Collections : [University of Michigan William L. Clements Library]

The Beeson family papers consist of genealogical notes, travel journals, business documents, and correspondence relating to several generations of the Beeson family, who settled in Uniontown, Pennsylvania, in the 18th century, and later migrated to Michigan and Wisconsin.

This collection consists of 137 items, including: 55 items relating to financial matters -- receipts, bank and stock records, subscription lists, etc.; 39 items relating to Beeson family history and genealogy, including handwritten notes, and a 33-page typed transcription; 11 letters written by members of the Beeson and Lukens family (related to the Beeson family by marriage); 2 travel journals; 1 daily diary; 1 oversized journal, containing entries on family history, genealogy, and travel; 6 maps, including one pasted onto the flyleaf of the oversized journal; 9 newspaper clippings; 6 legal documents; 7 miscellaneous items; and one unidentified photograph.

The majority of the financial documents consist of lists of stockholders and subscriptions for the Union Bank of Pennsylvania. One document, a receipt for glassware dated 9 August 1827, is written on the illustrated letterhead of the glass manufacturer Bakewell, Page & Bakewell, of Pittsburgh.

The history and genealogy notes concern the branch of the Beeson family that was instrumental in the founding and settling of Uniontown, Pennsylvania. Two descendants of this branch, Edward Beeson and Jacob Beeson (b. 1807), contribute diaries and journals to the collection.

Jacob Beeson's 1829-1830 travel journal (with occasional notes in shorthand) relates, in brief but lively entries, a journey from Uniontown to New Orleans, to help an uncle in the mercantile business. While traveling by steamer down the Mississippi, Jacob Beeson gives colorful descriptions of his fellow passengers and shipboard events. "We had scarce went 500 yds. when we were rous'd by the cry of ‘a man overboard'--drop the Stern Boat, etc. I rais'd my eyes from the book & they were immediately fix'd on the face & arm of a Slave who had pitch'd himself from the Bow of the Boat. He was between the Steamer & her boat when I saw him. By the time he got to where I saw him, he appear'd tired of his sport. He gave a piercing scream & sunk amid the Billows. The Boat was dropped awhile for him but twas to no purpose." (27 March 1829) Jacob describes going to the theater in New Orleans (13 May 1829); the landscape and climate of the area east of New Orleans (8 September 1829); a visit to "Crabtown", at Bayou St. John, where Spaniards subsisted solely by fishing for crabs (23 May 1829); battling a forest fire (14 February 1829); and the inadequacy of his boarding house fare: "For dinner, we have the standby dish of bacon, venison, cornbreads and sour milk served in tea cups, handed round on a waiter that for aught I know to the contrary performed the same service prior to the Revolution. For Supper we have the remains of dinner with the addition of coffee that would be better off than on the table." (16 June 1829) He takes several business trips by boat along the gulf coast. The journal ends with a trip North up the Mississippi in early 1830. A later diary kept by Jacob Beeson in 1873 records the business and personal affairs of a now-settled business and family man living in Detroit Michigan.

Edward Beeson provides much of the family history and genealogy in the collection. His handwritten notes, both loose and in a large bound journal, chronicle Beeson family history and lore, and contain names, dates, and narratives of his direct ancestors, and sketchier details of the wider Beeson clan.

Edward Beeson is also the author of two interesting travelogues. The first is included in the journal he kept in an oversized volume, originally intended for shipping manifests for the shipping agent Monson Lockwood, each page headed with an illustration of ships and a lighthouse. In this journal, Edward recounts a trip he takes from Wisconsin west to Kansas in 1866. He describes the towns he visits on the way, and reflects on the scars left by the Civil War. In Aubry, on the Kansas/Missouri border, his Quaker sense of outrage at the violence perpetrated by both sides is aroused by the abandoned and burnt-out homesteads:

