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

This collection is made up of the correspondence and business papers of Andrew Law, composer and compiler of tune books. Dating primarily during his most productive professional years, these papers also contain manuscript sheet music and printed proof sheets.

The Law papers contain over 500 letters written during the most productive years of Andrew Law's professional career as a singing master, composer, and compiler of tune books, 1780-1821. Most of the correspondence relates to Law's musical publications, his ideas on music, and family matters, and together, they form an invaluable archive of the mind and work of one of the most prolific tunesmiths of the Early Republic.

In addition, the collection includes approximately 700 accounts, receipts, and other business papers; personal memoranda relating to Law's travels and financial affairs (350 pp.); 35 lists of students; and miscellaneous sheet music (368 pp.).

The letter book contains copies of correspondence Benjamin Stevens wrote as Commissary General at Hartford, Connecticut, during the Revolutionary War. The letters document his attempts to secure supplies for the Continental Army.

The letter book contains copies of letters Benjamin Stevens wrote while executing his duties as Commissary General at Hartford, Connecticut, from 1781 to 1784. Several of the letters are addressed to the governor of Connecticut, Jonathan Trumbull. The letters contain frequent requests for items such as salt, meat, flour, and rum. Stevens had to deal with the problems of short supplies, and damaged goods. Following the letters are two stanzas of a poem about a "young Irish Girl" (page 17), and nine pages of work accounts for Stevens and William Kingsbury for the "making of Bricks and Lime" from 1806 to 1808.

The Boardman papers are made up of correspondence and business documents of the Connecticut merchant and senator, Elijah Boardman. The collection also holds the research notes and draft of a biography of Boardman written by Walter G. Drogue, and an 1849 memoir of Boardman's wife, Mary Anna Boardman.

The Correspondence series consists of 167 personal and business letters of Elijah Boardman and his family. Many of the letters are copies sent to Eli Baldwin, who managed Boardman's property in Ohio. Oliver Wolcott, from the Connecticut Council Chamber, sent multiple letters (1818, 1820) informing Boardman of his elections to state office. The collection also contains letters between friends and family members, including a number of items between Elijah and his son William, who was studying at Harvard College in Massachusetts, and letters to and from William's brother George and his mother Mary ("Mama"). In addition to the Boardman material is a small set of fifteen 20th century letters pertaining to Walter G. Drogue, comprising.

The Documents series contains 10 items, mostly inventories of Boardman's estate and property, along with his last will and testament.

The Business and Financial Papers series of 163 items consists of promissory notes, tuition receipts from Harvard and Yale, correspondence on orders and shipments from Villee and Burrail, and miscellaneous receipts and financial accounts.

The Miscellaneous: Political and Other series holds 30 items, both related to Boardman's public work as well as some truly miscellaneous items, such as a poem titled Oh Unfortunate, and a printed list of prices for produce in New York. Two items of note are a booklet with a list of names of "Freemen Republicans" and "Freemen Federal," and Boardman's Political Notebook from 1803.

The Drafts, Research, and Notes and series contains an undated manuscript draft of Walter Gerald Drogue biography of Elijah Boardman and the the materials he used to write the history. This series is comprised of 1,848 dated and undated items such as letters from libraries and special collections detailing their related holdings, and note cards with citations from primary and secondary sources.

The Books series contains two volumes: William Boardman's "Commonplace Book," which mentions topics such as philosophy, astronomy, and poetry; and the published Memoir of the Life and Character of Mrs. Mary Anna Boardman, with a Historical Account of Her Forefathers, and Biographical and Genealogical Notices of Many of Her Kindred and Relatives, by John Frederick Schroeder, published in New Haven, in 1849.

This collection is made up of two volumes of subscription and business records relating to the Akron, Ohio, printing and publishing business of Horace Canfield and his son Horace Canfield, Jr., between 1842 and 1853.

