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Fisher-Whitson 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
Thomas S. Fisher and Anna M. Whitson were descended from a long line of Quakers from Delaware and Chester Counties in Pennsylvania. Anna M. Whitson was the daughter of T. Barclay Whitson and Elizabeth Owen Pennell. Her aunt, Esther M. Whitson, married Elmer F. Cope.
The bulk of this collection is a series of thematically arranged genealogical binders which contain both original manuscripts and photocopies. It also includes family photographic albums, artwork, and memorabilia such as guest and autograph books. There is also family correspondence, predominantly from the Samuel Smedley family of Pennsylvania during the ninteenth century. The focus of all the collection is on the families in donors' direct lines, including the Fishers, Pennells, Jacobs, Smedleys and Whitsons. Of particular interest is a journal and photographic album of Esther Whitson, later Cope, who served with the AFSC in Russia in the 1920s, and the correspondence of Sam Smedley who was killed during the Civil War in the US.
The collection is divided into five series:
- Ser.1 Genealogical Binders
- Ser.2 Photographic Albums
- Ser.3 Correspondence
- Ser.4 Albums & Commonplace Books
- Ser.5 Other Manuscripts & Family Memorabilia
Donor: Gift of Thomas S. Fisher, 2005 and 2012 (Accession numbers: 2005-016, 2012-015)
This collection has been kept largely intact in folders as arranged by the donor and his daughter, Rebecca Fisher Schneider. The binders contain original and photocopied material, with some duplication elsewhere in the collection.
People
- Cope, Esther Whitson, b.1900
- Whitson, Margaret
- Whitson, T. (Thomas Barclay), b.1894
- Fisher family
- Smedley family
- Whitson family
- Pennell family
Subject
- Quakers -- Pennsylvania
- Quakers -- Ireland
- Quakers -- Correspondence
- Quakers -- Family relationships
- Courtship -- Religious aspects -- Society of Friends
- Quakers -- Education
- Death -- Religious aspects -- Society of Friends
- Apprentices -- United States
- Women -- Suffrage
Place
- Publisher
- Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
- Finding Aid Author
- FHL staff
- Finding Aid Date
- 2012
- Access Restrictions
-
The collection is open to researchers. Due to its extremely fragile condition, access to Esther Whitson Cope's journal is by photocopy, except by permission of Curator.
- Use Restrictions
-
Some of the items in this collection may be protected by copyright. The user is solely responsible for making a final determination of copyright status. If copyright protection applies, permission must be obtained from the copyright holder or their heirs/assigns to reuse, publish, or reproduce relevant items beyond the bounds of Fair Use or other exemptions to the law. See http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/.
Collection Inventory
Family binders were arranged by the donors and contain original and photocopied materials.
Album of copies and originals, primarily photographs. Also includes drawings and pamphlets as well as Reuben and Joan Fisher's family tree.
Physical Description1 volume
Primarily family trees, genealogical information, and personal and family narratives. Also includes a number of photographs and some correspondence. Documents are related to the families of Joseph Beaston and Margaret Devault, Daniel Stratton of NJ.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals. Contains genealogies, photographs, correspondence, poems and other writings, newspaper clippings, official documents (marriage certificates/wills) and photographs. Documents are related to the descendents of George and Sarah Smedley of PA. Of particular interest are Civil War letters and 19th century original images.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals. Includes photographs, family trees, maps, flyers/pamphlets, poetry, scans out of books, family and personal narratives. Documents are related to the descendents of Thomas and Jane Wright of Ireland.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals. Includes a Record of Events book, school/college essays, photographs, correspondence, portions of journals and poetry, a deed, maps, and a Pendle Hill flyer. Documents are related to the family of T. Barclay Whitson of PA. Particular attention is given to sisters Margaret, Ruth, and Anna Whitson.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals. Includes photographs, a journal, maps, books and pamphlets including one on colonization in Argentina, family histories/biographies and newspaper clippings, pertaining to South American voyages.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals, including local history, correspondence, genealogies, newspaper clippings, one whole magazine, scans of books, photographs, and sketches, related to the descendents of William Pennell of York.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals. Includes drawings and pamphlets.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals, predominantly photographs of people as well as of buildings, with one letter.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals. Predominantly photographs, also includes school documents and newspaper clippings regarding Margaret (Peg) Whitson.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals. Includes family trees and genealogies, family histories/personal narratives (both published and unpublished), a few copies from history books, journal excerpts, photographs, town records, maps, correspondence, newspaper clippings, wills, and school documents. Whitson, Evans, and Cooper histories, regarding the descendants of Henry Whitson of Hempstead, Long Island and of Thomas Whitson and Phebe Cooper of PA. Of particular interest are a couple of documents regarding underground railroad participation and Thomas Barclay Whitson's WWI Bureau of Friends American Red Cross mission papers, and T. Barclay Whitson's Journal/ Record of Events.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals of newspaper clippings and letters regarding Dr. Joseph Stokes III.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals, primarily photographs with some narratives, regarding the Whitson family of PA.
