Search

Manchester Township, Washtenaw County, Michigan, farmer. Material concerning farming activities, English's work with the Southern Washtenaw Farmers' Club, local Democratic Party affairs, his work as clerk of the Iron Creek (Manchester Township) Free Will Baptist Church; correspondence; miscellaneous account books of family members, notebooks containing reference information, and reports of the overseer of highways for Manchester Township; and photographs. Correspondence includes a letter from Thomas English of West Virginia, who was formerly an enslaved person. The collection also includes a diary of Lucy English, Albert D. English's sister.

The English collection documents different phases of his life and provides the researcher with material for the study of Manchester, Michigan between 1880 and 1910. In addition to correspondence, the collection includes notebooks containing the newspaper columns on local affairs which English wrote for several county newspapers. There are also 18 "Ready Reference Books" containing lists of local, state, and national political candidates and office holders, Manchester property owners, lists of school teachers and graduates, church leaders, as well as other information gleaned from almanacs and newspapers over the years. Included are also several farm journals of Albert English and his father Benjamin English, and a personal diary and a scrapbook of Albert's sister Lucy English (in marriage, Lucy Simmons). Much of the correspondence files concerns the Free Will Baptist Church. Correspondence includes one letter from Thomas English of West Virginia, a formerly enslaved person, whom Albert English apparently contacted in regard to the family genealogy. There is no record of continued correspondence on this subject.

Township record books, 1845-1902; registers of births, 1906-1943; registers of deaths, 1897-1912; poll books, tally sheets, and statement of votes from polls within township; records relating to surveys, repairs, etc. of township roads; reports and compiled statistics pertaining to township schools; property assessment roll books; and other miscellaneous records.

The records of Ann Arbor Township include township record books, 1845-1902; registers of births, 1906-1943; registers of deaths, 1897-1912; poll books, tally sheets, and statement of votes from polls within township; records relating to surveys, repairs, etc. of township roads; reports and compiled statistics pertaining to township schools; property assessment roll books; and other miscellaneous records. The records are organized into nine series:

1. Township Record Books, 1845-1902
2. Registers of Births, 1906-1943
3. Registers of Deaths, 1897-1912
4. Election records
5. Highway Records, 1820s-1920s
6. Treasurer's records, 1830s-1923
7. School Records, 1840s-1930s
8. Miscellaneous, 1827-1920s
9. Assessment Roll Books, 1872-1996

Bulletins, minutes of committees, correspondence, news clippings, and other materials relating to the activities of the organization; also minutes, 1928-1953, of Ann Arbor Ministerial Association.

The record group is comprised of two series: Ann Arbor Ministerial Association and Ann Arbor-Washtenaw Council of Churches Yearly Files. The kinds of documents in the Ann Arbor Ministerial Association series includes minutes of meetings, scattered correspondence and financial reports. The Ann Arbor-Washtenaw Council of Churches Yearly Files also includes minutes as well as greater documentation of projects and services provided by the organization.

Ypsilanti and Ann Arbor, Michigan, area family; correspondence, diaries, and other family materials.

The Campbell family collection includes correspondence and other family materials. Items of interest include Civil War correspondence of Gabriel Campbell and John S. Farnill; correspondence, diaries, and teaching materials of William Campbell; personal correspondence of Mary and Sarah (Sadie) Campbell concerning farming, local Republican politics, and school affairs; and printed materials concerning the Free Silver question and the election of 1896. The papers of Robert C. Campbell include diaries and University of Michigan student notebooks. Of interest are the notes he took from the lectures of John Dewey in philosophy, Henry Carter Adams in political economy, Burke A. Hinsdale in pedagogy, Joseph B. Steere in zoology, and A.A. Stanley in music, among other professors. The collection also includes high school notebooks of Carrie Read and E. Mabel Read.

Ann Arbor chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution; minutes and other organizational records.

The record group has been arranged into the following series: Minutes; Published Material; Yearly Files; Officers Files; Membership records; Topical Files; Genealogical records; Scrapbooks, Historians Albums; and Visual Materials. Of interest are files relating in part to the chapter's activities during the Spanish-American War and World War I. The genealogical records include cemetery records for various Washtenaw County cemeteries.

