Saint Louis Manuscript Collections

The records contain meeting minutes and copies of its journal, "Transaction of the Academy of Science of St. Louis." Established in 1856 by twelve prominent St. Louis residents, the Academy of Science's mission was to promote the advancement of science.

The Agribusiness Club of St. Louis was founded in 1937 as the Farmers’ Club of St. Louis and was affiliated with the Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan St. Louis. The club was established to advance research, interest, and cooperation in agricultural business. In 1960, Farmers’ Club of St. Louis was renamed the Agribusiness Club of St. Louis. A decade later, in 1970, a decision was made by the club to merge with the St. Louis Chamber of Commerce’s Food and Agriculture Committee to form the Food and Agribusiness Committee of the Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan St. Louis. The records contain meeting minutes, correspondence, membership rosters and cards, and the constitution and bylaws of Agribusiness Club of St. Louis.

The Jaquelin Ambler Collection contains gallery announcements, flyers, programs, invitations, and newspaper articles regarding St. Louis area art clubs, galleries, and artists collected by Jaquelin Ambler between 1966 and 1972, after her retirement from the St. Louis Art Museum.

The records of the American Chemical Society, St. Louis Section, contain correspondence, meeting minutes, subject files, and issues of the “The Chemical Bond,” documenting the group’s mission to promote the field of chemistry. Founded in 1907, the St. Louis Section’s members have included pioneers in chemistry who helped make St. Louis a chemical manufacturing center.

"Symbolic Emergence of Community in an Historically Black Neighborhood: The Case of the Ville," or simply "The Case of the Ville," was an essay written by Charles Bailey. The paper was presented at the Annual Meeting of the Midwest Sociological Society in Chicago, April 9-12, 1975 and discussed the history of the black majority neighborhood "the Ville" and the symbolic sentiments that have been attached to the neighborhood because of its history.

The First African Baptist Church History contains a four-page document that briefly describes the history of African-Americans in St. Louis as well as the First African Baptist Church in St. Louis. The church was founded in 1827 by Reverend John Berry Meachum and is the oldest African-American church west of the Mississippi River. Many of the original congregation consisted of slaves, who were permitted by their owners to attend. A physical church was built two years following the organization’s inception and went through two other location changes to accommodate the rapid growth of the church’s congregation.

The collection contains court documents, memoranda, newspaper clippings, and a University of Missouri-St. Louis student paper regarding the city of Black Jack, Missouri's attempt to prevent the Park View Heights Corporation from building an integrated housing complex within its borders.  

The papers of Louis Marie Bliss contain diaries, correspondence, and manuscripts regarding her life as an author and pacifist. Bliss was a member of the Fellowship for Reconciliation and worked for the Civil Liberties Committee. The materials in this collection date from 1894 to 1971.

This collection contains the records of the St. Louis Chapter of Women in Communications, Inc., formerly called Theta Sigma Phi. Women in Communications sponsored various programs to educate, encourage, and reward women in the field of communications. They also sponsored an annual “Ladies of the Press” luncheon. The materials in this collection include correspondence, minutes, reports, bylaws, constitution, directories, brochures, newsletters, photographs, and scrapbooks.

The records contain bylaws, correspondence, meeting minutes, research abstracts, and photographs regarding the Missouri Society for Health and Physical Educators'  (MOSHAPE) mission to develop and promote health, leisure, and movement programs.  

The Ernest Calloway papers contain correspondence, speeches, public statements, reports, campaign materials, newspapers, and photographs documenting Calloway's activities as president of the St. Louis NAACP, political analyst for Teamsters' Local 688, and a political activist in St. Louis and a lecturer on urban problems for St. Louis University.

The DeVerne Calloway Papers contain correspondence, meeting meetings, newspaper clippings, photographs, posters, and scrapbooks chronicling her personal life and career as the first African American woman elected to the Missouri legislature. As the Missouri State Representative from the 70th District (1962-1981), Calloway focused on assisting welfare recipients and prisoners, which is reflected in her correspondence.

The Florissant Missouri City Council Ordinance and Council Meeting Minute Book Collection include copies of official correspondence, council rosters, budgets, resolutions, certificates of appointments, and maps, chronicling the city's growth and development from 1857 to 1973.

