Historic
Northampton
46 Bridge Street
Northampton, MA 01060
Telephone: (413) 584-6011
Call for hours/appointment
www.virtual-valley.com/histnhamp
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 Massachusettsfor 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.
We have tried to make certain
that researchers understand the importance of contacting the repository
before a visit. This is especially important at Historic Northampton because
the reading room is very small and cannot accommodate more than two or
three researchers at a time.
Return to:
History Source Guide Main Page
Historic
Northampton Collection table of contents: