1900-1919

George Norcross (1838-1915) graduated from Monmouth College in 1861 and Princeton Theological Seminary in 1864. He served as minister of the Second Presbyterian Church in Carlisle, Pa., from 1869 until 1909. This collection contains seven sermons given by Norcross between 1870 and 1904. Norcross preached many of these sermons on more than one occasion. The front page of each document, therefore, contains a list of locations and dates for each instance when a sermon was given.

This collection consists primarily of the diary of Esther Popel Shaw (Class of 1919), the first African American woman to graduate from Dickinson College.  Esther kept this diary between the conclusion of her junior year in high school on June 10, 1914 and April 30, 1915 of her senior year.  The diary entries document her daily activities, particularly her interactions with family, friends, and neighbors. Esther routinely listed the names of the individuals she met each day and the people with whom she corresponded.  She also included accounts of her school days, the books she was reading, the lectures and social events she attended, and her membership in a basketball team named the Philanders.  It was during this time that Esther self-published her first collection of poetry, titled Thoughtless Thinks by a Thinkless Thoughter, which she sold to establish a college fund.  The diary traces the evolution of this publication, which was printed on February 26, 1915.  A transcription of this diary is housed with this collection. 

In addition to the diary, this collection includes a newspaper clipping from the July 20, 1954 Baltimore Afro-American newspaper that features a profile of Esther’s retirement activities. 

The collection documents the lives of the members of the Potter, Guererro, James, and Lord families from the 1850s to the 1940s, beginning with Henry Cardwell Potter (1822-1902), a Philadelphia businessman who through his business dealings became Consul of Nicaragua for the city. Potter's daughter married into the Guererro and James families; her daughter married into the Lord family. The bulk of the collections consists of correspondence; a large portion of these letters are addressed to Mary Agnes Guererro from her fiancé John Carlisle Lord, a professional ball player. The collection also contains a large amount of business materials, including papers relating to Potter's office as Consul, Dr. James' medical practice, and the sale of the family estate, La Hacienda Santa Enriqueta. A large scrapbook, maintained by Dr. James, contains newspaper clippings, correspondence, and programs of social events. The collection is supplemented by a large collection of photographs, some of which have been identified.

The collection documents several generations of the Poulson family and its role in publishing Poulson's American Daily Advertiser. It includes submissions, woodcuts, and sample issues from the Daily Advertiser; correspondence; genalogical materials; and financial and legal documents. Correspondents include Horace Binney, Benjamin Rush (1811-1877), Samuel Sartain, John Sargeant (1779-1852), and Noah Webster. The genealogical notes address the Poulson, Carlyle, Graham, Gurney, Knorr, and Wood families.

The collection consists of correspondence, legal and financial materials primarily related to Price's law practice, his service in the Pennsylvania State Senate (1854-1856), and as a commissioner for Fairmount Park Association. Also included in the collection are papers concerning the Fisher's Creek Improvement Company and from the files of Eli Kirk Price, Jr., correspondence and applications for the Keene Home for Women, a retirement home in Bristol, Pa.

This collection includes letters, documents, clippings, pamphlets, and photographs relating to Joseph Priestley and his descendants. It was presented to the college by Mrs. Temple Fay.

This collection includes articles, manuscripts, newspaper clippings, and programs about Joseph Priestley and related topics. Also included in the collection are genealogical materials - correspondence, notes, charts - collected by Priestley family members

Leon Cushing Prince (1878-1937) graduated from Dickinson College in 1898 and received his law degree from the Dickinson School of Law and his masters from New York University. Prince returned to Dickinson in 1907 to become a professor of history, where he would teach for thirty years until his death. He was elected a Pennsylvania state senator in 1928 and served for two terms. The collection contains material dated 1898-1937, and includes correspondence, legal documents, literary materials, printed materials, and other memorabilia. The bulk of the collection centers around manuscripts of Prince's research notes, sermons, speeches, and writings. Other materials in the collection include newspaper clippings, correspondence with other professors regarding lecture appearances, and printed material on the Kiwanis Club.

