (C1470)

Additional materials include a sizeable collection of travel slides from Wahl and Sarduy’s vacations and other audiovisual materials such as photographs, negatives, and the description of 43 audio cassettes. The audio cassettes will be digitized as part of the Latin American Collections Audio Pilot.

Paul Frankl Papers (C0779)

A recent addition to this collection of correspondence, writings, notebooks, photographs, and printed matter of the Czech art historian, architect, author, and educator Paul Frankl (1878-1962) consists of two boxes of additional corrected typescript drafts of Frankl’s The Gothic: Literary Sources and Interpretations Through Eight Centuries.

Princeton University Library Collection of Modern Greek Materials (C0958)

Recent additions to this open collection of miscellaneous source material related to Modern Greek studies include letters from artists associated with the Pre-Raphaelite circle, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Edward Coley Burne-Jones, to members of the Ionides family, a prominent Greek family living in London in the 19th century known for their patronage of the arts.

Princeton University Library Collection of Patrick Henry Materials (C1165)

A recent addition to this open collection of manuscript material by and about American attorney, politician, and planter Patrick Henry (1736-1799), consists of three documents (1743-1783) related to the legal status and purchase of lands for Henry’s Leatherwood Plantation in Henry County, Virginia.

Princeton University Library Collection of Raymond Mortimer Materials (C0271)

Additions to this collection of correspondence, notebooks, drafts and proofs of articles and reviews, photographs, documents, and printed ephemera of the English literary critic and editor Raymond Mortimer (1895-1980) include additional correspondence with Nancy Mitford, Janet Flanner, Aldous Huxley, Eardley Knollys, and Rebecca West, drafts of articles and reviews, photographs of Mortimer with friends, and printed materials.

T. A. Barron Papers (C1522)

Additions to the papers of American writer of fantasy literature, books for children and young adults, and nature books T. A. Barron (1952-) include editions of books from the Merlin Saga and the Atlantis Saga, international editorial correspondence, articles and speeches, video recordings, personal correspondence, and fan mail.

Portrait of Argentine poet, translator, journalist, and human rights activist Juan Gelman (1930-2014) from the Juan Gelman Papers (C1511).

New finding aids include the following:

1st Canadian Regiment, Continental Army, Payrolls and Muster Rolls (C1537)

Consists of forty-three payroll sheets and fifteen muster rolls, dating from 1776 to 1780, of the 1st Canadian Regiment, which supported colonial efforts during the American Revolution. Also included is a copy of Senate Bill S. 186 submitted to the 33rd Congress by the Committee on Revolutionary Claims in 1854.

Alfred de Marne “Épures de géométrie descriptive et d’architecture” album (C0938 no. 720)

Bound album of drawing exercises completed by Alfred de Marne, a student taking Charles François Leroy’s course in descriptive geometry and Jean-Nicolas-Louis Durand’s course in architecture at l’École Royale Polytechnique in Paris in 1829.

Charles Gillispie Wartime Letters (C1538)

Consists of thirteen letters from Charles Gillispie (1918-2015) home to his parents, Raymond Livingston Gillispie and Virginia Coulston, while he was stationed with the United States Army in France, Germany, and Austria during the final months of World War II in Europe. His letters, which span from March 9th to August 25th, 1945, are addressed from France, Germany, Austria, Bavaria, and Camp Shelby in Mississippi, and describe the conditions for American soldiers and prisoners of war in Europe, the state of the people and infrastructure in the German and French countryside, and other topics.

Italian news sheet (Princeton MS. 239)

A 1535 handwritten news sheet with the heading “Copie de litere di Genoa de 22 Iulii” that includes twenty-one lines of text written in Italian on the recto regarding the imminent defeat of the Ottoman Turkish Admiral Hayreddin Barbarossa (d. 1546) and death of the pirate Aydin Reis “Cacciadiavolo” (d. 1535).

Juan Gelman Papers (C1511)

Juan Gelman (1930-2014) was an Argentine poet, translator, journalist, and human rights activist. His papers contain handwritten, typewritten, and printouts of his writings, correspondence, notes, research files, awards and certificates, and personal photographs. A significant portion of the papers feature analog and born-digital investigative files relating to human rights investigations and campaigns Gelman conducted with his spouse, Mara La Madrid, on the forced kidnapping and death of his son and pregnant daughter-in-law, Marcelo Gelman and María Claudia García Irureta Goyena. Also included are files on his search to find his missing granddaughter, Macarena Gelman.

Prayer book (Princeton MS. 238)

Dating from circa 1440 to 1525, this prayer book in Latin and Netherlandic (Dutch/Flemish), written by at least nine scribes, was intended for the use of nuns, perhaps Augustinian Regular Canonesses, at an unknown religious house in West Flanders, southern Netherlands (now Belgium).

Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies Records (AC448)

The Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies (PIIRS) is Princeton University’s international and regional studies center. The PIIRS Records document the institute’s activities and include material from its precursor organizations, the Yale Institute of International Studies and the Center of International Studies at Princeton University.

New additions to existing collections were added to the following finding aids:

Toni Morrison Papers (C1491)

Recent additions include working files, press clippings, printed material, and floppy disks. The working files document specific book and writing projects, as well as a variety of Morrison’s professional activities, such as awards, conferences, interviews, and lectures. Contents from the floppy disks include draft material from Beloved, Jazz, Paradise, Playing in the Dark, Race-ing Justice, Engendering Power, Birth of a Nation’Hood, and various academic lectures; as well as administrative databases and correspondence.

General Manuscripts Miscellaneous Collection (C0140)

A recent addition consists of a detailed letter (March 29, 1935) and Christmas card from author Thomas Wolfe (1900-1938) to Scribner’s editor Katherine (Gauss) Jackson, and a related letter from Jackson to her family (January 3, 1936) detailing the relationship between Wolfe and his editors at Scribner’s, including Maxwell Perkins.

Princeton University Library Collection of Western Americana Miscellaneous Manuscripts (C1446)

Recent additions include two letters (1859 May-1860 March 23) from fruit farmers Nathaniel and Mary Coe, written from their farm in Hood River, Wasco County, Oregon Territory, to Nathaniel’s sister, Sophia H. Coe in Ohio, describing pioneer life in Oregon; and an eight-page letter from Sylvester Mowry (1830-1871) to his father detailing the survey expedition for the Northern route of the Pacific Railroad across the Cascade Range in July-November 1853.

Selected Papers of J. Howard Woolmer (C1318)

A recent addition to this collection of author files of the American antiquarian book dealer J. Howard Woolmer consists of a group of author photographs, including portraits of Edward Albee, Robert Frost, Seamus Heaney, David Mamet, James Merrill, Muriel Spark, Allen Tate, Dylan Thomas, and others. Many photographs are inscribed to Woolmer.