The volumes include a list of subscribers to newspapers including the American Democrat, with notations about payments. Newspapers not printed by the Canfields are also included, suggesting a wider distribution network. Some lists are noted as "office list," "Post-Office List," "Carrier's List," "Mail List," "Exchange List," and "Office Packages." Some lists are divided by geography, with the bulk of cities being in Ohio, but others including in Massachusetts, New York, Wisconsin, Vermont, and Illinois.

The records document the purchase of newspaper advertisements in the American Democrat, listing the name, ad title, and cost. Other services include job work, with a record of customer names, brief descriptions of the items printed, and costs.

The Charles Faivre Collection is made up of eight items pertinent to the veterinary work of father-son horse surgeons Charles Faivre and Charles Nicholas Faivre of Philadelphia. The bulk of the papers are a 60-page treatment record kept by the younger Faivre in 1895; and a ca. 1908 medicinal recipe book of Charles, Jr., "of The Bergner & Engel's Brewing Co's 31st and Jefferson St. Stable Dept. Philadelphia Pa." Other items include a portrait photograph of Charles Faivre, Sr.; a photograph of Charles, Jr., standing with a horse; and a business card and order sheets of Charles, Sr., dating from ca. 1870 and the 1880s.

The Charles Faivre Collection is made up of eight items pertinent to the veterinary work of father-son horse surgeons Charles Faivre and Charles Nicholas Faivre of Philadelphia. The bulk of the papers are a 60-page treatment record kept by the younger Faivre in 1895; and a ca. 1908 medicinal recipe book of Charles, Jr., "of The Bergner & Engel's Brewing Co's 31st and Jefferson St. Stable Dept. Philadelphia Pa." Other items include a portrait photograph of Charles Faivre, Sr.; a photograph of Charles, Jr., standing with a horse; and a business card and order sheets of Charles, Sr., dating from ca. 1870 and the 1880s.

• Carte-de-visite-sized full length studio portrait of a bearded man, labeled on verso as Dr. Charles Faivre. Mount: "Photographie Centrale No. 2, Cours Belzunce à l'Angle de la Rue Noailles, (Canebière prolongée) Marseille".
• Faded pink paper printed business card for "DR. CHAS. FAIVRE, French Veterinary Surgeon, Graduate at College of Veterinary Surgery at Alfort, France, in 1860, No. 2345 FAIRMOUNT AVENUE, PHILADELPHIA. A Fine Infirmary of 20 Box Stalls and Good Attendance."
• Printed envelope, pink paper, of "DR, CHAS. FAIVRE, French Veterinary Surgeon, 2315 WALLACE STREET, PHILADELPHIA." Return address. Unused.
• Two partially printed order sheets (faded pink paper), "DR. CHARLES FAIVRE, French Veterinary Surgeon, No 2315 WALLACE STREET. Philadelphia, [ ] 188[ ] No. [ ] Ordered from". One of them has pen and ink writing in French, giving birthdays of Dr. Charles Faivre, Sr.'s children Charles, Marie, Frank, and Annie.
• Silver gelatin paper print of a man standing with a bridled horse in front of double-doors with a wooden ramp leading up to them. Pencil identification as Charles Faivre, Jr.
• Charles Nicholas Faivre Treatment Record, January 24-December 31, 1895. These records include around 60 unbound, 6" x 3.75" pages, comprised of partially printed accounts on which Dr. Faivre indicated the dates, names of his clients or type of horse, and the work performed either at his stables or on visits. The following are typical entries. On February 25, he recorded "1 Bottle of White Lini for Black horse." On March 8, "Mr. Miller 1 Bottle of Blue fire 1 visit—3F." On April 2, "Mr Finknauer 1 visit for gray carriage horse hind leg Broke Jerry take him away." On April 12, "Plastered 1 shoulder of Mr Kleins gray horse . . . at our Stable carriage horse." On July 29, "Dr Stewarts horse came to our Stable sick constipation." The records show periodic use of B.J. Kendall Company's opium-based medicine for horses: "Fired horse with Spavin Cure."
• Charles Nicholas Faivre Veterinary Formula and Recipe Book, ca. 1908. This tattered notebook contains ingredients and measures for medical treatment of horses at "The Bergner & Engel's Brewing Co's 31st and Jefferson St. Stable Dept. Philadelphia Pa." The recipes include a variety of different liniments ("strong," "yellow," "camphor," "fever," "blue"); White and Black Sore powder (containing white pepper, chalk, zinc, sugar of lead, camphor, and burnt alum); "colique medicine"; pain colic; liquid for cooling; "Red Sore Powder"; "Powder for Proud flesh"; a base for salves"; liquid and powder medicines for worms; treatment of sand cracks or split hooves; pneumonia and fever medicine; liniment for saddle galls; eye wash; treatment "for Swelling of Horse's Penis"; deep sealed wound treatment; "Powder Hippiatrique"; and medicine "for sores for sluffing out and Healing." Faivre also wrote out seven numbered powders, for example, "Powder No 7 Powder a l'aconite pour la Toux" is made up of 10 ingredients, among them pulverized licorice root, marshmallow root, opium, squill powder, and sulfur antimony. Several recipes pertain to hair, including a hair tonic, shampoo, and pomade noir. At least two recipes are not veterinary, including "Rupture for People" with ingredients yellow wax, mutton tallow, Burgoyne Pitch, Lard, and Russian Cantharadis. Also present is a linseed oil-based furniture polish recipe.