"At this place a cavalry camp was maintained during the greater part of the war. From here the lawless Jayhawkers often started on their thieving raids into Missouri and this was also made a place to be retaliated on by the equally desperate and thievish bushwackers and guerillas of Mo. …Here a voice raised for humanity, honor, mercy, justice or freedom of speech was made the occasion for suspicion, persecution, and defamation, often ending in the murder or robbery of the luckless men who dared to think or speak. These scenes of violence, and the always present danger of life and property, had the effect of almost depopulating the country. The graves of the victims of violence are scattered over the country. The bare chimneys of burned houses loom up on the prairie, monuments of vandalism and violence such as the world has seldom seen. They stand there in the desolate silence pointing upward to heaven -- upward ever -- as if to remind the victims of war who sleep in graves nearby, that mercy and justice alone is to be found above." (9 September 1866, p. 78).

Edward Beeson's second travel journal is an account of a trip to Italy, taken by Edward Beeson and his family in 1877-1878. While his daughter, Abbie Beeson Carrington, takes voice lessons, Edward observes Italian life and customs, largely in and around Milan, and is particularly struck by the overall poverty of the region. Edward reports on the Italian diet, domestic arrangements, attitudes toward religion, and local funeral customs. He is present in Rome for the funeral of King Victor Emmanuel II, and attends celebrations commemorating the 1848 Italian Revolution against Austrian rule.

Five of the maps in the collection are hand-drawn survey maps, likely of Uniontown, Pennsylvania, dated from 1830-1850, with one undated. The sixth map, an undated, hand-drawn map of Uniontown, labeling buildings of significance to the Beeson family, is pasted onto the flyleaf of Edward Beeson's oversized journal.

The Elizabeth Rous Comstock papers contain letters and writings related to Comstock's family, her Quaker ministry, and her social reform activities. The letters span her entire career with the greatest concentration of correspondence centering on her work with the Kansas freedmen's program and her family life. In addition to the Elizabeth Comstock material, the collection includes content related to her daughter Caroline, her grandchildren, and papers related to the Kempton family.

The Elizabeth Rous Comstock papers (282 items) contain letters and writings related to Comstock's family, her Quaker ministry, and her social reform activities. The letters span her entire career with the greatest concentration of correspondence centering on her work with the Kansas Freedmen's Association and on her family life. In addition to the Elizabeth Comstock material, the collection contains content related to her daughter Caroline, her grandchildren, and to the Kempton family.

The Correspondence series (151 items) contains 123 items related to Elizabeth Comstock and her family. The bulk of the collection consists of letters written by or addressed to Elizabeth Comstock between 1847 and 1890.

• Elizabeth’s correspondence with her friends, acquaintances, and immediate family, particularly with her husband, daughter, and sister Caroline.
• Correspondence related to Elizabeth’s work with social reforms and social justice, primarily concerning her relief work in Kansas in 1879 and 1880.

The family and friends correspondence primarily relates to everyday life, such as work, homemaking, visiting, family life; contemporary issues such as the Civil War and slavery; and news of friends and family, including illnesses, marriages, and deaths. Elizabeth wrote many of the letters, which document her perspective on her work, her marriage and relationship with her husband, and on religion and the Society of Friends. Elizabeth’s preaching, charitable work, and travels are often mentioned in these letters, including her trip across the Atlantic in early 1884. These letters cover both theoretical discussions of religious topics and discussions of the Society of Friends, its policies, and its schools. A subset of these letters regards Caroline De Greene’s serious illness and "mental suffering" in 1870, which may have been related to childbirth. Also of note is a letter from Elizabeth Steere that describes her experiences living in the remote Minnesota Territory (December 9, 1856).