Physical Description1 volume
Binder of copies and originals of photographs, drawings, genealogical notes and family trees, family history/personal narratives, property records, marriage certificates, scans of family bible records, pamphlets, flyers, and newsletters, lecture transcriptions, correspondence, newspaper clippings, etc. related to the descendants of Rueben and Joan Fisher of London (primarily through Abraham and Jane Moor Fisher). Of particular interest are original sketches and photographs, 1919 pamphlet on women's suffrage in Ireland, scans of Thos. Wright Fisher's naturalization papers upon moving to the USA, a few originals of letters as early as 1895
Physical Description1 volume
Original photographs in album, mostly school and family photos.
Physical Description1 folder
Inscribed Property of T. B. Whitson. This album consists of original photographs of Haverford faculty
Physical Description1 volume
Inscribed to Margaret [Whitson], from Mother and Daddy. This album consists of original family photographs.
Physical Description1 volume
This album consists of original photographs, including photographs of Whitsons and Pennells.
Physical Description1 volume
This album includes original photographs as well as two Christmas cards: Barclay and Elizabeth Whitson, 1924, and the Maris family, 1932.
Physical Description1 volume
Album includes original school photographs from Westtown and CHS, as well as a number of photographs of what looks like charity and nursing work in the Philadelphia area, and some unidentified portraits and building photographs.
Physical Description1 folder
Photo portraits.
Physical Description1 folder
This album contains original photographs, predominantly portraits. Date is from clasp of album, none of the pictures are dated.
Physical Description1 volume
Original photo album of Esther Whitson's service in Russia and Germany in the mid 1920s.
Physical Description1 folder
This album contains original photo-portraits, all undated.
Physical Description1 volume
This album contains original photo-portraits, mostly undated.
Physical Description1 volume
Includes original photographs. Seems to be the loose pages of a scrapbook/photo album complied by a man who was at Haverford around WWI: includes a few cartoons, pamphlet pages. Primarily photos, mostly of people with some nature shots and images of generator tests and other technology.
Physical Description1 folder
Letters from Phoenixville and Lumberville, addressed to family members. Includes a letter to his aunt (regarding illness in his immediate family), brother Benjamin (in Philadelphia), and mother (with a PS from Sam Smedley).
Physical Description1 folder
One letter from aunt Mary Davis in West Chester, regarding Maris Woodward's failure to bring B. Smedley home for a visit, and hopes for a future visit as well as family news.
Physical Description1 folder
Addressed from Philadelphia and sometimes from West Chester (during visits with his aunts). Includes one letter urging parents to send Otto on to B. Albertson, and telling Otto about the place; newsy letters to brother, Otto, his parents (one requesting money), his aunts, and cousin Benjamin (Davis). A number contain his meditations on virtue, education, letter writing, etc. Topics of interest include the sale of Benjamin Albertson's business to a Conrad, Westtown School, and the Mexican-American war.
Physical Description1 folder
Several letters on various topics. Includes the possible hospitalization of his brother (1863), two letters to Otto in Philadelphia from father regarding ending his apprenticeship with B. Albertson at 18, and two letters from Michael Duffy on westward migration (with/to Bloomington McLean Co. Illinois, Benjaminville) and Cuba.
Physical Description1 folder
One letter from William Smedley in Middletown, to Samuel Smedley in Phoenixville regarding illnesses in the family.