This collection of around 300 partially printed retained receipts is a record of sales made by a currently unidentified wholesaler and consignment merchant in Dawson City, Yukon, following the Klondike Gold Rush. The firm sold a wide variety foods, feed, hay, and a small quantity of non-edible dry goods.

This collection of around 300 partially printed retained receipts is a record of sales made by a currently unidentified wholesaler and consignment merchant in Dawson City, Yukon, following the Klondike Gold Rush. The firm sold a wide variety foods, feed, hay, and a lesser quantity of non-edible dry goods.

Between January and July 1903, the company's clientele included individuals as well as hotels, a market, an auction house, grocery stores, cafes, and other merchants and traders. Among the business patrons were the Ladue Company, McDonald Trading Company, Klondike Market, Ahlert & Forsha, "St Charli Hotel"/"Hotel St Chas", Butler's Corner, the "Model Trunk", Straits Auction House, Ames Mercantile Company, Stanley Scearce, Kinney's Express, Garvie's Hotel, and N.A.S. & T. Company, and a number of cafes (Melbourne, Northern, Bank, and Merchants).

The establishment sold goods in quantities of tons, bales, crates, baskets, boxes, and socks.

• Grains: The greatest bulk of sales were thousands of pounds of feed, oats, rolled oats, bran, and hay. Other grain products included flour, wheat flour, Graham flour, macaroni, buckwheat, and germ wheat granules.
• Meats and other animal products: bacon, slab bacon, sliced bacon, Winchester bacon, dry salt pork, mutton, ham, pig feet, mackerel, salmon, lard, corned beef, veal loaf, gelatine, and tripe.
• Vegetables, starches, and legumes: Onions, asparagus, corn, mushrooms, potatoes, spuds, and tapioca.
• Eggs and dairy: fresh eggs, cheese, reindeer milk [i.e. Reindeer brand condensed milk], and cream.
• Fruits: red raspberries, pears, apricots, King apples, apples, strawberries, Simcoe tomatoes, and lemons.
• Also: coffee, sugar, chow chow, pickles, jellies, jams, marmalade, veal and tar soaps, coal oil, Snyder's candles, rock salt, Imperial B. Powder, playing cards, tobacco, and a letter file.

• $1,427.97 worth of merchandise sold in February 1903 on consignment, which was not credited until March. The recipient was marked "Sold to 'Suspense'."
• On February 26, 1903, the firm sold grocers Ahlert & Forsha a set of gold scales.

The Garret Abeel papers are made up of the correspondence and business papers of New York City iron merchant Garret Byvanck Abeel and the firms G. B. & J. Abeel and Abeel & Dunscomb.

The Garret Abeel papers are made up of the correspondence and business papers of New York City iron merchant Garret Byvanck Abeel and the firms G. B. & J. Abeel and Abeel & Dunscomb.