The second group of Elizabeth's correspondence mainly consists of letters between Elizabeth and Joshua Longstreth Bailey, a dry goods merchant and philanthropist, who assisted her in her work with the Kansas Freedmen’s Relief Association from 1879 to 1881. Elizabeth discusses the logistics of supplying newly arrived African Americans with food, shelter, and a means of subsistence, and relates information about the migrants and their experiences in both the South and in Kansas. Elizabeth shares, in depth, her perspective on this large migration, which she refers to as "the Exodus." An item of note is a letter from John W. Snodgrass proposing a plan to buy land to aid resettled former slaves in Kansas (May 3, 1881). Other items concern Comstock's work to improve the lives of former slaves and prisoners during the Civil War, including a letter from Ed Howland who wrote to Comstock of a "plan before Congress to change the whole plan of taking care of colored people" (February 3, 1865). B. Dornblaser, the warden at the Illinois State Penitentiary, wrote to Comstock about pardoning Frederick Marx from Kentucky who was "tricked" into buying a stolen mule (April 5, 1865). She also communicated with Thomas Story Kirkbride, superintendent of the Philadelphia Hospital for the Insane (March 6, 1870).

The collection also contains material related to her daughter Caroline and to Elizabeth's grandchildren. Much of this is correspondence between Caroline and members of her family, regarding news, daily life, traveling and visiting, religion, work, and school. Of interest are letters of reference for Caroline "Calla" De Greene in support of continuing her education and recommending her for positions teaching French and German at the college level (May 2, 1893, July 11 and October 5, 1898, May 10, 1905, and March 19, 1906).

The Kempton Family material consists of 26 letters, which largely concern religious issues, everyday life, and news of family and friends. These include the 7 earliest items in the series, from 1827-1828, with the rest scattered throughout.

The Commonplace Book and Diary series (2 items) contains an 1839 commonplace book (52 pages) of poems and essays inscribed as belonging to Charity Kempton. Many entries center on the theme of a loved one leaving on a sea voyage. These include passages called "Seamen's Hymn," "Matrimonial Chart," and "The Old Oaken Bucket." The second item is Elizabeth Comstock's 34-page travel diary (8 blank pages) during the summer of 1878. It contains Biblical verses, brief descriptions of places she visited, notes on her activities, and notes on religious services she attended.

The Poems Series (10 items) contains handwritten copies of poems, all of which are religious in nature. Included among the 9 unattributed poems are a cautionary poem on dancing and drinking, a 16-page poem called "The Ministry of Angels," and a poem entitled "One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism: A Dialogue in Verse." The single attributed poem is a copy of William Cowper's "God Moves in Mysterious Ways."

The Corrections for Caroline Hare's Life and Letters of Elizabeth Comstock series (1 item) is 7 pages of notes and corrections for Caroline Hare's biography of Elizabeth Comstock (see the Related Materials section for information on the Clements' copy of this book). The comments range from grammatical edits to insights into personal events and her ministerial efforts.

The Miscellaneous Writings series (25 items) contains non-correspondence material including: religious quotations, miscellaneous notes jotted down on scraps of paper, Friends meeting minutes, recipes, and essays on religion and marriage. Most of these items are unattributed but are likely from Elizabeth Comstock, Chastity Kempton, and others. Of note is a three-page item containing "Dying expressions of Soldiers," including the last words of a soldier on the Battlefield of Fredericksburg (December 13, 1862), and those of a man about to be hung in Nashville, Tennessee. This series also contains instructions for refining sugar, and remedies for common maladies, such as heartburn, dysentery, snake bites, and nausea, "By the celibrated Indian Doctor John Mackintosh, of the Cherokee Nation; None of which have ever before been communicated to the world" (undated).

The Documents series (11 items) contains various official documents related to the Comstock and Kempton families.

• Elizabeth Comstock's ancestors’ 1740 marriage covenant between William and Mary Moore
• A deed from Isaac Steer to Aaron Kempton in Woodstock, Michigan (1845)
• A handwritten pass from Philip Henry Sheridan allowing Comstock and her companion Mary B. Bradford to travel by rail to Baltimore, through enemy lines (December 9. 1864)
• A document entitled "The Colored Exodus. A Statement of Monies Received from Various States, Canada, and England.
• Elizabeth's sister Lydia Rous' last will and testament (March 5, 1889).

The Accounts series (6 items) contains 3 lists of books to be sent to various Friends libraries and associations, 1 list of donated goods such as fabric and clothes addressed to E. Smith of Victoria Road, an 1875 bill for goods, and an item documenting money owed with interest for an unspecified purpose.

