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Ash-Schofield Family Papers
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Held at: Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College [Contact Us]500 College Avenue, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania 19081
This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.
Overview and metadata sections
Samuel Shinn Ash, son of Dr. Caleb and Rebecca (Shinn) Ash, was born Feb. 2, 1829, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Dr. Caleb Ash was described as a "radical Quaker and Reformer." His marriage to Rebecca Shinn was the first to be solemnized in the new Cherry Street Meeting House; the bride's family had taken the Orthodox side in the Separation of 1827 and did not attend the ceremony.
The family moved to Darby in 1834, and here Samuel Shinn Ash received his early education. At 15, he joined the Franklin Institute, of which he remained a life-long member. Apprenticed as an engineer and machinist, he joined the firm of Howard and Son (later Howard and Ash) and subsequently worked to perfect a stamp-perforating machine for the manufacture of U.S. postage and revenue stamps. At the termination of the Government contract, he joined the furniture and upholstery firm of Amos Hillborn, where he remained until his retirement in 1897.
In 1859 he married Sarah Jane Schofield, daughter of Oliver W. and Mary Jackson Schofield of Darby. Her twin sister was Lydia A. Schofield, a prominent peace activist, and a her younger sister, Martha Schofield, was a prominent educator. Three sons and one daughter were born to Samuel and Sarah Schofield, the youngest son and the daughter surviving their parents. A number of the letters in the collection concern the loss of the two older sons, at ages of 14 and 21 respectively.
Throughout their lives, Samuel Shinn Ash and his wife were active members of their Meeting. He was not only a minister much in demand for a variety of spiritual services, but they were active in a wide range of philanthropic activities, antislavery, peace and temperance movements, women's rights, and education. As clerk of the First Meeting of Friends' Educational Association, he was one of the founders of Swarthmore College. Samuel Shinn Ash died in 1911, and Sarah Ash died in 1912. Their daughter, Mary Schofield Ash, married George Herbert Jenkins in 1903.
This collection consists of family papers, manuscript letters and memorabilia, largely of a domestic nature. Includes some descriptions of Meetings and religious journeys, of the early struggles of Samuel S. Ash in engineering and business, and references to the Schofield Normal and Industrial School in Aiken, S.C., of which Martha Schofield, one of the correspondents, was Manager. The exchange of letters between Mary S. Ash and her mother, Sarah Ash, describes student life at Swarthmore College in the 1890's.
Donor: Mary Schofield Ash Jenkins, 1940
Donor: Eleanor Jenkins Zendt, daughter of Mary Jenkins, 1980
Donor: Katherine Smedley Yellig, 1986
Donor: Lydie Jenkins Valentine Wexler, grand-daughter of Mary Jenkins, Acc. 2016.052
Previously titled Samuel Shinn Ash Papers.
In 2018, additional family papers were added to the collection, including Samuel Shinn's 1849 journal, Mary Schofield Ash 1895 commonplace book, family photographs, and a small number of letters.
People
Subject
- Publisher
- Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
- Finding Aid Author
- FHL staff
- Finding Aid Date
- 1980, 1986
- Sponsor
- Encoding made possible by a grant by the Gladys Kriebel Delmas Foundation to the Philadelphia Consortium of Special Collections Libraries
- Access Restrictions
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Collection is open for research.
- Use Restrictions
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Friends Historical Library believes all of the items in this collection to be in the Public Domain in the United States, and is not aware of any restrictions on their use. However, the user is responsible for making a final determination of copyright status before reproducing. See http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-US/1.0/.
Collection Inventory
handwritten
Letters her father wrote her while she was a student.
Visting Aiken, South Carolina, and wrote about a formerly enslaved person who had agreed to work for his former enslavery but then was not paid. (Acc. 2016.052)
Family correspondence between members of the Samuel Shinn Ash family - his wife Sarah Jane and her twin sister Lydia, sons S. Earl and Henry C. Shinn and daughter Mary S. Ash who married George H. Jenkins.
Listed by author.
Original added by the family in 2016. Includes photocoopy from scan, made 5/2014.
Written while a student at Swarthmore College. Bound volume.
Excelsior Diary used as day book and commonplace book with clippings and notes. An entries dated 1897 apparently in Mary's mother hand, Sarah Jane Ash in which she mentions letter from her sister, Martha Schofield and graves of "our boys."
Includes wedding anniversary celebrations of Oliver and Mary Schofield and Samuel S. and Sarah Jane Ash.
A scrapbook of photographs and writings by friends and family compiled by Mary Ash Jenkins and her husband for her parents, as a new year's gift.
Includes "Welsh Society" book and invoice.
Given to Halliday Jackson by Mary H.J. Schofield Child.
Samuel Shinn and Sarah Jane Schofield Ash family photographs
Samuel S. Ash Sarah Jane Schofield Ash Mary S. Ash Jenkins Henry C. Ash Mary H. Child, mother of Mary Jackson Schofield Oliver W. Schofield Children of Mary S. Ash and George H. Jenkins, 1920s George Herbert Jenkins, circa 1940 Schofield sisters, 1888 Family group, 1910 Mary Schofield Ash Jenkins
Schofield ancestral home, Pine Grove, near Newtown, Pennsylvania, photographs from 1901 and late 20th century photograph
Lithographs of Sharon Boarding School with a note on one print that Mary Hough Jackson, daughter of Halliday and Jane Hough Jackson, was born in the home which later became the School.
Mary Schofield Ash graduated from Swarthmore College in 1897. Informal cyanotypes.