Collections : [University of Michigan Bentley Historical Library]

Genealogical collection for the Houck, Kibler, and Smith families, whose ancestors settled Michigan between the 1840s and 1900s. Includes correspondence, estate records, diaries, photographs, scrapbooks, war records, and other materials.

This genealogical collection traces the roots of three Michigan families. The papers include correspondence, estate records, visual materials, and war records.

Detroit, Michigan, attorney and judge, Democratic candidate for governor in 1934. Correspondence, legal case files, family materials, speeches, essays, diary notes, financial materials, newspaper clippings, scrapbooks, photographs, and transcript of oral interview.

The Arthur J. Lacy collection consists of correspondence and other papers documenting his political activities within the Democratic party and career as a Detroit attorney. The collection has been divided into the following series: Biographical information; Personal letters; Professional correspondence and related papers; Lacy Family papers; Speeches; Early personal materials; Writings, essays, etc.; Financial files; Miscellaneous; Newspapers clippings; Photographs; and Legal files.

The Lacy Collection documents particularly well Lacy's major legal cases (Wilson vs. White, the Ford Stock Tax Case, Mary A. Rackham Estate) and his transition from conservative Democrat to conservative Republican. His letters home from Valparaiso, Indiana and Ann Arbor and his letters to his future wife Beth Garwick give a detailed picture of college life in the 1890's. Major subjects covered in the public papers are the Detroit Domestic Relations Court, problems of taxation and banking in the depression, Lacy's friendship with James Couzens, and the campaigns of 1932 and 1934. A series of notes Lacy wrote to himself from 1915-1928 and 1946-1956 reveal his political ideals, personal morality, and his relationship to his family.

Within the Professional Correspondence and related papers series, the researcher will find correspondence with many notable political and business figures. These include John W. Anderson, William R. Angell, Art Baker, Arthur A. Ballantine, C.C. Bradner, John V. Brennan, Thomas E. Brennan, Prentiss M. Brown, Wilber M. Brucker, George E. Bushnell, Daniel T. Campau, Harvey J. Campbell, John J. Carson, E.R. Chapin, John S. Coleman, William A. Comstock, Calvin Coolidge, Grace G. Coolidge, Frank Couzens, James J. Couzens, John D. Dingell, Patrick J. Doyle, William J. Durant, Henry T. Ewald, Mordecai J.B. Ezechiel, James A. Farley, Homer Ferguson, Woodbridge N. Ferris, Clara J.B. Ford, Edsel B. Ford, Joseph Foss, Fred W. Green, Alexander J. Groesbeck, Edgar A. Guest, James M. Hare, Herbert C. Hoover, J. Edgar Hoover, Kaufman T. Keller, Stanley S. Kresge, David Lawrence, Arthur F. Lederle, John C. Lehr, Fulton Lewis, Percy Loud, William G. McAdoo, William McKinley, George A. Marston, Eliza M. Mosher, Frank Murphy, George Murphy, William J. Norton, George D. O'Brien, Elmer B. O'Hara, Hazen S. Pingree, Mary A. H. Rackham, Horace H. Rackham, Clarence A. Reid, George W. Romney, Eleanor Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Alexander G. Ruthven, W.M. Skillman, Albert E. Sleeper, Edward D. Stair, Arthur E. Summerfield, William H. Taft, Joseph P. Tumulty, Arthur H. Vandenberg, A. VanderZee, Murray D. Van Wagoner, Henry F. Vaughan, Carl Vinson, Matilda R.D. Wilson, Clarence E. Wilcox, and R.A.C. Wollenberg.

The Lacy Family papers are rich in detail about life in Michigan in the nineteenth and early twentieth century; the surviving letters document family crises and Lacy's role in them as the oldest and most successful child and later, as family leader. Lacy was the family genealogist and he collected and preserved the family correspondence of his uncles and aunt, some of which date back to the 1850's.

Architect based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Project files relate to work with George Brigham and his system of constructing prefabricated homes, 1944-1947; files relating to design and construction of Huron High School in Ann Arbor; other projects concern design of mobile home parks and other Michigan school buildings.

The collection is arranged into five series, Brigham Building System, Lane Projects, Huron High School, Personal and World War II Military Service. The series include the many projects that Charles Wesley Lane worked on during his architectural career and some materials from his military service as well. The collection is composed of photographs, slides, microfilm, microfiche and prints. The researcher will be interested in the variety of architectural projects in which Lane was involved, which include schools, mobile homes, churches, and other types of structures. A small number of photographs of Nagasaki after the atomic bomb may also be of interest.

Papers of several generations of Laramy and DeBlonde families of Grand Rapids, Mich. Correspondence constitutes most of the collection. Of special interest are Richard C. Laramy Sr. World War II-period letters written to his family, as well as letters written by James E. Laramy as a Univeristy of Michigan student in 1969-1972. Also included family photographs and photos of the members of the Grand Rapids Central High School Class of 1902, WWII regimental reunion materials and military papers, blank postcards depicting locations in Michigan, as well as a small amount of University of Michigan miscellanea.

The collection includes correspondence, photographs, and other materials that document the lives of two Grand Rapids, Mich. families. The Laramy family materials are more prominent in the collection.

