Quaker Archives at Guilford College

08/17/2023

Friends Church of North Carolina held their annual sessions last weekend at Quaker Lake.

We hope all of our regional yearly meetings have good sessions and remember to deposit official minutes and publications at the Quaker Archives.

08/16/2023

8/15/1888, New Garden Boarding School is rechartered as .

The New Garden Boarding School opened in 1837 by the Religious Society of Friends as a co-ed boarding school.

📷 Faculty & Staff New Garden Boarding School 1886, Quaker Archives at Guilford College.

08/09/2023

Glad to host PBS North Carolina as they work on an episode about the Underground Railroad!

07/26/2023

Archivist Barbie at the State Archives of North Carolina does the same tasks we do here in the Quaker Archives at Guilford College. We have the same boxes and carts and monitor our vault areas for temperature and humidity.

07/14/2023

Welcome to North Carolina Yearly Meeting (Conservative) members, who are having their annual sessions at Guilford College, this week.

07/06/2023

Just finished going through a collection of North Carolina Yearly Meeting's newsletter, 'Friendly News Letter,' from 1934 to about 2010. If you're cleaning out or have extra issues, especially of the recent decades, let us know!

06/28/2023

06/21/2023

Happy Juneteenth!

The Archivist of the United States, Dr. Colleen Shogan, made a special announcement on Saturday just before General Orders No. 3 and the Emancipation Proclamation went on public display through June 19.

Dr. Colleen Shogan announced earlier today that the National Archives plans to place the Emancipation Proclamation on permanent display in the Rotunda with the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution of the United States, and the Bill of Rights in the National Archives Museum.

The National Archives will begin an assessment to determine the best display environment, considering the condition and importance of the original document.

The current plan for display calls for showing one side of the Emancipation Proclamation, a double-sided five-page document, alongside facsimiles of the reverse pages. The original pages on display will be rotated on a regular basis to limit light exposure.

Learn about the Emancipation Proclamation and General Order No. 3: https://museum.archives.gov/featured-document-display-emancipation-proclamation-and-juneteenth

06/14/2023

Taylor Calloway, Quaker Archives summer employee, is scanning North Carolina Yearly Meeting minutes that were published 1845 to 1903. Online access is getting a lot closer!

05/26/2023

Inventorying original North Carolina Yearly Meeting minutes, with epistles and little notes to the clerk, from the 1850s.

05/05/2023

The Randolph County Genealogical Society's annual meeting is this Saturday at the Randolph County Public Library in Asheboro.

This is a free program and all are invited to attend.

05/03/2023

Stephen B. Weeks died 105 years ago today, May 3. We refer to his book, 'Southern Quakers and Slavery,' very often!

This website is undergoing design changes. Functionality of the site should not be affected, but things may look different.

04/27/2023

Thursday, April 27 at 7p.m.
Celebrate National Library Week and join us at the Visitor Center for a FREE special program on Black Patriots of the American Revolution. Hear the personal stories of descendants and learn about the role of black soldiers at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse.

For more info e-mail [email protected] or call 336-373-3617.

04/14/2023

It's thesis season! The first three for 2023 submitted and now available online via Guilford's JSTOR Open Collection site. More on the way as our seniors finish up before May graduation.

Guilford's Quaker Archives continues to add new incoming theses and also some older theses to our institutional repository available via JSTOR Open Collections.

04/13/2023

Congratulations to our Quaker Archives student employees, who all won academic awards! Taylor Calloway (left) and Alaina Betz (center) won the Algie and Eva Newlin Senior History Prize. Will Beardsley (right) won the Algie I. Newlin First-year Book Award.

We sure will miss our seniors and wish them well in future endeavours. And we look forward to having Will back in future sessions. We're proud of all of them (and so is Algie, in the background)!

photo by Michael Crouch

04/06/2023

A huge thank you to all who supported our campaign! We raised over $14,500 towards our goal to fund the Carole Treadway endowment for the Quaker Archivist/Librarian position!

03/28/2023

Then and now (ca. 1987 and 2023): Walking into the Quaker Archives research room is like walking back in time. Students still use it for a quiet place to study. For some, it’s their first time using primary sources in person, experiencing the texture and smell of old documents and artifacts.
go.guilford.edu/give2treadway

photo from 'Guilford College on the Strength of 150 Years' by Alexander Stoesen (1987)

03/27/2023

Only five people have served as curators for the Quaker collection since 1937. Retired archivist Carole Treadway (right), knows them all and worked with most, including Damon Hickey (left). Last summer, Damon and Mary Hickey donated a challenge gift of $500,000 towards a goal of $1 million to fund the Quaker Archivist position at Guilford College. At the Hickeys' request, the full endowment will be named in honor of Carole Treadway. You are invited to be a part of maintaining this renowned collection at go.guilford.edu/give2treadway .