The correspondence exclusively pertains to business matters, such as prices and price comparisons, plans for picking up or shipping merchandise, settling of accounts, and other issues regarding sales and purchases. The business papers consist of orders, invoices, shipment notifications, receipts, accounts, and other commercial documents. The Abeel papers mention many items handled by the company, including bars, bands, hoops, rods, anchor parts, nails and spikes, knives, wagon tires, and many other iron goods.

This volume is a record of telegraphs sent from and received at the Peru, Vermont, Office of the Green Mountain Telegraph Company between July 1880 and May 1897. The custom-printed pages have tables for recording data about each telegraph. The columns are headed Names Officers, Address, To What Place, Signature, From What Place, No. of Words, Local Cash, and information about office receipts, checks, and other lines. Each page documents a month's activities and J. E. McNaughton, W. E. L. Walker, E. G. Bacon, or other managers signed accounts as they were settled, typically in the weeks after the end of the month.

This volume is a record of telegraphs sent from and received at the Peru, Vermont, Office of the Green Mountain Telegraph Company between July 1880 and May 1897. The custom-printed pages have tables for recording data about each telegraph. The columns are headed Names Officers, Address, To What Place, Signature, From What Place, No. of Words, Local Cash, and information about office receipts, checks, and other lines. Each page documents a month's activities and J. E. McNaughton, W. E. L. Walker, E. G. Bacon, or other managers signed accounts as they were settled, typically in the weeks after the end of the month.

This collection consists of incoming letters and printed items to Henry Stahl, undertaker at Homeworth and nearby Washington Township, Ohio, in the late 19th century. Stahl kept letters, receipts, and trade cards, plus printed pamphlets, advertisements, and price lists for funeral home supplies and stock. They pertain to caskets and children's coffins, floral designs, wrappers, linings, trimmings, embalming fluid, headstones/tombstones/monuments, trade magazine subscriptions, and other items. Businesses that Stahl engaged with include Hamilton, Lemmon, Arnold & Company; Excelsior Coffin and Casket Works; Detroit Metallic Casket Company; Cincinnati Coffin Company; and others.

This collection consists of 25 incoming letters and printed items to Henry Stahl, undertaker at Homeworth and nearby Washington Township, Ohio, in the late 19th century. Stahl kept letters, receipts, and trade cards, plus printed pamphlets, advertisements, and price lists for funeral home supplies and stock. They pertain to caskets and children's coffins, floral designs, wrappers, linings, trimmings; embalming fluid, headstones/tombstones/monuments, trade magazine subscriptions, and other items. Businesses that Stahl engaged with include Hamilton, Lemmon, Arnold & Company; Excelsior Coffin and Casket Works; Detroit Metallic Casket Company; Cincinnati Coffin Company; and others.

Please see the Box and Folder Listing below for information about each item in the collection.

The Hurley collection is primarily made up of the letters of James J. Hurley, an Irish Catholic working class man from Troy, New York. He and his family moved to Oneonta, New York after the Delaware & Hudson railroad shops were transferred there. Several photographs are also included in this collection.

The Hurley papers document the life of a blue collar worker, an underrepresented figure in historical manuscript collections. James Hurley proudly defined himself as a father, husband, an Irish Catholic, and a member of the working class. In reply to a letter from a relative which he regarded as insulting, Hurley asserts that "a workingman has as much pride and spirit about him as any rich man." Referring to an Oneonta landlady who discovered that he was Catholic, he writes "I found she was liberal in her yankee views as such people are and you should have heard me trim those bigots. She found out after I got through that the Catholics are not people that have horns on them, she thinks I am a perfect gentleman, the mighty dollar catches those people out here."