Collection of photographs and other material documenting various locations, communities, and organizations in Michigan.

Collection of materials (mostly photographs) that document social, cultural, religious, and daily life in the state of Michigan and at the University of Michigan. Photographs depict locations throughout the state and groups of people. Materials are in the following categories: graduating classes, social societies and clubs, University of Michigan, views and scenes.

Student papers, 1930-1987 prepared for classes in history at the University of Michigan (primarily Michigan history class taught by Lewis G. VanderVelde, but also including research papers for classes taught by Sidney Fine and others); topics concern Michigan social and political history; Michigan biography and bibliography; and local community history.

The student papers are organized alphabetically by author in two series, which are similar in date range and topics covered. Topics of papers concern Michigan social and political history; Michigan biography and bibliography; local community history and University of Michigan history. A topical index to the papers is available in the first box of the collection.

Ed Beach was an amateur photographer whose photographs document his hometown of Howell, Michigan and historical sites in other Michigan communities. His collection consists of photographic negatives (with some prints) and albums with prints of historic plaques and markers, statues of famous statesmen and their gravesites, early school buildings, historic houses, gristmills, sawmills, and county courthouses.

The Ed Beach collection consists of photographic negatives (with some prints) and albums with prints of historic plaques and markers, statues of famous statesmen and their gravesites, early school buildings, historic houses, gristmills, sawmills, and county courthouses. Other subjects include tourist sites in Michigan (such as Greenfield Village or Mackinac Island) and state parks, especially those in the Upper Peninsula. His hometown of Howell, Michigan is also heavily documented.

The Beach collection is arranged into three series. In the Kodak series the negatives measure 2 3/4 by 4 1/2 inches in size and cover the years 1931 to 1948. The Leica series consists of 35-millimeter strips and were taken between the years 1936 and 1938. The third series consists of seven albums of carefully identified photographs.

An item-level listing of the contents of the Kodak and Leica series is available at the library. To aid researchers a geographic and subject index has been created and is attached to this finding aid. These indices provide the best introduction to the collection.

Beach created the photograph albums around broad topics, and each has a title. The albums include: "Michigan Historic Places," "Around Lake Erie in Ontario. Trip to Chicago Century of Progress," "Michigan Courthouses," "Michigan Ships, Monuments, Historic Places, Buildings, Creek Scenes," "Indian and Trail Markers," "Around Michigan: Historic Places, Buildings, Mills, Dams, Bridges, Masonic Buildings," and "Michigan Governors' Homes, Michigan Trees, Old Buildings of Michigan." The photos in the albums include Beach's negative number.

This collection is comprised of business accounts, letterbooks, and correspondence relating to Republican politics, particularly election campaigns of 1912 and 1936, and enforcement of the Prohibition Amendment; and other papers concerning the career of Frank Knox and the coming of World War II. Correspondents include: Frank Knox (correspondence throughout), and Earl C. Michener, Mar. 23, 1936, Oct. 4 and Nov. 15, 1941; and photographs.

The photographs also include a black and white group photo of the members of the Washtenaw County Bar Association and of the Washtenaw County Courthouse staff.

Ann Arbor, Michigan, photography firm. Photonegatives, and some photoprints, of images largely relating to Ann Arbor and the University of Michigan, but including Ypsilanti and other Michigan cities: buildings, businesses, houses, street scenes, community activities, and organizations; also photos of automobiles, storm damage, etc. taken to support insurance claims.

The Ivory Photo collection consists of an impressive array of negatives and prints taken by Ann Arbor photographer Mel Ivory from the 1920s to the early 1970s. Most of the photographs were taken by Ivory for customers, whether the University of Michigan, local businesses, or private citizens. The collection is probably most valuable for its extensive documentation of Ann Arbor and the University of Michigan, the two areas in which it bulks largest. However, because it spans a relatively long time period, the collection is also useful for illustrating changes in photography as an art and as a business, and for documenting social trends in twentieth-century America. Finally, the collection documents the career of a commercial photographer.