photo from 'Guilford College on the Strength of 150 Years' by Alexander Stoesen (1987)

03/27/2023

Welcome to Guilford Madness! The Quaker Archives team, in the Lavina Curry division, is raising an endowment for the Quaker Archivist position. Support the professional management of this internationally known collection for Friends' meetings, researchers, and Quaker studies for many years to come! Scan the QR code or visit go.guilford.edu/give2treadway

03/24/2023

Then and now: 50 years ago - Carole Treadway models a Quaker costume in front of the vault containing old and rare Quaker books and documents. 2023 - Gwen Erickson, Quaker Archivist and Special Collections Librarian, gives a look behind the scenes at what the vault is used for today. The Quaker Archives is raising an endowment, named in honor of Carole Treadway, who curated the collection and helped researchers for more than three decades.
Read more here: https://www.guilford.edu/news/2023/03/theres-vault-hege-academic-commons
photos from 'Carolina Quakers: Our Heritage, Our Hope' (1972) and the Guilford Gazette.

03/23/2023

Join Guilford Madness next week, as we combine the excitement of basketball season with our annual Day of Giving. The Quaker Archives team, in the Lavina Curry division, is raising an endowment to support the Quaker Archivist position. Stay tuned!

03/17/2023

Applications are open for the Herbert L. Poole award, due June 1, 2023. North Carolina Friends Historical Society sponsors the award for topics in southern Quaker history.

https://library.guilford.edu/archives/fellowships/Poole?fbclid=IwAR3Te8htZXnQtFGoofeJQiXu-HM8ByNJ8E2OYQT03n_fq7Ywa33Le3xYzNI

Information for researchers seeking funding and awards relating to topics relating to resources in Guilford College's Quaker Archives.

03/15/2023

Tabitha Anne Holton, born in 1854 to a Methodist minister in Guilford County, was the first female lawyer in North Carolina — as well as the Southern United States.

She passed the bar exam in 1878 — nine years after the first female lawyer in the United States, Arabella Mansfield, was certified in 1869. But Holton’s examination wasn’t exactly typical.

She attended Greensboro Academy and graduated in 1878, at which point she accompanied her brother Samuel to take the bar exam in Raleigh in front of the North Carolina supreme court. Unfortunately, they were informed, women were not permitted to practice law in North Carolina. Holton appealed the decision, and the judges of the court requested that she come back the following day to argue her case.

Tabitha’s brother Alfred was trained under legendary lawyer Albion Winegar Tourgée. Tourgée argued that the exact wording of the statue was “all persons who may apply for admission to practice as attorneys,” and that surely Tabitha Ann Holton was included in “all persons.” Tourgée also argued that other states had adopted explicit wording permitting women to serve as lawyers, and that according to decisions made in the state constitutional convention of 1868 that “any person having license to practice in the highest courts of any other State, shall be admitted to practice.” Allegedly, the justices present deliberated for just 10 minutes before electing to allow Holton the right to take the bar exam. Holton passed, and was granted her license to practice law on January 8, 1878.

Tabitha Holton practiced law alongside her brother Samuel, and largely left courtroom appearances to men while she performed research work and built cases. She died in 1886 of tuberculosis, was buried in what is now High Point at a Quaker church, and is remembered through a memorial on the courthouse grounds in Dobson, North Carolina.

03/15/2023

Humphry Smith was cast in goal [jail] several times for "witnessing unto the living Truth," and he died in Wi******er Goal 360 years ago this month. Among the testimonies about him in this book is one written by George Fox, dated 8th of 11th month, 1682.

03/03/2023

Did you know that we have several guides on our website? For Friends' meetings, we have a list of current holdings and a pdf guide on how to send us records. There's a guide for Quaker genealogy, and a list of cemeteries with resources.

LibGuides: Quaker Records: Home

02/16/2023

Guilford College won the NAIA national championship 50 years ago! The 1972-73 men's basketball team is being honored with a reunion this weekend, including a banquet Feb. 17 and half-time recognition at the Quakers' game Feb. 18. Come out and celebrate!
More info: https://www.guilford.edu/news/2023/01/guilford-celebrate-50th-anniversary-naia-title?fbclid=IwAR3yPmS3G15OgPFGXLp6L9L5F7wB57gkqHT9S1pgcxlPKdY5MLv9yM_ouhc

02/08/2023

The fun things you find in old books!
Benedick Macy was born the 30th of the 9 mo 1811
Anna Macy was born the 2th of 6 mo. 1814
(translating the thorn as its intended "the," not "ye.")
Thaddeus Macy's Book bought in Philadelphia
price $1

On the flyleaf and endpapers of Thomas Clarkson's 'A Portraiture of Quakerism ... ,' vol. 2, 1808 edition.