The Printed Ephemera series (24 items) includes miscellaneous printed material: passes to cross Union and Confederate lines during the Civil War; 8 "Bible Reading Leaflets;" two Quaker related essays; a fragment of a book labeled "Self-Communion" (pages 3-10); 4 poems (prayers); 4 event cards; and a catalogue for mechanical farming equipment. The collection also holds one of Comstock's hymn books entitled, Gospel Hymns and Sacred Songs (Words Only) , by P.P. Bliss and Ira Sankey. The handmade cover is reinforced with a portion of a postcard stamped March 9, 1878 (95 small pages of hymns).

The Newspaper Clippings series (50 items) is composed of printed items related to the Kansas Freedman's Relief program. These include several essays and articles written by Comstock and her colleagues, as well as newspaper stories about Comstock's activities aiding African American "refugees" in Kansas, who were suffering from sickness, poverty, and unemployment. Many of these include pleas for charity. The clippings come from newspapers across America, as well as from England.

The Prints and Photographs series (8 items) consists of 7 photographs, including 2 of Elizabeth and 1 of her daughter Caroline, one print of the residence of R. Hathaway in Rollin, Michigan.

• Elizabeth Comstock, taken in Philadelphia for De Greene, undated
• Elizabeth Comstock portrait, hand colored and in a small square wooden frame (Behind his photograph, as part of the backing, is a small picture of 7 angels with trumpets, clipped from a postcard).
• Carrie Wright De Greene O'Harrow, 1881
• Freddie Hare at age 4 ½, August 1874, labeled "for Carrie" (Carte-de-visite)
• Unlabeled picture of a girl, undated
• Woman reading (likely Caroline Hare), accompanying the letter dated February 22, 1882 (Carte-de-visite taken by J. Cooper)
• A portrait of a woman in a small metal frame accompanying the letter from March 16, 1870.

• A machine catalogue with images of: Cooks Sugar Evaporator, Cross-Cut sawing machine, a victor mill, vertical mill with sweep below, and a back-geared mill
• Ink sketch of Caroline Hare’s home in letter, February 13, 1870
• An engraved portrait of Comstock in a newspaper clipping from early 1881

The Clements Library's collection of individual friendship and autograph albums (the ones that are not part of larger bodies of family papers) dates primarily from the second half of the 19th century. The creators of these albums sought out friends, family, schoolmates, public persons, and others to write signatures, sentiments, poetry, extracts from books and serials, personal sentiments, and more. Contributions often emphasize ties of friendship, exhortations to seek love, happiness, or Christian religious salvation. Most of the volumes in this collection were compiled in the Northeast United States and areas in the Midwest, with urban and rural areas represented. The greater number of the albums were kept by young women and the bulk of the signers were also female. Contributors occasionally illustrated pages with calligraphic designs, trompe l'oeil visiting cards, animals, flowers, and themes that had particular significance to their relationship with the keeper of the album. The volumes in this collection are largely decorative blank books adorned with tooled covers, sometimes containing interspersed engravings of religious, literary, historical, and landscape themes. Some include pasted-in photographs, die-cuts, or stickers.

The Clements Library's collection of individual friendship and autograph albums (the ones that are not part of larger bodies of family papers) dates primarily from the second half of the 19th century. The creators of these albums sought out friends, family, schoolmates, public persons, and others to write signatures, sentiments, poetry, extracts from books and serials, personal sentiments, and more. Contributions often emphasize ties of friendship, exhortations to seek love, happiness, or Christian religious salvation. Most of the volumes in this collection were compiled in the Northeast United States and areas in the Midwest, with urban and rural areas represented. The greater number of the albums were kept by young women and the bulk of the signers were also female. At least one volume was kept by an African American man, Lewis G. Mosebay. Contributors occasionally illustrated pages with calligraphic designs, trompe l'oeil visiting cards, animals, flowers, and themes that had particular significance to their relationship with the keeper of the album. The volumes in this collection are largely decorative blank books adorned with tooled covers, sometimes containing interspersed engravings of religious, literary, historical, and landscape themes. Some include pasted-in photographs, die-cuts, or stickers.

