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 Historic Northampton has collections that fall into four main categories:

 See the List of Collections

• Objects and Ephemera. There is a major collection of art and other examples of local material culture, as well as a collection of more than 10,000 photographs and 700 daguerreotypes. Like the Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association, it is a museum as well as an archival repository.

• Family Papers. There are five collections that have finding aids. These collections all have broad date spans, typically from the mid-18th to the mid-20th century. The material therein is arranged by individual and type (correspondence, deeds, account books, etc.).

• Business Records. Some of their collections are on deposit at the University of Massachusetts—for example, the cutlery materials. Two noteworthy business collections are the Pro Brush collection, approximately 60 linear feet (processing in progress), and the E.J. Gare [jewelers] Collection. The Gare Collection is unprocessed but it is included as important. It is open for research use.

 
• The remaining collections are located in one large finding aid, which is also available online. It is divided by century, and within each century material is divided by type. Divisions here include: account books, deeds, correspondence, wills, and miscellaneous documents. This last group is mostly made up of assorted financial and legal documents that don't fall into one of the other categories. In addition, the Revolutionary War and the Civil War both have their own category, as do militias, which are listed in the 19th-century section only. This group has item-level descriptions, so individual correspondents can be identified from the finding aid. This makes it especially easy to find groups of letters or other documents by or to a particular person.

• Among their holdings is a significant collection of Civil War letters, which have been edited and published. The letters were written by a single individual, Charles Harvey Brewster, and are located in the Civil War Documents collection. This same collection also contains official military documents maintained by Brewster.

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 Historic Northampton Collection table of contents:

17th-Century Documents—1659
17th-Century Documents—1672
17th-Century Documents—1693
17th-Century Documents—1659b
17th-Century Documents—1685
17th-Century Documents—1671
17th-Century Documents—1681
Account Books—18th Century
Deeds—18th Century
Letters—18th Century
Miscellaneous Documents
Religion—18th Century
Revolutionary War Documents
Account Books—19th Century
Bills—19th Century
Civil War Documents
Deeds—19th Century
Letters—19th Century
Miscellaneous Documents—19th Century
Military Documents—19th Century
Shaw-Hudson Letters
Stoddard Family Papers
Parsons Family Papers
Pro Brush Company Papers
17th-Century Papers—1699