Julius N. Proeschel was a French immigant who was an employee and friend of John McClintock, a professor at Dickinson College. The Proeschel Family Collection is comprised entirely of correspondence and is housed in one document box. The Correspondence is divided by recipients: John Sanford Batchelor, Augusta McClintock Longacre, Julius N. Proeschel, Lily Proeschel (Mrs. Matthew Miller), and Margaret Proeschel (Mrs. John S. Batchelor). Most of the letters are from family members, but among the letters received by Julius N. Proeschel are a number of letters from Reverend John McClintock and his son Emory. A number of letters are written in French.

Earl Eugene Rahn graduated from Dickinson College in 1912. This scrapbook includes images of people, places, and events at Dickinson between 1909 and 1912, as well as at Rahn's home in Weavertown, PA.

The records contained in the President George Edward Reed record group pertain only to his time and affairs as president of Dickinson College. As such, no personal papers are included in this record group. For records concerning Reed’s interactions with students, please refer to RG 5/1. The Reed records are arranged into two series: General Business, and Personnel.

This collection contains the correspondence, photographs, newspaper clippings and other materials of Mary Lamb Riley. The bulk of the collection is correspondence sent to Mary Lamb Riley by her mother, Harriet Collins Lamb, and her daughter, Marjorie Lamb Riley. The collection also contains some Collins/Riley family memorabilia, including an announcement for the birth of Marjorie Lamb Riley.

The Charles Arthur Robinson Collection was donated by Charles L. Robinson on January 14, 2012. The collection is housed in two document boxes, one oversized box, 57 photograph folders, and one small artifact box. The collection contains materials related to Charles A. Robinson ('20) and Reba M. Beam’s ('22) Dickinson College careers as well as their married life. It also includes items belonging to Dickinson graduates Harry Delmar Robinson ('18) and Dorothy Anne Robinson ('45). The Collection is arranged into eight series: Academic Papers, Correspondence, Ephemera, Financial Papers, Photograph Albums, Miscellaneous, Oversized, Photographs, and Artifact.

William Howard Sharp (1891-1958) graduated from Dickinson College in 1913. After graduation he worked as an insurance agent, was admitted to the New Jersey bar, and was elected to the New Jersey State Senate. This collection contains correspondence, newspaper clippings, and photographs that document Sharp's political career and civic involvement.

These images were distributed in the United States by the Soyuzfoto Soviet News Agency during the early 1930s. The images themselves date from 1918-1933 and depict notable individuals, places, and scenes from daily life.

These images are from a pair of published souvenir photo albums documenting Lima and Central Peru, where Steese appears to have travelled in 1911. The albums, whose titles are listed below, were produced for Edward Muecke of Lima, with photographs taken by C.L. Chester of New York City:

Lima Descripcion Pintoresca de la Ciudad Capital Del Peru

El Centro Del Peru: Descripcion pintoresca del Ferrocarril Central del Peru.

The photographs are from the James Gordon Steese family papers. For more information about this collection, see the links under related entries.

James Gordon Steese (1882-1958) was a member of the Dickinson College class of 1902. Among his many activities, Steese served as president of the Board of Road Commissioners for Alaska; the Steese Highway in Alaska is named for him. He later was involved with the development of railroads in both Alaska and Maryland and with several oil companies. Diaries and journals chronicle Steese's military service and his later years. The collection contains mostly professional correspondence, pamphlets, and reports on the Alaskan Road Commission and Steese's military service. Also included are several newspaper articles, maps, charts, and correspondence with Steese's family. A large photograph collection, mainly in the form of photo albums, supplements the document collection.

These images are from a collection of photograph albums compiled by James Gordon Steese, an officer in the Army Corps of Engineers. Steese assembled these albums using photographs he collected while stationed in Panama working on the Isthmian Railroad and the Panama Canal Project between 1907 and 1912.

For more information about this collection, see the links under related entries.

These images are from a collection of photograph albums compiled by James Gordon Steese, an officer in the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers. Steese assembled these albums using photographs he collected on a trip to Europe in 1919 following World War One. Steese served as Assistant Chief of Engineers and chief of a General Staff Section. His mission was to tour the battlefields along what had served as the Western Front and report his findings to the Secretary of War.