Physical Description1 folder
One letter from Philadelphia addressed to Samuel Smedley in Lumberville asking for Otto Smedley's continued apprenticeship in Albertson's store. Also mentions that Otto wishes to learn surveying, which could be done in evening classes (paid for by Albertson)
Physical Description1 folder
Folder contains one letter from Phebe D. Peabeets, framing his despair after illness as a site of divine battle with evil
Physical Description1 folder
From Cork, full of family gossip and reports on illness and education, both mention Uncle Alfred.
Physical Description1 folder
The bulk of the letters are addressed to his brothers, Otto and Thomas, with one to his mother and family. Addressed from Union camps (near Belle Plains, Upton's Hill, near Convalesant [sic], and Camp 4th Regt. PRVC, generically), during the Civil War. Themes and mentions of note: a persistent illness/injury, eventually cured, visits/possible, food supplies, troop movements/strategy, rebel prisoners, his desire for a furlough/discharge, his month's pay when it is received and the best ways of sending money home, requests for gloves, mistrust of the mail, packages, his service in Company K.4th Regiment, his brother Otto being in E 36th Regt. PM, his brother Thomas' impending marriage, and his mother's health.
Physical Description1 folder
Addressed from: Camp Hale, Camp Linley, Fort Pennsylvania and Camp Pierpont. Most are addressed to his brothers, primarily Thomas Smedley, but also to Otto Smedley and to two Respected Friends at home Discusses drilling, troop movement, and strategy, his duties, meeting enslaved people, packages, and hot-air balloons.
Physical Description1 folder
Addressed from: Camp Pierpont, Camp near Alexandria, Camp Prince Williams, Camp near Falmouth, Camp near Fredericksburg, Camp along James River, Camp near Harrisons Landing, Camp near Alexandria, Camp near Sharpsburg, and Camp 4th Regt. PRVC . Most are addressed to his brothers, Thomas and Otto, and one to his Mother. Discusses or often mentions: troop movements, rebel prisoners, members of the Meredith family, money/pay day, obtaining a tent in very bad weather, his father's death, the reliability of the mails, desire for victory and visions of a reunited America, the possibility of family visiting, battle, rebel prisoners, packages, his company, a hospitalization, wine, and the possibility of getting a discharge or furlough.
Physical Description1 folder
All sent to him in New York, and many discuss his loneliness and adventurousness for living there. One addressed to nephew and niece, plus another from an aunt thanking him for the gift of some fashion books and newspapers, a few from friends: a J. Grubb in Dublin, for one, discusses everything from the contested election of 1876 to a ministers and laymen convention. A few from cousins, for example: Anna Fisher in Jamesville NC, who mostly discusses the Centennial Exhibition, a Dublin cousin giving advice on trades and city introductions, also discussing his marriage. Two also reference visits to Alfred. A casual invitation to a party on Staten Island with Rules: We have no married folks with us written across the bottom. Also letters from his grandmother and mother (on black-bordered paper)
Physical Description1 folder
Belonged to a Mrs. Whitson with daughters Margaret and Anna. One photograph of Thomas H. Whitson's home tipped in. Has signatures of a number of Pennells (close family members), Smedleys, Whitsons, and Coopers
Physical Description1 volume
Autograph book, red velvet cover.
Physical Description1 volume
Commonplace book of Benjamin Whitson, most entries not dated.
Physical Description1 volume
Appears to begin as a commonplace book, with a journal in the back. Isabel Fisher is scrawled under the first entry, but in different handwriting. Ruth Fisher is written under one of the journal entries.
Physical Description1 folder
Commonplace book, two newspaper clipping obituaries.
Physical Description1 folder
Drawings and hand-drawn maps, geometry problems. One drawing of a statue bears the date (on the statue base) 1879, but that seems likely to be a feature of the statue, not a date for the drawing.
Physical Description1 folder
Autograph album inscribed to Phebe P. Cooper.
Physical Description1 volume
Clippings from The Friend, a visa to Russia, a calendar, several copies of the same photograph and a journal (with a few letters interspersed), all belonging to Esther Whitson. Letters either to or from Esther Whitson.
Physical Description1 folder
Journal and correspondence of Esther Whitson, later Cope.