Grand Rapids, Michigan businessman and Republican politician. Correspondence, business records, speeches, and other papers relating to state politics, charitable and civic interests, banking issues, the Grand Rapids Varnish Corporation, the Michigan Trust Company of Grand Rapids, and the Ypsilanti-Reed Furniture Company of Ionia, Michigan; also materials on Albion College, the Methodist Church, the Ionia Free Fair, and Republican Party politics, especially the campaign of Arthur H, Vandenberg for the presidency in 1940.

The collection documents the business, civic, and political interests of Howard C. Lawrence. The series in the collection are: Correspondence; Speeches and speech material; Financial; Business Interests; Charitable and Civic Interests; Clippings; Miscellaneous; Photographs; and Notebooks.

Ironwood, Michigan businessman and local historian; include correspondence, research notes and writings largely concerning the history of Gogebic County and Upper Peninsula iron mining; also papers concerning his work with the Gogebic Industrial Bureau.

The Victor Lemmer Papers concerns the history of the western portion of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, particularly Gogebic County, as well as his work as the agent for the Gogebic Industrial Bureau. The collection has been divided into the following series: Correspondence; Photographs; Personal/Miscellaneous; Gogebic Industrial Bureau Files; Research Files; Collected Materials; and Writings/Speeches.

Michigan State Police officer, 1923-1941, Michigan Civil Defense Director during World War II, State Police Commissioner, 1947-1951, Republican candidate for governor, 1954, served on Michigan Liquor Commissioner and as Detroit Recorders Court judge. Papers include extensive documentation of his service as Director of Civil Defense and State Police Commissioner and his political activities.

The Donald S. Leonard collection is a valuable resource to researchers studying topics of law enforcement and civil defense and Michigan state politics and government. The Donald S. Leonard collection has been arranged into seven series: Personal and Correspondence, 1925-1966; Civil Defense; World War II Era, 1941-1946; Michigan State Police, 1929-1952; Detroit Police Department, 1952-1954; Political Files, 1950-1956; Organization and Activities Files; Audio-Visual Materials; Committee on Equal Educational Opportunities. Leonard also taught law course at the State Police Recruit School and Metropolitan Police Academy of Michigan.

Conservationist, professor of natural resources at the University of Michigan. Professional files, including correspondence, speeches, and newspaper clippings; letters to his wife, 1943-1946, while in military service stationed in the Solomon Islands during World War II; and photographs.

The Leonard collection consists of thirteen linear feet of materials, most of which is correspondence, both personal and professional. There are also biographical and genealogical information, clippings, speeches, research notes, photographs, printed materials, and miscellaneous writings. The collection has been arranged into the following series: World War II service; Professional Correspondence; Topical Information; Topical files; Organizational/People file; and Photographs.

Ann Arbor, Michigan resident and businessman with strong interest in local history. Collection includes video featuring interviews with residents and other historical footage of landmarks and events in Ann Arbor, Ypsilanti, and the hamlet of Dixboro as well as collected papers and records related to Ann Arbor High School and Dixboro United Methodist Church.

Most of the collection consists of digitized film footage and digital video relating to Ann Arbor and Michigan history. A small portion of the collection also includes biographical and genealogical material.

Social scientist, director of the Institute for Social Research of the University of Michigan. Papers include project files, survey research data and reports, and printed material, largely from his work with the Division of Program Surveys, Bureau of Agricultural Economics and the office of War Information during World War II; Office Of Strategic Bombing Survey, I.S.R. project files; and transcript of oral interview, 1970.

The Rensis Likert Papers document his work as one of the pioneers of survey research, first with the Bureau of Agricultural Economics, then with the Office of War Information, Office of Strategic Bombing Surveys and finally at the University of Michigan's Survey Research Center and Institute for Social Research. The papers include biographical information on Likert; transcripts of oral history interviews with Likert; reports, background information, correspondence relating to various survey projects.

The Likert papers were received and initially processed in four accessions in 1975, 1982,1990 and 1995. Material in later accessions sometimes continued or complemented records series in prior accessions. The papers are boxed in an order that reflects the dates the accessions individual accessions were received. In this finding aid the disparate parts of series received in multiple accessions have been together to reflect the intellectual arrangement of the collection. As a result, the box-folder sequence in he contents listing are not always consecutive.

The materials in the 1975 accession (boxes 1-20) of the Rensis Likert Papers cover the period of 1939 to 1953 and largely concern Likert's work at the Bureau of Agricultural Economics and the Office of War Information during World War II and his subsequent work in the early development of the Survey Research Center.

In 1982 the family of Rensis Likert donated an additional three feet (boxes 21-23) of materials. Notable items in this accession concern Likert's work as assistant secretary and treasurer of the Psychological Corporation (1934-1935); consultant to the Newell-Emmett Company (1935); survey researcher with the Morale Division of the United States Strategic Bombing Survey unit (ca. 1944-1946); and activities with other professional organizations (ca. 1938-1949)

The third accession of the Likert papers (box 24-29) came from the library of the Institute of Social Research of the University of Michigan. The files pertain to all phases of Likert's professional career, and thus the researcher should use these papers in conjunction with the materials in the previous accessions. The final accession (box 29) was received form several sources.