The Victor E. Clark Collection contains correspondence, newspaper clippings, and photographs documenting Clark's attempt in 1968-1969 to create a "Hitler Museum" of the former Nazi buildings and bunkers in Obersalzberg, Germany.

The Lucille Papendick promoted art and cultural education programs throughout her life and after her death through a fund she set up to support cultural, arts, and education organizations and the community. The collection contains programs from concerts, plays, recitals, and dance programs in St. Louis by visiting performers at theatres throughout the St. Louis area.

The papers contain 83 letters written by or to Absalom Roby Dyson (1832-1864) and his wife, Louisa Johnson Dyson (1833-1898), between 1850 and 1880 regarding their life in Steelville and Franklin County, Missouri, before the Civil War and Absalom Dyson’s service as a Confederate soldier. Also included are various teaching contracts, business and employment records, and other documents related to Absalom Dyson’s work as a farmer, postmaster, and teacher.

The Jewel Family Civil War letters span 1859-1878 and describe camp conditions, military campaigns, and daily life in the Confederate Army and Georgia. The collection contains 150 letters written by James, Sallie, William, Eliza, and their cousins and family genealogy.

The Agnes Candy MacNutt scrapbook book includes newspaper clippings, photographs, programs, and a biographical sketch documenting McNutt's pioneering efforts promoting the dance movement in the Playground of the Parks and Recreation System in the City of St. Louis.

The papers contain correspondence between St. Louis area art collector and gallery director William N. Eisendrath Jr. and prominent artists including Alexander Calder, Henry Moore, Virginia Peusner, Alexander Archipenko, and Robert Chesley Osborne. 

The Down Memory Land Manuscript is a 50th-anniversary celebration history of the Charles Sumner High School, published in June 1959 for the 1909 graduating class, St. Louis, Missouri.

Originally founded in 1972 as the League of Chinese Americans, Organization of Chinese Americans – Asian Pacific American Advocates promotes the cultural heritage and social, political, and economic well-being of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. The collection consists of newsletters from the organization from the mid-1970s.

"The Development and Roles of Ethnic Groups in St. Louis" is an unpublished manuscript written by Harry Nadler for a graduate seminar in sociology at Washington University.

This collection contains the transcript of the Ethnic Heritage Studies City-Wide Colloquium proceedings, which was held at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri on May 13, 1975.

This collection contains one manuscript titled “Shakesperean Plays in St. Louis in the Nineteenth Century”. Nanette Baz-Dresch wrote the manuscript for a class at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.

The Fellowship of America’s Loyal Irish Record Book contains a constitution, by-laws, meeting minutes, correspondence, and membership list of a St. Louis Irish organization. The organization was founded to promote “good fellowship” amongst St. Louis Irish Americans.

This collection contains an unpublished 36-page report titled "Studies and Analyses Covering a Proposed Colored Amusement and Building Project to be Located in Saint Louis, Mo." In the report, the Albert Wenzlick Real Estate Company proposes the erection of an entertainment and residential complex containing a theater, dance hall, five retail stores, a bowling alley, and 28 efficiency apartments for African Americans in St. Louis.

This collection contains a handwritten history of the Carper Casket Company, an African American-owned casket firm founded by George A. Carper in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1932.

This collection contains a manuscript titled The History of Central Baptist Church, showing her influence upon her times by Reverend George E. Stevens. Reverend Stevens wrote the manuscript in 1927 to commemorate the 80th anniversary of Central Baptist Church, an African American Baptist Church founded in 1846 in St. Louis City.

This manuscript is an unpublished dissertation by Audrey Olson documenting the assimilation of St. Louis Germans into American life.

This collection contains an unpublished thesis titled A Study of Voluntary Associations of Greek Immigrants of Chicago from 1890 to 1948 with Special Emphasis on World War II and Post War Period by Constantine A. Yercaris. Yercaris chronicles the history of Greek voluntary associations throughout Chicago from 1890 to 1948.

This collection contains a dedication album of the St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church in St. Louis, Missouri, titled Partners in Progress. St. Nicholas created the album in 1962 to celebrate the addition of a community center to the church. The album documents the history of St. Nicholas's Greek Orthodox Church and the Greeks in St. Louis from 1870-1962.