The Letters, Documents, and Other Manuscripts of the Duane Norman Diedrich Collection is a selection of individual items compiled by manuscript collector Duane Norman Diedrich (1935-2018) and the William L. Clements Library. The content of these materials reflect the life and interests of D. N. Diedrich, most prominently subjects pertinent to intellectual, artistic, and social history, education, speech and elocution, the securing of speakers for events, advice from elders to younger persons, and many others.

The Letters, Documents, and Other Manuscripts of the Duane Norman Diedrich Collection is a selection of individual items compiled by manuscript collector Duane Norman Diedrich (1935-2018) and the William L. Clements Library. The content of these materials reflect the life and interests of D. N. Diedrich, most prominently subjects pertinent to intellectual, artistic, and social history, education, speech and elocution, the securing of speakers for events, advice from elders to younger persons, and many others.

For an item-level description of the collection, with information about each manuscript, please see the box and folder listing below.

The Blandina Diedrich Collection is a selection of manuscript items compiled by her son Duane Norman Diedrich and dedicated to her memory. The content of these letters, sermons, documents, and other materials reflect the life and interests of Blandina Diedrich (1903-1996), most prominently subjects pertinent to Christianity, home, and the family.

The Blandina Diedrich Collection is a selection of manuscript items compiled by her son Duane Norman Diedrich and dedicated to her memory. The manuscripts reflect the life and interests of Blandina Diedrich, most prominently Christianity, home, and the family. Items include sermons from prominent ministers or preachers of different Protestant denominations, documents related to church operations and discipline, letters by prominent and everyday persons respecting their faith and beliefs, correspondence of missionaries, and reflections on religion's role in all manner of human endeavor.

The collection is comprised of over 260 letters, manuscript sermons and hymns, documents, and other items. For a comprehensive inventory and details about each item in the collection, please see the box and folder listing below.

The Morgan family papers contain the correspondence of three generations of the Morgan family of Ohio, Iowa, and Colorado. Primarily spanning the 1850s and 1880s-1890s, the papers document the Morgans' support for abolition and social reform, as well as their teaching, farming, and business endeavors.

The Morgan family papers consist of 292 letters and 7 documents relating to 3 generations of the Morgan family, primarily in Ohio, Iowa, and Colorado. The collection spans 1834-1913, with most of the items clustered in the 1850s and the 1880s-1890s, with little representation of other decades.

The Morgan siblings wrote nearly all of the approximately 117 letters dating from the 1850s. Their correspondence provides family news, details on their teaching careers, and updates on their health. As the Morgans were very politically and intellectually engaged, they also discussed their opposition to slavery, opinions on various reform issues, and attendance of lectures by such figures as Sojourner Truth (August 25, 1851) and Henry Ward Beecher (January 30, 1856). Eliza Morgan's letters address such topics as bloomers (September 15, 1851: "I can walk faster than ever now and much farther without being tired") and spiritualism (April 18, 1852: "New mediums are being developed constantly all through the country, near and far & some of our nearest neighbors…Milton Maxwell is a shaking medium--that is the spirits can & do shake him [and others too] without his being able to control himself in the least."). Another subject in which the siblings shared an interest was education. Sue Morgan, in particular, wrote of a desire to make it more commonly available: "how much better it is to educate the mass of the people than to confine knowledge to the few[.] if all had an equal chance and were equally educated what a vast amount of suffering and crime might be prevented and Oh what a good leveler would it be to society…" (February 4, 1851).

In the 1880s and 1890s, the most prolific letter writers were Joshua Morgan's sons, Charlie and Wendell. Their letters concern farm life in Colorado and Nebraska, including a boom period for Holyoke, Colorado (March 17, 1888). Sometime during this period, Charlie and Wendell went into business together in Colorado, and this is reflected in their letterhead. The later letters in the collection contain more business-related material and represent more correspondents outside the Morgan family. Many letters (primarily from John Burns and Peter Young) focus on the ongoing care of Celinda Spiker, a relative of Susan Spiker.