As a photographer for the University of Michigan in the 1920s and 1930s, Ivory took the standard pictures of campus events, buildings, and people, but the value of many photographs from this period is as much aesthetic as informational. Producing cover art for the Michigan Alumnus allowed him to experiment with unusual angles, lighting, and subject matter. (See, for example, photographs of the Clements Library and of students strolling through the Diag in the 1930s.) In stark contrast to these images is a large group of photographs of car wrecks that Ivory took for insurance companies between 1937 and 1969.

Besides providing thorough documentation of the physical plant of the University of Michigan, the Ivory collection evokes the flavor of life on campus in the 1930s and 1940s through photographs of football games and crowds, dance bands, social events, professors at work in laboratories, the Michigan Daily staff at work, and students in classrooms, libraries, and dormitories.

The Ann Arbor subseries includes numerous photographs of houses and businesses, filed by address to facilitate research into a particular building or site, as well as a rich assortment of photographs depicting life in Ann Arbor through more than four decades. There are numerous photographs of men and women at work in factories, stores, and other settings. Some show women at work in unusual settings (as cab drivers for Ace Cab Company, for example) while others depict women in stereotypically female occupations (as secretaries, store clerks, and ditto machine operators). Photographs of drug and department store display windows and of products in grocery stores illustrate trends in merchandising.

The Ivory collection is also remarkable for its documentation of social mores. Wedding photographs taken from the 1930s to the 1960s depict a variety of settings, fashions, wedding rituals, and even fads, such as a 1940 wedding at a roller rink. There is also a small group of photographs of funerals and an extensive series of portraits of children, families, and individuals.

Photographs of a depression-era hobo cooking near a railroad car, of lawn parties and country clubs, of the soap box derby and sports teams reflect diverse aspects of life in Ann Arbor. The home front during World War II is documented in views of an aluminum drive, a blitzkrieg game in a local tavern, a commuter bus with a female conductor, and the Judge Advocate General's school exercises in the Law Quad.

Although the Ypsilanti subseries is considerably smaller than the Ann Arbor and University of Michigan subseries, it contains a number of valuable photographs, such as the Cleary College photographs showing rows of students at typewriters, students relaxing on boarding house steps and in Cleary lounges and recreation rooms, and annual graduation processions. The Washtenaw County subseries contains rural scenes such as farms, country roads, and a county fair. The remaining subseries consist of businesses, street scenes, railroad stations, and a variety of other photographs representing Michigan towns and counties.

A few copy negatives made by Ivory from existing photographs are scattered throughout the collection. A late nineteenth or early twentieth-century anatomy lesson in the Medical School, for example, is filed in the "Colleges, Schools, and other Divisions" section of University of Michigan 5"x7" negatives.

The contents of the various subseries and sub-subseries are for the most part self-evident, but a few words of explanation about the Ann Arbor subseries are in order. "Buildings and Views" consists largely of exterior views of buildings. However, there are many interior scenes of people and activities in the "Churches," "Hospitals," and "Schools" sections. For example, photographs of Ann Arbor churches include views of the pastor and congregation, choirs, recreation rooms, meetings, and athletic teams in addition to interior and exterior views of the buildings. "Schools" contains photographs of sports teams, classroom scenes, social events, and buildings representing Ann Arbor public and parochial schools, but also Ann Arbor Secretarial School and Concordia College.

Researchers seeking images of commercial enterprises will find material in the "Buildings and Views" sub-subseries (listed under the street address in the "Houses and Businesses" section) and in the "Businesses" sub-subseries (under the name of the enterprise).

The "Houses and Businesses" negatives within the "Buildings and Views" sub-subseries are arranged alphabetically by street name and then numerically by address. Most of these photographs are exterior views, but interior scenes of businesses have been filed here in order to keep exterior and interior views of a particular business together. Photographs of products, equipment, people at work, and special events are filed in the "Businesses" sub-subseries when no building exteriors exist or when the address of the business was unknown. Researchers should look both places for photographs of businesses. Although some "see also" references have been added, they are by no means exhaustive. Researchers may also wish to examine the "Motor Vehicles" sub-subseries, which contains photographs of trucks owned by Ann Arbor businesses.

In the University of Michigan subseries, "Buildings and Views" consists of exterior and interior views of buildings, whereas "Colleges, Schools, and Other Divisions" contains photographs of professors and students in laboratories and classrooms as well as group photographs of staff and students.