The Holy Trinity Serbian Eastern Orthodox Church Almanac includes an illustrated history of the Holy Trinity Serbian Eastern Orthodox Church and the Serbian community in St. Louis from 1900 to 1976. Holy Trinity created the almanac to celebrate the United States' bicentennial in 1976.

The collection contains a manuscript, flyers, and program books relating to anniversaries and performances of the Harmonie Singing Society from 1935-1971.

The Czechs in St. Louis Collection contains anniversary programs, histories, and unpublished manuscripts, relating to Czech-American life in St. Louis, including Bohemian Hill, St. John's Nepomuk Parish, and Sokol St. Louis.

This collection contains anniversary programs and histories of the Italian Club of St. Louis, the Ladies Auxiliary of the Fratellanza and Societa Unione E Fratellanza Italiana, and an unpublished manuscript titled "Over Here: St. Louis Italo-Americans and the First World War" by Gary Ross Mormio.

The African Americans in St. Louis Collection is an artificial collection containing histories, unpublished manuscripts, programs, directories, reports, pamphlets, and articles documenting St. Louis's African American Community from 1920 to 1991.

The Frei Gemeinde Von St. Louis Records contain correspondence, ledgers, protocol books, and articles of association about the founding and operation of this German fraternal association. 

The Howard F. Baer Papers contain correspondence, photographs, and newspaper clippings documenting his activities as a St. Louis Zoological Sub District Commission member from 1979 to 1984 and his time as a Trustee of the Missouri Botanical Garden from 1937 to 1985. Also included in the collection is Baer's autobiography, "An Ordinary Man."

The Medlock-Luecke Family papers contain correspondence, photographs, yearbooks, family histories, and a yearbook pertaining to the Jim, Kay, Joey, and AJ Medlock; the Luecke family, primarily Robert Clarence and Louise Meers Luecke; and other branches of the family, including the Eakers and the Hodges.

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform NOW (ACORN) contains bylaws, correspondence, newsletters, issue statements, and press releases relating to the group's mission to fight for social and economic justice for low and moderate-income families in Missouri.

The records of Citizens for GLOBAL Solutions of Greater St. Louis contain newsletters, correspondence, membership rosters, speeches, reports, bylaws, meeting minutes, and financial materials pertaining to the group's mission to lobby for world peace in a world community where enforceable law replaced armed conflict. The group was founded in 1947 as the World Federalists Association of Greater St. Louis.

This collection includes articles of incorporation, correspondence, reports, lists, and flyers relating to the founding and operation of Junior Kindergarten from 1962, and 1964-1970. Junior Kindergarten was organized in 1965 by the Junior League of St. Louis and Page-Park County YMCA (currently Bayer YMCA) to improve the school readiness of educationally disadvantaged children around St. Louis City before their entrance into a public kindergarten.

The Nine Network of Public Media records contains correspondence, meeting minutes, press releases, photographs, newsletters, and newspaper clippings regarding the organization's mission to provide community-supported educational television to the St. Louis area.   

The Missouri School Districts Collections is an artificial collection combining small acquisitions pertaining to various school districts in St. Louis and outstate Missouri. 

The collection contains meeting minutes, letters, memos, periodicals, and membership information pertaining to Americans for Democratic Action, St. Louis Chapter, a political advocacy group that promotes the principles of liberals as formulated in the New Deal. The bulk of the material dates from 1959 to 1970 and 1977 to 1982, all during the administration of Jack L. Pierson. Subjects of interest include the group’s endeavors to promote progressive political candidates, as well as their involvement in anti-war protests.

The Adolph Gustav Lipp Papers contain marriage certificates, photographs, newspaper clippings, and theater programs documenting the life of Adolph Lipp, who immigrated from Germany to St. Louis, Missouri, between the late 1880s and 1890s.

The scrapbook contains newsletters and newspaper clippings pertaining to the St. Louis Chapter of the American Red Cross’s 1955 Fund Campaign. Also included in the scrapbook is a letter from Whitelaw T. Terry, Chairman of the St. Louis Chapter’s 1952 Red Cross Fund to Fred W. Gardner, Chairman of the chapter’s Special Gifts Division, regarding the 1952 fund raising campaign in St. Louis.