Wilbur Morris Stine (1863-1934) graduated with Dickinson College's class of 1886 and later received advanced degrees from both Dickinson College and Ohio University. He served on the engineering faculty at Ohio University, the Armour Institute of Technology, and Swarthmore College. Stine also received national recognition for his research with x-rays. These papers include documents dealing with his 1891 battery patent application and clippings of articles written by Stine on electricity, x-rays, and science education. The collection also includes some correspondence pertaining to Stine's short involvement with the Swarthmore College Press, as well as 30 literary notebooks containing typescripts of essays, poems, speeches, and stories written by Stine.

James Alexander Streams fought for three years with Company A of the Sixty-First Regiment of the Pennsylvania Volunteers, which recruited its members from Indiana County. This collection contains 41 letters, most of which were received by Streams while he was fighting with the Union Army. They include information about life on the home front during the war, accounts of fellow soldiers' experiences, and details about the post-war life of members of the Streams family.

In the nineteenth century, the activities pertaining to admissions and student affairs were performed by the President of the College, with some assistance from the other faculty members. Inquiries concerning admissions were generally made directly to the President of the College. Members of the faculty (including the President) supervised students both inside and outside the classroom. Besides taking attendance, delivering lectures, and grading students, faculty members also monitored students’ behavior and managed the financial accounts of underage students. Communications with parents and other day to day affairs were handled directly by faculty members. This state of affairs lasted until the early twentieth century, when the College began establishing separate offices to handle the necessary paperwork for running an institution of higher learning with an ever increasing enrollment. For ease of access, the following Student Affairs/Registrar papers, representing the period prior to the modern college office system, have been assembled into one record group.

The Student Affairs/Registrar 1783-1914 Record Group is organized into seven series:

Series 1 - General Student Affairs
Series 2 - Matriculation/Registrar
Series 3 - Attendance and Deportment
Series 4 - Grades
Series 5 - Student-Patron Accounts
Series 6 - Individual Students
Series 7 - Admissions

These records document the activity and structure of Dickinson's student government.

Charles Lowe Swift enrolled at Dickinson College in 1900 with the class of 1904, but left in Fall 1903 to become a journalist for the Baltimore Herald.  He taught English at Dickinson's Conway Hall and later at the Hill School in Pottstown, PA before joining Dickinson's English Dept. faculty in 1935.  Swift retired in 1947 and passed away in 1956. This collection consists primarily of correspondence from writer H. L. Mencken and John Charles Thomas, a noted concert baritone who had attended Conway Hall. An article about the letters from Mencken to Swift appeared in the Nov. 1979 alumni magazine.

Allen C. Tanner (1898-1987) was an Illinois-born pianist. At fifteen he was awarded a scholarship to study music in Chicago. There he met Margaret Anderson, editor of the Little Review. Tanner then moved to New York City where he performed in musical salons and accompanied many musical greats of the era including Marguerite Namara and Marguerite d'Alvarez. In 1922, Tanner left for Berlin, where he met Russian artist Pavel Tchelitchew and the two men became lovers. In 1924 the pair moved to Paris to pursue their artistic careers. There they became friends with literary greats Gertrude Stein and Edith Sitwell. Tanner and Tchelitchew ended their relationship in 1934. Tanner returned to the United States where he coached piano students in concert repertory. In 1967 he released the album Allen Tanner Plays Bach, Debussy, Scriabin, Granados, Rachmaninoff, Liszt, and Steinert. The collection contains correspondence, writings, programs and publicity, news clippings, financial documents, sheet music, sound recordings, photographs, and books. The correspondence comprises the bulk of this collection. In addition to Tanner's correspondence with fellow musicians and cultural figures, Tanner also exchanged letters with authors and publishers who were interested in his memories of individuals such as Tchelitchew, Gertude Stein, Edith Sitwell, and Margaret Anderson.

The Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University also holds a collection of Allen Tanner papers.