01/27/2023

Feb. 10-11: Afro-American History and Genealogical Society, Piedmont-Triad chapter, will celebrate 25 years with a gala banquet Friday, and a very affordable and full genealogy conference on Saturday.

AAHGS - Piedmont Triad Chapter Celebrates 25 Years of Existence with its 20th Banquet & Conference

01/26/2023

Nothing like getting to visit 300+ year-old records! The minutes and records of Pasquotank Monthly Meeting, later called Symons Creek, range from about 1699 to 1854. These two books are the Records (births, deaths, and marriages), volumes III and IV, starting in 1809.

01/19/2023

Dear F/friends,

We are proud to announce the 2023 Black Quaker Lives Matter Film Festival & Forum, a groundbreaking exploration of Black Friends who made a difference throughout both USA and world history.

Register for free on our website here: https://www.theblackquakerproject.org/2023-film-festival-forum

This year’s festival-forum features themes of importance to African American Quakers and others concerned with truth and justice: abolition, retrospective justice/reparations, freedom, education, Black-White relations, non-violence, and anti-violence in response to systemic violence. Our honorees range from 20th century trailblazing Friends of African Descent back to early Quakers of Color who are too often forgotten. Some of their stories will challenge Friends to consider what defines a Quaker, as we examine the lives of extraordinary people of color who were Friends in all but name, and ask ourselves what may have prevented or deterred them from joining the Religious Society of Friends. Our festival-forum begins on 4 February, in recognition of Black History Month, continues through Women’s History Month in March, and ends on 8 April with a special celebration of the momentous 125th birthday of prolific artist and human rights activist Paul Robeson, a descendant of over 200 years of Quakers.

Screenings will be held over Zoom every other Saturday at 1:00 PM Eastern Time and will feature post-screening dialogues between invited guest experts, hosted by festival-forum director and curator Dr. Harold D. Weaver. We are honored to have eminent scholar-activists, writers, and historians, some of whom are descendants of our honorees, participating in this year’s dialogues, which will conclude with Q & A sessions open to our audience.

01/04/2023

We mourn the loss of former Quaker Archives librarian/archivist, author, and generous donor Damon Hickey.

Damon Douglas Hickey, 80, of Wooster, died on Monday, December 26, 2022 at his home. He was born on October 30, 1942 in Houston, TX, the second of...

12/20/2022

Early did not celebrate Christmas, believing that every day was equally a Day unto the Lord. Many recent, 20th- and 21st-century Friends embrace the holiday, some celebrating in a simple style.

Hege Library and the Quaker Archives are closed until January 9 for semester break. Enjoy your holidays!

Decorations from college president Kyle Farmbry's annual breakfast, with the library's bust of Shakespeare looking over our model of Founder's Hall.

12/13/2022

Meet one of our wonderful student staff. Taylor Calloway '23 is with us a few hours each week assisting with college archives projects.

Drawn to Guilford College for its values and the opportunity to have close relationships with professors, Taylor Calloway ’23 aspires to be a professor.

12/09/2022

Thank you to former staff Damon Hickey and Rachel Miller (and their very generous spouses) for giving back in such a meaningful way and to Carole Treadway for being the type of colleague who has given so much to us all through her decades stewarding the Quaker Archives.

Damon and Mary Hicks have made a $500,000 endowment challenge gift to Guilford in honor of Carole Edgerton Treadway, a Guilford archivist. Read more.

11/17/2022

The library and Quaker Archives will be closed all next week. Wishing you all safe travels and a great Thanksgiving break!

11/10/2022

A video of last week's "Quaker Jubilee," as multiple yearly meetings celebrated 350 years of Quakers in North Carolina.

This is a more complete version than the live stream being that we lost internet 3 times. This was recorded to the computer except the first 17 minutes. Pl...

10/19/2022

Our condolences go out to the family of Ray Treadway, husband of 62 years to former archives librarian Carole Treadway.

View Ray Theodore Treadway's obituary, send flowers and sign the guestbook.

10/13/2022

Looking forward to this afternoon's workshop and tonight's session with "Dr. No" on George Fox's visit to N.C., and the "motley residents of the Albemarle" who lived there 350 years ago.

10/12/2022

Enjoyed Conference of Quaker Historians and Archivists first 2022 session, about Quaker history in graphic novels, including history of under-represented people and culture.

10/10/2022

Noeleen McIlvenna, author of 'A Very Mutinous People: The Struggle for North Carolina, 1660–1713,' speaks this Thursday about George Fox's visit to North Carolina 350 years ago - at 7pm in the Carnegie Room in Hege Library. Here's a little intro:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lr8PkKU2Wlc&t=166s

Dr. Noeleen McIlvenna is an Associate Professor of History and Director of the Social Science Education program at Wright State University. She is passionat...