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Description
The New-York Historical Society institutional archive includes records of the institution from its founding in 1804 to the early twenty-first century. This digital collection, currently being developed, presents selections from the institutional archive that have been digitized with funding from the Leon Levy Foundation, as well as other related materials. They include the minute books from the meetings of New-York Historical's members (1804-1937); minute books of the Executive Committee (1842-1937) and its successor the Board of Trustees (1938-1959); the early record of donations to New-York Historical (1806-1818, 1822); the complete run of accession ledgers recording donations and purchases for the collections (1841-1962); selections from general correspondence and Museum Department records relating to the purchase of the Audubon watercolors in 1863; and selections of minutes and other documents (1848-1938) relating to New-York Historical's buildings at 2nd Avenue and 11th Street, and its current location, 77th and Central Park West, including the unsuccessful attempt in the 1860s and 1870s to establish a Museum of Antiquities, Science, and Art in Central Park. Related materials include the complete run of the New-York Historical Society Quarterly and annual reports (1917-1980), and the New-York Journal of American History (2003-2008).
Full Title
New-York Historical Society Selections from the Institutional Archive, 1804-2008
NYHS Identifier
Mss Collection - NYHS-RG Archives
Genre
Owning Institution
Subject (Topical)
Subject (Geographic)
Coordinates
40.779167, -73.974167
Creator
Digital Format
Digital Origin
digitized other analog
Date Created
1804 to 2008
Subcollections
9 subcollections
In November 1937, a by-law change resulted in the creation of an independent Board of Trustees to succeed the Executive Committee as the governing body of the New-York Historical Society. The Board of Trustees records primarily include the materials related to Board meetings, including agendas, minutes, committee reports, various documents distributed at the meetings, and some working files from 1939 forward. The minutes of Board of Trustees…
The New-York Historical Society collection accession registers include the 39 oversized registers of accessions (or, "additions") to New-York Historical Society's collections from December 1841 to 1962. Recognizable gaps occur in the 1840s and 1850s, with sustained entries beginning in 1861. The earliest entries seem to be donations only; it is unclear when purchases began to be recorded, though these seem to appear regularly by 1879. Registers…
Collection of 49 letters written to the New-York Historical Society in response to invitations for the April 3, 1860 New-York Historical and Lenox Library tribute to the "Patriarch of American Literature," Washington Irving, who died November 28, 1859. The event featured an address on Irving's "Life, Character and Genius" by William Cullen Bryant. The collection includes letters from many prominent men of the time, but letters from women are…
The Executive Committee Meeting Minutes series includes the twenty bound volumes of minutes recorded at the meetings of the committee from April 1843 to the last of its meetings in 1937. The series also includes the 1938 minutes of the committee's successor governing body, the Board of Trustees; the 1938 minutes are bound in the same volume as the 1936-1937 committee minutes. Matters routinely considered by the Executive Committee and recorded…
The New-York Historical Society Meeting Minutes record the regular and special meetings of New-York Historical Society members from the founding meeting on November 20, 1804, to the last of these meetings on November 16, 1937. Routine content includes lists of individuals nominated and accepted for membership; obituaries and memorials for recently-deceased members and nationally-known figures; annual elections of officers; meeting attendees;…
The New-York Historical Society original buildings planning and construction records include material concerning construction of the two buildings that served as New-York Historical's home from 1857 to 1908 (2nd Avenue and 11th Street) and from 1908 to the present (Central Park West, between West 76th Street and West 77th Street). The collection covers both the construction of the Central Park West building's central portion in the first decade…
The collection consists of correspondence, reports, subscription books, financial records, and other materials concerning the New-York Historical Society's purchase of the original Audubon watercolors for John James Audubon's The Birds of America from his widow, Lucy Audubon, in 1863. It documents early attempts by Mrs. Audubon and her supporters to interest the New-York Historical Society in the watercolors; the subsequent work by a special…
The New-York Historical Society Quarterly (1917-1980) is an outstanding resource for the study of nearly every aspect of New York and American history and material culture, especially as illustrated through the far-ranging collections of the N-YHS Library and Museum. The New-York Historical Society Quarterly was digitized with generous support from the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation and the Pine Tree Foundation.
Semiannual. Vol. 65, no. 1 (spring 2003)-Vol. 67, no. 1 (2008). Continues: New-York Historical Society. New York Historical Society quarterly. None published from 1981-2002.
