Collections

Charles Conn Michigan Railroad Collection Negatives includes negatives of Michigan railroads and other Michigan-related topics, as well as people, scenic views, and buildings in Michigan.

This collection, 3 cubic feet (in 3 boxes), undated, is the 2018 addition to Charles Conn’s Michigan Railroad Collection. As far as we know this material has not been digitized and therefore is not part of the Charles Conn Michigan Railroad Database. Box 1 of the collection includes negative pages with one page or more of a specific Michigan city or county with image subjects such as buildings, businesses, people, and scenic views. Box 2 is a continuation of city and county negatives, with multiple locations in each page of negatives. At the end of Box 2 begins negatives categorized by specific railways in Michigan. Lastly, Box 3 includes miscellaneous railroad negatives, logging negatives, and unidentified negatives of people and buildings. Two folders of interest are glass-plate negatives (2), undated, of a blacksmith and equipment on a flatbed car, and Railroad index, undated, which appears to index items in Conn’s other collection. The collection is organized alphabetically and by topic. It is housed mostly in the original negative sleeves provided by Conn.

The papers include biographical materials of Beck, poems, ballads, and recordings of lumbermen songs.

His undated papers include typed copies of shanty-boy type songs, folk ballads, poems, and music that Beck collected, possibly in the 1930s, as well as two cassette recordings of his group singing lumberjack songs.

Two audiodisc recordings (ca. 1960?) of Beck talking about, singing and reciting various songs, and the three 2005 CDs made from the recordings, are also included. The recordings include a spoken introduction to each section by Beck who then sings or recites the songs. Tracks 1 and 2 are from Audiodisc #1 and Tracks 5 and 6 are from Audiodisc #2. Please note that only the CD labeled “Unprocessed Recordings of Earl C. Beck” plays in a CD player. The other two CDs apparently were used to create the playable CD.

Track 1: Ballads: ‘Barbara Allen’ (short and long versions) and ‘Little Mohee’ (11:11); Track 2: Ballads: ‘Barbara Allen’ (long versions) and ‘Little Mohee’ (10:14); Track 3: Miscellaneous chorus; chipmunks (Chip N Dale)? (0:22); Track 4: distorted voices (0:37); Track 5: Lullabies: ‘Little Old Sod Shanty’; Michigan Lumber Jack Songs: ‘Shanty Boy’ and ‘Pete Batiste’ (both recited) (7:37); Track 6: American Cowboy Songs: ‘Railroad Corral’, ‘Old Saddle’ (recited), and Round Up Time This Fall (verses recited, chorus sung) (8:52).

Notecards on research topics for Lydens' book, the Story of Grand Rapids, Michigan (1966).

Notecards on research topics for his book, the Story fo Grand Rapids, Michigan (1966), a copy of which is available in the CMU libraries.

Photographs, negatives, and war papers of a Catholic nurse from Adrian (Mich.) who served in World War II in Sydney and Brisbane, Australia, and Bureaun, The Philippines. Also documented are her family, friends, medical staff, a convent and nuns in Louisiana.

The original part of the collection (Boxes 1-4) is organized into two series, Negatives and Photographs and then alphabetically by topic. The images are mostly undated, but date from the 1940s through the 1960s.

The majority of this part of the collection (1.25 cubic ft.) consists of undated Negatives, mostly of Grace’s relatives. There are many images of a family with four girls playing, eating, celebrating birthdays, going to school, being baptized, preparing for First Holy Communion, with Easter baskets, on vacation, and with extended family. The family traveled overseas, as well as to camp and enjoyed speed boating and fun with a jeep, during the 1950s-1960s. A family dog is in several negatives as well as the girls’ swing set. There are a number of images of a family with two boys, probably also relatives, playing, at a summer camp, and with family members.

There are numerous negatives a nun, who was a family member, first as a novice, and later as a professed nun, by herself, but more often with other nuns or family members, most often the four girls, their parents, and probably the nun’s mother, at church, the convent, visiting shrines, and at family gatherings. A number of the photographs clearly show the address of the convent as 717 Orleans Street. She was a member of the Holy Family Convent in New Orleans (Louisiana). [This information is from an e-news article in the Clarion Herald (the) Official Catholic Newspaper of the Archdiocese of New Orleans, Vol. 42, No. 14, July 2, 2003. According to the article, the convent moved to another location in 1955 after 80 years at 717. A convent, novitiate, and high school, St. Mary’s Academy, were once located at 717.]

Grace’s niece wrote to the archivist that a close family friend, Sr. Mary Matthew (a black nun) was from New Orleans. Francis’ daughter, Margaret Kelly’s sister, is also a (white) nun, Sr. Ruth Anne Kelly, an Adrian Dominican.

A priest is often in the family photographs, particularly with the family of four girls and with the nun. He may have been a family member as well.

Older negatives show the four girls’ Grandma, a boy often wearing knickers, and other senior family members wearing 1920s-1930s era clothing. Grandma apparently lived in her house, as the four girls visited her there with their parents. Grandma’s backyard, with her birdhouse and swing, with numerous large family gatherings, is featured in many negatives.

One folder of negatives shows Grace and various men in military uniforms with family members before leaving to serve in World War II. A common element in the negatives is the large pile of concrete blocks in the backyard.

Additional negatives show animals, buildings, trips, cars, and flowers, trees, etc.

The rest of the collection consists of Photographs (.5 cubic ft.). Most of the Photographs date from World War II and document Lieutenant Grace Kelly’s nursing experience and training at Fort Custer (Battle Creek, Michigan), in October 1943, in Brisbane and Sydney, Australia, in 1944, and in Bureaun, the Philippines, in 1945. The barracks, housing, operating room and equipment, island natives, nurses (working, relaxing, fooling around, on ship, in trucks, hauling equipment, and sightseeing), doctors, medical corpsmen, soldiers, prisoners, patients, animals, scenic wonders, as well as vehicles are documented.

Other photographs document later family barbecues and children in August 1960, and there is one photograph of a nun (Grace’s sister?) with a little girl (Grace’s niece?), dated September 1956.

A few additional, undated photographs of crowds at a Grand Stand, and people in an arena or stadium with loud speakers complete the collection.

All of the negatives that match photographs have been filed with the appropriate photograph.

The 2015 addition, Box 5 (.5 cubic feet) to the collection is a mix of incomplete materials, mostly papers, including U.S. Army special orders and other forms regarding Kelly’s enlistment, transfers, equipment, leave, hospitalization, demobilization, and clearance forms, receipts, and an application for pension. There is also information about how to set up a hospital and what equipment and supplies are necessary for such a hospital. There are some maps of hospital camp layouts, including one that is unidentified and one of Leyte Bay. There is a newspaper article about Kelly, which probably dates from the end of the war. There is also a newspaper image with text about the Angels of Bataan, nurses who were POWs of the Japanese. Kelly was not a POW. Also of interest are some poems, clearly authored by Americans serving in the Pacific. One poem is from a newsletter. Authorship of the poems is unknown.

It is likely that most of the photographs and pamphlets were the property of at least one of her brothers as they are European in nature. Most of the photographs are unidentified and only three are dated, all 1945. The photographs are pretty general in nature and include various civilian buildings and people, soldiers, planes in formation high overhead, various boats, and tents. Several photographs are identified as images taken in England, near the Elbe, along the Rhine, and in Munich. There is one photograph of an unidentified group of nurses. Ralph Kelly, who served in Bavaria, is identified in two images. There is an interesting sequence of four images showing several men practicing a life boat drill.

One item that is definitely that of Francis P. Kelly’s is an invitation to Eisenhower’s inauguration (copy), 1953.

Processing Notes: Many of the forms and the inaugural invitation were extremely acidic and were copied. Originals were removed from the collection. Also removed from the collection were several general publications about the war.

Collection includes 21 glass slides of the Grove Gardens of Saginaw, Michigan, circa 1907.

Beautiful, colored, homemade, glass lantern slides (21) of classical gardens in bloom in spring in the Grove district of Saginaw, Michigan. Each slide measures approximately 3 inches x 4 inches. The slides are undated, but annotation in the original listing states that the last three lantern slides were taken using the autochrome process, which was marketed to the public in 1907. The slides probably date from circa 1907. The slides are in the original numerical order. Images of the following gardens are included: Will McClelland, Mrs. Harwood Gilbert, G. H. Boyd, R. Judd, R. S. Montague, Treanor, C. L. Ring, Fred Buck, Mrs. Herman Zahnow, and Mrs. Blumbes. The slides are in excellent condition.

All of the gardens documented in the collection were very large and gorgeous, including classical architecture, fountains, and extensive grounds bordering on Lake Linton. Clearly the owners of the gardens were very wealthy Saginawians. According to Saginaw Images, at http://www.saginawimages.org (viewed February 5, 2009), Saginaw received 125 acres on September 5, 1905 from the Honorable Ezra Rust for a large park. This included property in Hoyt's Subdivision and the area known as the Middle Ground, which had previously been the site of many lumber mills. Lake Linton, also known as Rust lake or Wright's Bayou, ran behind the Grove mansions located on the west side of South Washington Avenue in Saginaw. In 1907-1908 Ojibway Island was built, swamp land was dredged, and lowlands were filled in. In 1924 Lake Linton was cut in half by Ezra Rust Drive which was constructed by a boat being sunk and covered with dirt. Additions to the park continued until 2000.

The negatives, and some modern prints made from them, document the Lewis M. Ward family, animals, logging, nature, people, and possibly locations in Charlevoix, Michigan, New York (State), and Niagara Falls.

Glass-plate negatives, circa 1905, of the H. E. Ward family and farm, Max and Carrie Ward, Two Rivers area, people, logging, animals, and nature. Some images may be of Charlevoix or New York (State), or of Niagara Falls (New York and Ontario, Canada).

The negatives are in their original order and boxes, inside of larger, acid-free boxes (1-3) for support. The negatives are both very fragile and very heavy, and should be lifted and handled with care by researchers.

Box 4 contains prints made from the negatives in Boxes 1-3 in December 2000 and January 2001. The folders note from which box of negatives the prints were created. They are in order by large box number and then negative box numbers within each box. All the boxes are also numbered.

