Skip to main content

SFHL/FHL/RG5. Family and Personal Papers

 Record Group Term
Identifier: SFHL/FHL/RG5
The largest category of collections in Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College is that of Personal and Family Papers. These materials include correspondence, journals and diaries, and property records of Quaker individuals and family groups they date from the mid 17th century to the present.

Found in 103 Collections and/or Records:

Moses Sheppard Papers

 Collection
Identifier: SFHL-RG5-137
Overview Moses Sheppard (1775-1857) was a Quaker humanitarian and businessman of Baltimore, Maryland. He was the son of Nathan and Sarah Shoemaker Sheppard, born outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. After their property was confiscated during the Revolutionary War, the family settled in Maryland. Sheppard never married and devoted most of his life to a number of social reforms, including the treatment of the insane and the colonization movement. As a member of Baltimore Monthly Meeting, he was...
Dates: 1794-1927

Philip W. Smith Papers

 Collection
Identifier: SFHL-RG5-224
Overview Philip W. Smith (1889-1981) was a Quaker dairyman from Bucks County, Pennsylvania, who was active in Russian concerns and a prominent peace activist. In 1925-1926, he spent two years on a collective farm in Russia, and in later life he traveled extensively for peace causes. He was a member of Buckingham Monthly Meeting. This collection contains his correspondence, several journals and day books, photographs, writings on Russia, dairy farm records, and information on various groups he was...
Dates: 1906-1981

Stabler Family Papers

 Collection
Identifier: SFHL-RG5-234
Overview Contains the papers of the Stabler family of Brooklyn, N.Y., and Greenwich, Ct., and their collateral lines. The collection spans six generations of a Quaker family and includes diaries, daybooks, albums, pictures, and voluminous correspondence concerned primarily with family issues. Louisa Merritt Field (1826-1914) married Edward Hartshorne Stabler (1813-1877) in 1859. He was the son of Edward Stabler (1769-1831), an Alexandria, Virginia, druggist, by his second wife, Mary Hartshorne. They...
Dates: 1835-1955(bulk)

Stabler-Lea Family Papers,

 Collection
Identifier: SFHL-RG5-140
Overview

The Stabler and Lea families were Quakers of Sandy Spring, Maryland, and Alexandria, Virginia. The collections contains chiefly correspondence of Mary Lea Stabler (1822-1888), with her mother, Elizabeth Ellicott Lea (1793-1858), her sister, Martha Lea (1819-1900), her brother, James Lea (1816-1857), and Martha Ellicott Tyson (1795-1873).

Dates: 1835-1932

Norman Walton Swayne Family Papers

 Collection
Identifier: SFHL-RG5-144
Overview The Swayne family were Quakers of southern Chester County, Pennsylvania. Caleb Swayne was a farmer and tanner, and his son, Benjamin, also operated a tan yard and conducted a school for boys, the London Grove Boarding School. Evan Thomas Swayne also taught at London Grove, but moved to the Eaton Institute, a boarding school for girls in Kennett, after 1865. His son, Edward Swayne, had a greenhouse business and wrote poetry. Edward's sister, Anna Belle, was a photographer before her marriage...
Dates: 1733-1987

Taylor-Thomson Family Papers

 Collection
Identifier: SFHL-RG5-203
Overview

The Taylors and Thomsons were Quakers from Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, who married into the Knight, Clothier, and Shoemaker families. This collection includes correspondence, copybooks and albums, account books, family photographs, and miscellaneous clippings. Of particular interest is a large collection of deeds and some late 19th and early 20th century travel diaries.

Dates: 1817-1955

Thorne Family Papers

 Collection
Identifier: SFHL-RG5-191
Overview

This collection contains correspondence, memorabilia, and photographs of a New York City Quaker family. It includes some writings by Phebe Anna Thorne (1828-1909), a Quaker minister, and travel correspondence from various family members.

Dates: 1848-1909

Truman-Underhill Family Papers

 Collection
Identifier: SFHL-RG5-151
Overview The Truman and Underhill families were prominent Philadelphia-area Quaker families with close ties to Swarthmore College and active in social concerns. Best known is George Truman (1798-1877), Quaker merchant and doctor and a recognized minister who visited Indians in the American West and former Quaker settlements in the West Indies. He was one of the founders of Swarthmore College. This collection contains chiefly the papers of Benjamin Mott Underhill (1863-1930), with some...
Dates: 1755-1930

Turner Family Papers

 Collection
Identifier: SFHL-RG5-152
Overview This collection centers around the family and descendants of Joseph Turner, Jr., (1790-1850) and his wife Rebecca (Sinclair) Turner (1787-1877), members of Baltimore Monthly Meeting-Western District. They raised eight children and had fifty-four grandchildren. As a young man, Joseph left the family plantation near Still Pond, Kent County, Maryland, and became a lumber merchant in Baltimore. He served as Clerk of the Lombard Street Meeting. Rebecca was a recorded minister and traveled widely....
Dates: 1776-1954

Underwood Family Papers

 Collection
Identifier: SFHL-RG5-153
Overview

The Underwood family was a Quaker family, of Millville, Pennsylvania, and Woodbury, New Jersey. The collection contains chiefly papers of Warner Underwood (1851-1941), Quaker businessman and philanthropist, and his wife, Tamar Eliza John Underwood (1848-1932), including personal correspondence, financial and legal records (1876) relating to a sawmill in Centre County, Pa., student copy work, memorabilia, and historical material relating to Millville.

Dates: 1833-1927