Physical Description1 folder
Letters to "Esther" in Warsaw from "Harold". Also includes 1923 calendar pages, a few notes dated 1923 (one signed "Walter'), and a photocopy of her 1944 job application that lists previous positions.
Physical Description1 folder
A narrative "A Quaker Experience of Death" and correspondence from the same family as the author (?)—the Bowles.
Physical Description1 folder
Undated newspaper clippings as well as copies of "The Common Cause" ( National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies) from January 3, 1919 and April 19, 1918
Physical Description1 folder
Details the history of the Limerick Friends Meeting, which at one time included the Fisher Family which has its own section within the "Reminiscences". Draws on records as old as 1623.
Physical Description1 folder
Accounts of sale of property and receipts, geometry homework and other writings. Also includes pamphlets, copied sonnet (Milton), poetry, marriage certificate (copy), and a typescript copy of the will of Thomas W. Fisher. Also includes temperance pledge signed by Thomas W. Fisher in 1867 and a notice of a lecture by Henry W. Fisher in Pittsburgh
Physical Description1 folder
Includes copies of Carter genealogical information as well as "The Shackletons of Ballitore" and the "History of the Jacob Family," both by Caroline Nicholson Jacob.
Physical Description1 folder
(2) copies of the Cooper History by Sarah W. Cooper .
Physical Description1 folder
Photocopies of family histories and family trees, including: "Our Wright Ancestors Family by Susanna G. Fisher, with appendix by Maria Jane Wright; The Wright Family, by Samuel Wright; The Fisher Family, by Susanna G. Fisher; the Autobiography of Henry W. Fisher; and the history of the Evans family.
Physical Description1 folder
Photocopies of the marriage certificates of Thomas David Schneider and Rebecca Masters Fisher under the care of Germantown Monthly Meeting and of Abraham Fisher and Sarah Wright at Cork Monthly Meeting
Physical Description1 folder
Inscribed Elanor (?) P Fisher. Full title "Emigration to the Argentine Republic (River Plate) Alexandra Colony, Province of Santa Fe." (scan in one of the folders)
Physical Description1 folder
On "the faith of Fusa Shiina," with English edition introduction by Herbert V. Nicholson.
Physical Description1 folder
Personal narrative of Clarence Pennell, brother of Grandmother Elizabeth Pennell Whitson, spanning the dates 1897-1990. Includes copies of a large number of family letters and photographs.
Physical Description1 folder
Spiral bound manuscript "Memoirs of a Quaker Childhood in Ireland and Pennsylvania" by Louisa M. Jacob. Edited by Caroline N. Jacob, sister of Francis Nicholson. Also Jacob and Fisher family trees.
Physical Description1 folder
Thesis (A.B. Princeton) "A Socio-Economic Study of Sebasco, a Maine Sea Coast Fishing Village" by Thomas S. Fisher. File includes family tree, correspondence regarding Teddy and Phil Jacob's strong religious shift towards Christianity, as well as a thank-you note and letter from Teddy Jacob and her daughter Barby to Tom Fisher. Also includes a book "Small Point: The Cape of Many Islands"
Physical Description1 folder
Undergraduate thesis on the town of Sebasco. Senior year high school paper on a similar topic.
Physical Description1 folder
This folder contains copies of photographs, correspondence with Dorothy Harvey Leonard,, and a copy of the address at the 1936 Thorp family reunion
Physical Description1 folder
This folder contains copies of sketches, some signed by Susan Brinton. Also includes a photograph of Maria Wright and Jane (Moor) Fisher and the family tree of Sarah Wright.
Physical Description1 folder
1 folder
Inscribed to "Tom Fisher from Rebecca Masters Fisher Schneider and her Tom, 9/11/1993. Quakers p. 50, 63, 94"
Physical Description1 folder
Quakers' Meeting house is marked.
Physical Description1 folder
1 folder
Book by Hubert Lidbetter
Physical Description1 folder
Entitled "Memorials Concerning Deceased Friends Being a Selection from the Records of the Yearly Meeting for Pennyslvania, andc. from the year 1788 to 1819, inclusive." Includes the memorial testimony regarding Hannah Fisher, of Philadelphia.
Physical Description1 folder
Full title "English Exercises Adapted to the Grammar, Lately Published by L. Murray." Inscribed Jane Moor.
Physical Description1 folder