The Native American collection contains miscellaneous letters and documents concerning Native American Indians in the United States, Canada, and the West Indies, and their interactions with British and American settlers.

The Native American collection is comprised of approximately 125 miscellaneous letters and documents concerning Native American Indians in the United States, Canada, and the West Indies, and their interactions with British and American settlers (1689-1921). Topics range from land agreements, legal issues, treaties, descriptions of travel through Indian Territory, Indian uprisings and conflicts, Indian captivities, prisoners of war, Indian enslavement, and interactions with Quaker and Moravian missionaries. Tribes include the Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Cree, Iroquois, Ojibwa, Oneida, Ottawa, Kickapoo, Seneca, Shawnee, Sioux, among others, and concern activities in Canada, New England, the Midwest, the South, and the western frontier. Also present are items written in Cherokee, Mohawk, and Ojibwa.

The Parrish family photograph album contains 110 photographs assembled by the Parrish family of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, including images of family and friends, political figures, celebrities, and popular illustrations as well as photographs related to Union efforts to educate freed slaves during the Civil War in the Port Royal Experiment.

The album (15.5 x 24 cm) has embossed brown leather covers and two metal clasps. 63 loose photographs are stored in Mylar sleeves and many appear to have been separated from the album over time. In some cases, it is possible to match loose images with a specific page slot through pairing inscriptions on the photograph with annotations present in the album. However, many loose images do not contain any identifying information, so it is unclear where some may have been located within the album or if they were ever associated with the album in the first place. It is possible that a small portion of the loose images were never originally included in the album since there are more photographs present in the collection than there are available photo slots in the album. At least two portraits from the 1890s do not appear to have belonged to the original family collection.

Compilation of the album may have first begun in the 1860s, but it was most likely completed during in the 1870s with photographs that the Parrish family had acquired over time. Sarah H. Parrish, née Wilson (1836-1892), the wife of Joseph Parrish’s grandson John Cox Parrish (1836-1921), may have been one of the primary creators of the album. She and John had a daughter named Caroline L. Parrish (1863-1915), who may be the “Carrie” whose name is written on the back of some of the photographs. Overall, there appear to be three different styles of handwriting present in the album. Captions for several of the album’s portraits were made in pencil in a flowing cursive while other names appear in a more juvenile-looking cursive hand, and a distinctive third hand also appears sporadically. The two cursive hands may well have been Sarah’s and Carrie’s as mother and daughter worked on the album together in the mid to late-1870s, with an occasional contribution (the third hand) possibly made by one of Carrie’s three younger brothers. One other detail supports this hypothesis: a portrait labelled “Fred” with “Mrs. Parrish, with love of Fred” inscribed on the verso. The individual photographed here was most likely Sarah’s cousin, Frederick Cleveland Homes (1844-1915). Additionally, the portrait on the page next to Fred’s portrait is of a young child identified as “Charlie Homes,” and it is likely that this is Fred’s son Charles Ives Homes (1872-1939).

Parrish family members are well represented in this album, while other unidentified family members may also be portrayed in some of the loose photographs without captions. Likely family friends or acquaintances of the Parrishes whose portraits are present include George and Catherine Truman, James and Lucretia Mott, the Rev. Richard Newton, and Phillip Brooks, all of whom were active in the same abolitionist organizations as the Parrishes. The album also contains many images of admired religious, political, and cultural figures, including Quaker heroes George Fox and Elizabeth Fry; Civil War leaders Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses Grant; George and Martha Washington; social reformers Dorothea Dix and Anna E. Dickinson; actor Edwin Booth; and Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. A number of these images are photographic reproductions of painted, engraved, or lithographic portraits. Also present are four hand-colored photographs of Dutch women in traditional dress as well as photographic reproductions of popular sentimental genre scenes such as “The Unconvanience of Single Life.”