Collection includes various sizes and types of photographic materials of the William H. White family,William H. White and Company, a lumbering and shipping business, and the city and people of Boyne City, Michigan.

This collection includes approximately .75 cubic feet (in 2 boxes) of Michigan genealogical-related material, mostly photocopies, 1922, 2019, of Donna Hoff-Grambau.

This collection includes approximately .75 cubic feet (in 2 boxes) of Michigan genealogical-related material, mostly photocopies, 1922, 2019, of Donna Hoff-Grambau. Included in the collection are church, cemetery, school, and local information from the Michigan counties of Bay, Isabella, Midland, Missaukee and Saginaw. Also included from Bay County is an incomplete run of the Bay County Genealogical Society’s publication The Clarion, 2004-2012. Many churches and cemeteries are documented in the collection, including several Indian Cemeteries, including photographs of headstones. Information on Bay County hospitals, Michigan Board of Registration of Nurses, and a student paper of Donna’s about the history of hospitals and nursing in Isabella County are also in the collection. A few documents from the Central Michigan Normal School (later Central State Teacher’s College and Central Michigan University), and Mount Pleasant High School, Mount Pleasant, Michigan, are included. Completing the collection are some Michigan Civil War documents (copies), materials on Donna’s family, and some of her own personal notes. The collection is organized alphabetically and by county where applicable.

Processing Note: Per the donor form, the .25 cubic foot of materials withdrawn from the collection were offered to the Isabella County Historical Society. One publication was separately cataloged.

The collection, 1974, 2019, undated, includes a mixture of mostly images, a news report Dick wrote about the blowout [natural gas well fire] east of I-75 near Waters, Michigan, in 1976, and biographical information on Bolton and Red Adair.

The collection, 1974, 2019, undated, includes a mixture of mostly Michigan oil and gas images that Dick photographed, mostly of or about the blowout [natural gas well fire] east of I-75 near Waters and Gaylord, Michigan, in June 1976; a news report Dick Bolton wrote about the blowout; and biographical information on Dick and Red Adair. There are eleven small slide boxes of slides and fifteen oversized photographic materials. The slides, collage, and galley prints are colored, whereas the rest of the photographs are black and white. Images include oil well workers, the Red Adair fire fighters, the blowout near Waters and Gaylord, Michigan, in 1976, the installation of oil rigs, and related views. Although all of Dick’s blowout images are dated June 7, 1976, they were actually photographed during the entire month that the fire raged. Five larger images are mounted, matted, or both. Miscellaneous slides include equipment, snow scenes, and fire in the woods. A 2021 addition to the collection is a yellow, plastic MSA safety hardhat, undated, used in 1976, with a felt and cotton lining with a plastic size adjuster. The hardhat has a red, white, blue, and black sticker of an oil well on fire with the text, Red Adair Co. Wild Well Control, Houston, Texas, Oil Well Fires-Blowouts. The hard hat measures 11 inches long, 6 inches high, and 9 inches in width.

Processing Note: Two Oversized boxes of mounted photographs, .25 cubic foot, which were published in local newspapers were withdrawn during processing.

This is an artificial collection of research copies of mostly personal correspondence from the Ernest Hemingway collection, Personal Papers, Series 2-4, at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library.

This is an artificial collection of research copies from the Ernest Hemingway (EH) collection at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library. This artificial collection is organized like the originals. Series 2 is outgoing correspondence from EH, in chronological order; Series 3 is incoming correspondence, organized alphabetically by the sender’s name, and then in chronological order; and Series 4 is Other Materials (Camping Trip, 1916 Notebook). As is typical with Hemingway correspondence, there are many nicknames and artistic descriptions. All the letters and the notebook are handwritten.

In this artificial collection there is one folder of Series 2 outgoing correspondence (copies) from EH to his parents, sister Marcelline, grandfather A.T. Hemingway, and friends Emily Goetzman, Barney Lawrey, and Grace Quinlan. The letters include news of family, friends, social, family events, and farm activities. EH notes ripe vegetables he harvested and pounds of fish including brook trout he caught and sold to Dilworth. In an April 1919 letter to Lawrey EH state that he is not going to marry. In an Aug. 1921 letter to Marcelline he begs her to come north for his wedding to Hadley.

The majority of this artificial collection is from Series 3, incoming correspondence, organized alphabetically by the sender’s name, and then in chronological order. Most of the letters are from EH’s Michigan friends, including the Dilworths and Marjorie Bump Main. There are also letters from his mother, Grace Hall Hemingway, his grandfather, A.T. Hemingway, and siblings, Ursula and Leicester (including brief notes from siblings Marcelline and Sunny), and from a variety of other friends including Jim Gamble.

His Camping Trip, 1916 notebook from Series 4 includes notes about his trip, fishing, and trip accounts.

Researchers may also be interested in other Hemingway collections and related collections in the Clarke.

Copyright and intellectual rights: Copyright and intellectual rights for Hemingway collections are complex. While this is a research copy collection, researchers should still review the copyright information in the front of the box and the JFK website for this collection at https://www.jfklibrary.org/sites/default/files/archives/EHPP/EHPP-FA.xml.