A report compiled by staff members of the Metropolitan Education Center in the Arts (MECA), a three-year program, founded in 1967 under Title III of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, to provide arts education programs to students St. Louis metropolitan region. MECA-sponsored programs taught students drama, modern dance, writing, and photography.

The collection contains correspondence, labor agreements, union identification cards, ballots, and programs of Harrison J. Liebrum. Liebrum was an employee of Laclede Gas Company from 1925 to 1971, and a charter member of the Gas House Workers Union, Local 18799.

The records contain meeting minutes, articles of corporation, bylaws, correspondence, and newsletters of an LGBTQ+ social services organization that offered social activities, newsletters, and a telephone hotline from 1975 to 1978. 

The papers of Harriett Woods contain correspondence, senate bills, transcripts of senate committee hearings, newsletters, press releases, and photographs chronicling her life as a journalist, television producer, Lieutenant Governor, and Missouri State Senator from the 13th district. 

The records of the Sacred Heart Catholic Church of Florissant, Missouri, contain registers for baptisms, first communions, baptisms, marriages, and deaths. Collection materials are written in Latin, German, and English.

The New Age Federal Savings and Loan Association records contain correspondence, meeting minutes, reports, ledgers, newsletters, and programs documenting the organization's mission to provide African-American St. Louisans with loans to buy homes. 

This collection consists of two diaries (1941-1943) and three "Social Capers" calendars (1942-1944) of Mary Anne Sell, a high school student at Villa Duchesne. In the diaries, Sell describes her social outings, including ice skating parties and summer trips to Michigan, as well as entries about her friendship with Tom Dooley. The calendars contain notions documenting school affairs, social outings, and family affairs.

The St. Charles, Missouri Collection is an artificial collection combining several small acquisitions about the history of St. Charles, Missouri. The collection includes reports, budgets, maps, histories, pamphlets, and newspaper clippings regarding City Council meetings, historical sites, popular statistics, restoration plans, waterworks, and zoning.

The records include correspondence, memos, meeting minutes, manuals, press releases, newsletters, and working papers chronicling the Missourians for Honest Elections' efforts to implement campaign finance reform laws in Missouri.  

The collection contains meeting minutes, correspondence, treasurer’s reports, and newspaper clippings documenting the establishment and growth of the St. Louis Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends.

The St. Louis Protestant Orphans' Asylum Records contain bylaws, histories, annual reports, board minutes, matrons' daybooks, and admission and departure records documenting the organization's mission to care for orphaned children.

Florence Wyman Richardson Usher helped found the Equal Suffrage League of St. Louis in 1910. She chaired the League's lecture committee for six years and was a member of the board of governors in 1912. The scrapbooks in this collection document suffrage activities both nationally and in St. Louis. They include news clippings, correspondence, public notices, programs, leaflets, and Usher's annotations.

Joseph Pulitzer was an editor and newspaper publisher, whose holdings included the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The papers primarily relate to his editorship of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and cover nearly every aspect of the operation and production of the newspaper, including its internal business management and its editorial policies. The collection contains extensive correspondence with family, journalists, and politicians.

The St. Louis Labor Council Minute Books include legislative committee reports, attendance lists, and announcements of activities of individual unions, documenting the Council's efforts to strengthen organized labor in the St. Louis area. 

The Opera Theatre of St. Louis Records contains correspondence, programs, and financial materials relating to the history of opera in St. Louis from 1939, including the opera productions, metropolitan opera auditions, and the efforts to raise the public's interest in opera. 

The People's Party National Convention Collection contains position papers, campaign literature, and newspaper clippings documenting the American leftwing's national conventions, held in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1972 and 1975. During the conventions, delegates adopted platforms calling for world peace, non-nuclear proliferation, tax reform, and women's and gay liberation.

This collection contains postcards of Missouri cities and towns from 1902 to 1956. Subjects include Charles Lindbergh, Louisiana Purchase Exposition, the St. Louis riverfront, buildings, parks, and streets.

The Arthur Proetz Papers consist of a family scrapbook containing theatre programs, flyers, and newspaper clippings from German and English newspapers, documenting the musical and cultural milieu of turn-of-the-century St. Louis.