Hurley wrote home frequently while away at work during 1904-1906, and the letters make it clear that he placed family above all else in his life, taking an active part in child-raising, worrying about Jennie's health, recognizing the stress and overwork she had to endure in caring for the children while he lived apart from them. He understood why she had no time to write, "as you are just about worked off your feet" having to be "both father and mother to them until this thing is settled..." In a February, 1904, letter he asks Leo to wait up for him on Saturday, to do as Mamma says, and to be "a perfect little gentleman," addressing the letter to him "to make him feel big and proud." In September, as Leo starts school, his father writes that "a great many things" are now expected of him, for he is not a baby anymore. He asks his son to keep this letter so that he will have it "to look at in after years and see if you have fulfilled the expectations of a loving Father and Mother."

The Delaware & Hudson workers hoped that the Oneonta move would be temporary, that the company would eventually decide not to build new shops in this "dismal hole," so different from urban, ethnic, and religiously diverse Troy. Hurley hated to bring his family to a place with such bad winter weather, questionable attitudes toward Catholics, and lack of school and work opportunities for the children. But the company stuck by its decision, and the Hurleys finally moved to Oneonta in the fall of 1906. The decision was probably prompted by the strain of the separation on Jennie Hurley, for her husband makes frequent references to his concern about her "nervousness" and ill health.

We learn little of Jennie's life except through her husband's letters. Her stressful life as a single parent evidently caused such depression and anxiety that her health deteriorated. Even after the family was reunited in Oneonta, Jennie seemingly did not do well, and James wrote to a cousin in May 1908 that his wife "does not enjoy good health at all I think that she is lonesome out here because it is not like good ol Troy." The one letter in the collection written by her seems to indicate that she was less well-educated and articulate than her husband, but the fact that it was written in a condition of extreme emotional distress should be taken into account. In 1906 a boarder renting part of their Troy house evidently made advances toward her, accused her of drinking and said the two of them would drink whiskey together. She ordered him out, he returned, she screamed, then threatened to break a bottle of whiskey in his face. "Jim I am not able too do my work I am all broke up and jest as nervis as I can be," she writes, signing her letter "from a hart broken wife." Hurley fumed at the "yellow cur of a loafer and scoundrel of a liar" who had abused her, telling her he is sure "the poor mean miserable God forsaken wretch" will end up in a poor house. The situation ended when the boarder and his family moved out -- Hurley expressing his hopes that they were relocating to the "wrong side of the tracks." This incident probably contributed to the final decision to move his family to Oneonta.

The papers document Hurley's work life to some extent, specifying piece-work rates for the jobs within the upholstery department, giving some sense of the kinds of materials which were routinely used, the range of tasks performed. They also reveal that Hurley took his responsibility as foreman seriously, while disliking the stress involved with that responsibility. Even though it was evidently not his nature to speak up to authority, in March 1905 he went to bat for his men concerning wage rates when he felt they were being unfairly treated. He argued against cutting piece-work rates, defending the workers as diligent and skilled tradesmen who had to work in "filth dirt and all kinds of diseases that is in this branch of business," and asking to see comparison with other companies' wages for the same sort of work.

The collection contains 16 letters to Hurley from men who formerly worked with him, thanking him for help in finding jobs elsewhere or telling him about their new circumstances. Included are 10 from John Carlon, dating from 1907-1910, which tell an interesting tale -- although in frustratingly little detail -- of a man who deserted his supposedly unfaithful wife and unsupportive family, moved to Boston to begin a new life, and managed to keep his location secret from them. Carlon repeatedly, in barely literate language, expresses his anger and resentment toward his wife, whom he insists he would not have back, "not if all the Priests in whole world and the Pope came with." A lengthy July 28, 1908, letter from W. J. Blake describes travel from New York City through Panama to the mines of Ecuador, and includes extensive commentary on construction of the Panama Canal and the startling amount of valuable machinery abandoned by the French.

The letters in the Hurley Papers hint at blue collar/white collar distinctions which are effectively portrayed in 9 fine photographs made of Delaware & Hudson employees ca. 1900-1905. Differences in setting, attire, and body language are striking, and these images, although not individually identified, bring the men and workplace depicted in letters to life. This small collection is not rich in detail on either home or shop, but it presents a rough sketch of working class life at the turn of the century, focusing on a segment of society which all too often remains historically anonymous.