Of particular note are a series of photographs related to the Port Royal Experiment, an ambitious effort to provide education for freed slaves following the capture of islands off the coast of South Carolina by Union troops in 1861. Relief committees in the North raised money and sent volunteers to set up schools and other institutions. Among the most successful was the Penn School, established by Laura Matilda Towne with support from the Philadelphia Freedmen’s organization in which the Parrish family was actively involved. People and places are identified with ink captions on the photographs themselves in a hand that differs from other inscriptions in the album. Towne may possibly have compiled these images herself and sent them to supporters back home. This series of photographs includes seven images of Beaufort, South Carolina, (four of which were produced by Sam A. Cooley, photographer to the Tenth Army Corps) captioned “Beaufort Soldiers’ Chapel and Reading Room,” “Path to the river of Smith’s Plantation,” “Beaufort House / Where we Stopped, showing the Beaufort Hotel and nextdoor office of the Adams Express Company,” “Soldiers’ Graves,” “Gen. Saxton’s Headquarters,” “Father French’s House,” and “Our House.” Three cartes de visite produced by Hubbard & Mix show instructors Towne, Ellen Murray, and Harriet Murray respectively posing with freed black children. The photograph with Ellen Murray bears inscriptions identifying her students as “Peg Aiken” and “Little Gracie Chapin (one of Miss Murray’s brightest pupils).” A fourth Hubbard & Mix image captioned “I’m a freeman” shows an African-American man dressed in clothing made from rags and includes an album page inscription that reads: “Young Roslin says, ‘Now I’m free, I go to bed/ when I please I’se gits up/ when I please. In olden times/ I’se help gits de breakfast/ but no’se time to eats it myself/ Ha-ha-I’se happy boy now.” Also present are three cartes de visite produced by photographers based in Nashville, Tennessee, including one portrait by T. M. Schleier of an African-American woman with two children (one of whom has a much lighter complexion than the other) with the recto caption “Lights & Shadows of Southern Life” and verso caption “Aunt Martha and children/ Slaves/ Nashville, Tenn.,” as well as two other images by Morse’s Gallery of the Cumberland that show the same young African-American boy looking sad “Before the Proclamation” and then grinning broadly “After the Proclamation.”

The Society of Friends Rules of Discipline and commonplace book contains extracts from the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting's disciplinary code (1834) and religious poetry and extracts later compiled by Edith Collins (ca. 1860s-1890s).

The Society of Friends Rules of Discipline and commonplace book contains extracts from the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting's disciplinary code (8 pages, 1834) and religious poetry and extracts later compiled by Edith Collins (ca. 1860s-1890s).

In the first 8 pages, comprised of 7 pages written directly into the volume and 1 sheet pinned on top of the seventh page, Mark Collins copied sections of the "Rules of Discipline for the Yearly Meeting of the Society of Friends Held in Philadelphia..." from April 21-26, 1834. The text outlines procedures for reinstating disowned Quakers and appealing judgments made at monthly meetings. The rules are followed by 2 notes: an anonymous note dated 1860 and a note written by Collins's wife Edith in 1897, concerning Collins's desire for the disciplinary code to be made available to all members of the Society of Friends.

Edith Collins used the remainder of the volume (around 90 pages) as a commonplace book during the late 19th century. Many of the copied poems are dated in the 1870s and 1880s; some are dated as late as 1896. The first section (14 pages) contains extracts from journals, letters, and other sources about religious experiences and Quaker families, including content from the autobiography of Quaker missionary Stephen Grellet. The extracts are followed by poems about religious topics. Some entries are attributed to particular authors, often women; some were copied from Quaker weekly The Friend. The poetry section of the commonplace book also contains some additional extracts and quotations. Some entries are based on items that Edith found in her husband's pocketbook. Eight poems are laid into the volume.

Eleven newspaper clippings are laid into the volume. Some contain poems; others concern religious associations, Quaker opposition to the Spanish-American War, and the presidency of Swarthmore College. The volume also contains an advertisement for stationer George C. Easton with a printed view of lower Manhattan.