The Logan Uriah Reavis Papers consist of correspondence of a St. Louis businessman and booster who, from 1867-1889, sought to move the nation's capital to St. Louis, Missouri. 

The Rotary Club of St. Louis records correspondence, reports, and rosters documenting the group's mission to promote community welfare and international understanding through student exchange programs and by supporting libraries, vocational training, and help for the disabled.

The records of the New Democratic Coalition contain correspondence, meeting minutes, press releases, and photographs relating to the group's mission to reform the Democratic Party.

The records contain bylaws, meeting minutes, correspondence, narrative histories, and curricula documenting the Committee for Environmental Information's mission to collect, evaluate, and make available to the public, information concerning nuclear tests and weaponry and the uses of nuclear energy. 

The St. Louis Artists’ Guild is one of the oldest extant art organizations in the country and one of the few which maintains its own building and galleries. The Guild sponsors annual art exhibition competitions and provides education in many artistic varieties. The materials consist of minutes, catalogs, correspondence, "Book of Hours," indenture deed, and programs, including those of Little Theater of St. Louis.

The report is a planning survey of cultural activities and needs in Greater St. Louis, produced by Civic Progress, Inc.

Stanley Herbert founded the Civic Ballet in October 1958 as a community-supported resident dance company. The organization fosters civic interest in dance, encourages young performers through scholarships and performances, arranges ballet productions, and sponsors the St. Louis Dance Festival. Records include correspondence, minutes, reports, newsletters, and programs.

The St. Louis County Data Collection is an artificial collection of various small donations documenting the history of St. Louis County and county government. The collection consists of publications, reports, newspaper clippings, pamphlets on historic buildings, highways, zoning, land use, and recreation.

The St. Louis Municipalities Collection is an artificial collection containing multiple small publications documenting the history of St. Louis County's municipalities. The collection contains publications, histories, and reports.

The St. Louis City Data Collection is an artificial collection comprised of various donations documenting the history of St. Louis City, city government, and historic sites. Included in this collection are reports, newspaper clippings, and pamphlets on neighborhood rehabilitation, street plans, population trends, and urban land policy.

The St. Louis Local History Collection is an artificial collection comprised of various small donations documenting the history of St. Louis City, neighborhoods, and historic structures. The collection includes reports, newspaper clippings, pamphlets, and unpublished manuscripts regarding Pruitt-Igoe, Mill Creek Valley, Laclede's Landing, and the Ville.

This collection includes an 1831 farewell pamphlet for the German families of Geiger, Haren, and Von Leveling, a photocopy of Haren Family Reminiscence written by William A. Haren, and a photocopy of an excerpt from German Americans: An Informal History by Richard O’Connor. 

This collection contains a diary written by John Wilson, an English immigrant. In the diary, Wilson chronicles his daily life in the first decade of the twentieth century, discussing the social and political life of St. Louis and Jennings, Missouri, and the St. Louis World’s Fair of 1904.

This collection consists of typescript drafts of statements Bethune wrote near the end of World War II for an unspecified conference of African American organizations. In the statements, Bethune demands “the eradication of all handicaps upon African American’s political, social, and economic life.”

This collection consists of Glass Town USA, A Brief History of Glass Making At Crystal City, Missouri, 1868-1981, a 64-page manuscript chronicling the history of Crystal City, Missouri, and the Crystal Plate Glass Company.

The Jennings Historical Society Collection contains photocopies of newspaper clippings, a deed of property, photographs, and the contents of a scrapbook collected by Jennings Historical Society regarding the history of Jennings, Missouri, a north St. Louis County suburb.

The St. Louis Regional Fellowship of Reconciliation Records contain correspondence, meeting minutes, newsletters, and reports documenting the chapter's commitment to the philosophy and programming of religious pacifism. Topics of interest include conscientious objectors during World War II and the Korean War, the relocation of Japanese citizens, and nuclear weapons disarmament.

The Scholarship Foundation of St. Louis contains meeting minutes, correspondence, bylaws, and photographs documenting the group's mission to assist St. Louis area students by providing them with interest-free loans to help further their education beyond high school.

The collection consists of annotated index cards to newspaper articles Virginia Irwin wrote for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch as a feature writer. 

