This collection is made up of the papers of Arba U. Thompson and his wife Frances Warner Thompson of Farmington and Avon, Hartford County, Connecticut, as well as the correspondence of their children Herbert, William, Lewis, Leila, Charles, and Frances May Thompson. The collection also includes the correspondence of Lucelia "Leila" U. Thompson, an educator who traveled with her husband William P. Baker to India in 1853 to serve for a decade as a missionary and teacher.
This collection is made up of the papers of Arba U. Thompson and his wife Frances Warner Thompson of Farmington and Avon, Hartford, Connecticut, as well as the correspondence of their children Herbert, William, Lewis, Leila, Charles, and Frances May Thompson. The papers include 2,713 letters, plus one linear foot of diaries, legal and financial documents, school papers, a commonplace book, a notebook, poems and writings, photographs, ephemeral materials, and printed items.
The Thompson Family Papers correspondence includes a wide range of writers and recipients. A temporary, rudimentary selection of them is as follows:
- The earliest portion of the collection is largely comprised of the incoming correspondence of Frances "Frankie" Warner / Frances Warner Thompson, 1850-1851, and the often lengthy, journal-like letters of Lucelia "Leila" U. Thompson who traveled with her husband William P. Baker to India in 1853, where she served as a missionary and teacher until her death in 1864. Lucelia's letters begin with correspondence from Dwight Place Seminary, New Haven, in 1850. By 1852, she served as a teacher at Germantown in a school of Mary Fales, then in 1853 determined to travel as a missionary abroad. From 1853 to 1864, she wrote lengthy, at times journal-like letters from different locations in India, including "Ahmednuggur," "Khokar," Bhingar, "Shingvay" (illustrated letter from Bombay, January 1, 1855). Her recipients included Emmie Gallup (in Essex, Conn.), Lottie R. Andrew, and Emily Hubbard.
- After Lucelia's death, her husband William P. Barker wrote letters to their parents, daughter Mary, and niece Leila Anna. Barker wrote from Minneapolis and Cottage Grove in the 1860s and 1870s, and from Carbon, Wyoming Territory, in the early 1880s.
- Early 1850s courtship correspondence of Arba Thompson and Frances Warner.
- Early 1850s letters from Mary E. Hubbell of Ipswich, Massachusetts; Avon, Connecticut; Baltimore, Maryland; and North Stonington, Connecticut, to Abigail "Nabby" Thompson.
- Correspondence of Frances Thompson's brother "Baxter" at Yale College, beginning in 1854.
- Letters by Flora Thompson in Avon, Connecticut, to her siblings beginning in the 1850s, then from Carthage, Ohio, by the 1870s.
- Letters of Abel M. Thompson of Rockville mid-1850s
- Correspondence of Pliny F. Warner of Aledo, Illinois, a job printer and publisher of the weekly Aledo Banner, editor of the Mason County Republican out of Havana, Illinois, and then the Havana Republican.
- Letters by Frances Warner's father Milo Warner of Strykersville, New York, 1850s-1860s.
- Letters by Frances Warner's sister Cordelia Morrill of Brooklyn, Strykersville, "Shadow Nook," and Java Village, New York, 1860s-1890s.
- Post-Civil War correspondence to Frances, Abigail "Nabby", and Herbert Wilson Thompson.
- Letters to Frances and Arba from cousin Dr. C. D. Woodruff of Lima, New York.
- Letters of E. G. Warner in Amherst, Massachusetts, to cousin Leila Thompson, 1880s.
- Letters from Charles and Anna Thompson to Frances Thompson from Bridgeport, Connecticut, late 1880s. Charles K. Thompson worked for the American Gramophone Company at Bridgeport.
- Letters of H. W. Thompson, working at C. H. Smith & Co., loan brokers and western real estate out of Hartford, Connecticut, late 1880s.
- Correspondence of Edith A. Warner of Brooklyn, New York, while teaching at Granville Female College, Granville, Ohio, in the 1880s.
- By 1890, the volume of letters to Frances May Thompson, known as May, from siblings and cousins increased dramatically. In the early 1890s, May took a job as a teacher at a schoolhouse in Washington, Connecticut. While there, she received letters from Helen M. Webster (1860-1905), a supervisor at the American Asylum at Hartford, Connecticut; later, Helen married to a man named George Reed and wrote from Hill City, South Dakota, in 1896 and 1897. By the late 1890s, May received letters from her husband, who worked at Harvey & Lewis, opticians and photographic supplies. He also used New York Life Insurance Company stationery.
- Correspondence between siblings Lewis and Leila Thompson, 1900s.
- Incoming letters to Leila Thompson from Alice P. Warner of Beloit, Wisconsin, early 1900s.
- Letters between Leila and Alice H. "Claire" Alderman in Clarkston, Georgia; St. Petersburg, Florida; and elsewhere, 1900s-1910s.
- Later letters between Beatrice A. Hoskins and her mother Frances Hoskins.
The collection includes two small, unsigned diaries, dated 1848 and 1923. Legal and financial documents include 57 accounts, tax receipts, land indentures, loan receipts, four account books (1824-1927), and other papers, largely from Avon and Farmington, Connecticut. One account book, kept by Guy Thomson in 1824, includes accounts for sawing, mending a halter, plowing, mowing, planting, picking apples, making cider, shoeing horses, mending fences, and other labor, plus monies taken in from a boarder.
School papers include 10 rewards of merit, report cards, school programs, a student's notebook, and a teacher's notebook, all dating from 1851-1925. A commonplace book by Leila U. Thompson dates from the 1840s and includes poetry and excerpts, including a multi-page poem, "The Missionary's Call." A notebook, marked "O.V. Brainerd" contains page after page of scribbles.
Poems and other writings include 42 loose leaf copies of poems on subjects such as temperance, resignation, death and bereavement, friendship, sentimental and religious topics, Christmas, and other subjects. Seventeen photographs include a CDV of Fannie Warner as a young girl, and a selection of snapshots, apparently of members of the Hoskins family.
The Thompson Family Papers include a variety of ephemera and printed items, including 12 visiting cards; 33 invitations and announcements; 46 birthday, valentine, Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, and other holiday cards; genealogical notes; newspaper clippings, pamphlets, programs, and other items.