The Louisiana Purchase Exposition Collection is an artificial collection of publications chronicling the World's Fair in St. Louis. Publications of interest include three volumes of the Worlds Fair Bulletin, published from 1900 to 1904 to promote the fair.

The St. Louis Teachers Strike of 1973 Collection contains correspondence to and from St. Louis teachers, court proceedings, strike bulletins, and flyers documenting the first teacher's strike in the history of St. Louis. 

The Robert S. Saunders Papers contains the unpublished autobiography of Robert S. Saunders, chronicling his life as a migratory laborer and union organizer during the 1930s and 1940s. The autobiography includes narratives of living conditions in migrant camps, and Saunders’s efforts to recruit members for the Socialist Party in the Midwest.

The Appelbaum Family Papers contain a scrapbook created by Marie C. Hamacher Appelbaum, documenting her son Lawrence T. Appelbaum's service in the United States Marine Corps during World War II. The scrapbook consists of correspondence, photographs, greeting cards, and newspaper clippings Lawrence T. Appelbaum sent her from 1942 to 1946. Additionally, the collection includes World War II Marine Corps photographs and two genealogical books written by Marie Hamacher Appelbaum.

The Missouri Social Hygiene Association (MSHA) Scrapbook contains correspondence, newspaper clippings, and newsletters pertaining to the group's mission to disseminate knowledge and laws concerning social hygiene to the public. 

The Socialist Party of Missouri became one of the best organized state-wide chapters of the American Socialist Party, especially active during the 1930s and 1940s. Missouri contained strong pockets of rural socialism and consequently, the Party considered the state an important region for socialist activity. The Socialist Party Records reflect this activity, and include administrative files, publications, and oral histories.

A book commemorating the World's Columbian Exposition by the Joint Committee on Ceremonies.

This collection contains pamphlets describing the history and activities of the Society of Independent Artists and its members from 1930 to 1972.

The collection consists of annual reports, newsletters, and pamphlets chronicling the Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis’s efforts to provide social services for the St. Louis area’s African American population.

The Nathan B. Young Papers contains correspondence and drafts of his unpublished autobiography, "The Quest and Use of an Education." Young was an African-American educator who attended Talladega College, Oberlin College, and Selma University. He taught at Tuskegee Institute and Atlanta University and was president of Lincoln University in Jefferson City, Missouri.

This collection contains an autobiography titled The 30’s: Donnybrook Decade in St. Louis Public School Power Plants (A Geechee Maverick’s Quest in a Jim Crow City), written by Frank Weldon Young. Young wrote the manuscript to discuss his life as the first African American to receive their stationary engineer’s license in the city of St. Louis.

The Young Socialist Alliance Collection contains flyers, posters, newspaper clippings, court briefs, and issues of the Young Socialist from the St. Louis chapter of the Young Socialist Alliance from 1974-1975. The Young Socialist Alliance was the youth group within the Socialist Workers Party from 1960-1992 and promoted causes and candidates representing the Socialist Workers Party.

The records contain flyers, leaflets, handbooks, newsletters, meeting minutes and a newspaper pertaining to the Crawdad Alliance’s efforts to halt the proliferation of nuclear power in Missouri, including the construction of the Calloway Power Plant in Calloway County, Missouri, through nonviolent means, including civil disobedience.

In 1933, employees of St. Louis-based dried fruit and nut dealer Funsten Nut Company demanded and received higher wages by striking. The collection consists of a thesis by St. Louis University student Myrna Fichtenbaum, entitled "The Funsten Nut Strike May, 1933". The paper discusses the local historical setting, the sequence of strike activities, and the connections with the labor movement and Communist Party.

This collection contains newspaper clippings and the bylaws, a constitution, and rituals of St. Louis Black Lodges, and the August 1909 Negro Educational, that were collected by St. Louis resident Nina P. Lewis in her lifetime.

The records contain meeting minutes, memos, evaluations, and reports of the Joint Community Board, a community service organization that was located in the Central West End neighborhood of St. Louis, Missouri. The board was comprised of three Central West End churches—Trinity Episcopal, Second Presbyterian, and First Unitarian—and oversaw the administration and funding of after-school and summer programs for neighborhood youth, as well as neighborhood revitalization projects.