Manuscripts include the papers of Elias Hicks, of Lucretia Mott and other Quaker related individuals and families.
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College was established in 1871 to collect, preserve and make available the documentary records of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers). Library and archival repository for books, archives, manuscripts, pamphlets, periodicals, photographs and other images of the Religious Society of Friends, including the archival records of New York Yearly Meeting, P
hiladelphia Yearly Meeting and Baltimore Yearly Meeting (shared with Haverford), Friends General Conference, Friends World Committee, and other Quaker yearly meetings and organizations. Anyone is welcome to visit, but we are open by appointment only. Appointments can be requested via our website.
One of our former Black History & Genealogy Fellows, Zahara Martinez '23, has just published an article about her work with Whitney Grinnage-Cassidy '24 creating a dataset of manumissions in our collection (based on methodology developed at Haverford College Quaker & Special Collections). Read all about it here! https://jsdp.enslaved.org/fullDataArticle/volume5-issue3-quaker-manumissions-in-the-northeast-and-midatlantic/
We're saddened to be sharing this news of the passing of Jim Hazard. Probably the most dedicated volunteer in all of FHL's 150+ year history, he spent decades here creating a monumental genealogy index rivaled only by the work of W.W. Hinshaw. Generations of historians and genealogists studying Quakers will be in his debt. Moreover, he was a delight to have around the library - "full of beans" (as he used to say) until the end. https://www.longwoodfuneralhome.com/obituary/James-Hazard
Have you ever used QuakerMeetings.com? We’re happy to announce that FHL has partnered with the Friends Collection of Earlham College to give the site a refresh!
QuakerMeetings.com began as a passion project of Quaker historian Thomas C. Hill, and was his attempt to create a comprehensive database of all current and historical monthly meetings in North America. Hill’s assiduous efforts over the course of three decades made the site an invaluable resource for researchers in Quaker history. However, the project went dormant after Hill’s passing in 2021.
In an effort to keep this resource around, Friends Historical Library and Earlham’s Friends Collection have joined forces to revive and revitalize the website. We’ve worked together to redo the site’s front end, and going forward we hope to do some collaborative maintenance of the monthly meeting data.
You can explore the refurbished site for yourself at quakermeetings.com!
"Monthly Meetings in North America: A Quaker Index"
FHL is participating in a project to digitize records we hold relating to Quaker Indian Boarding Schools. To learn more about the historical context and how to become involved in repairing past harms, join this webinar. https://friendspeaceteams.org/qibs-presentation-jul-24/
History-minded friends might be interested in joining this worthy project! An upcoming Friends Peace Teams North America webinar will explain more. Link in comments.
We seek to nurture a global human society that prioritizes the well-being of people over profit, and lives in right relationship with our Earth; a peaceful world with fulfilling employment, clean air and water, renewable energy, and healthy thriving communities and ecosystems. (Facing the Challenge of Climate Change A shared statement by Quaker groups January 2015) https://www.quaker.org.uk/documents/quaker-statement-on-climate-change---november-2015_0
"We dedicate ourselves to let the living waters flow through us – where we live, regionally, and in wider world fellowship. We dedicate ourselves to building the peace that passeth all understanding, to the repair of the world, opening our lives to the Light to guide us in each small step."
(The Kabarak Call for Peace and Ecojustice The Kabarak Call for Peace and Ecojustice was approved on 24 April 2012 at the Sixth World Conference Friends, held at Kabarak University, Kenya) https://www.quaker.org.uk/documents/kabarak-call
I believe that even though we Quakers are few in this world, the three great environmental crises cannot be solved without our organized help...
If we act while remaining faithful to our calling, if we draw upon the wisdom that has accumulated in our sect through three hundred years of seasoning, we need not be anxious about results. The Voice in our hearts will guide us; we'll let it speak through us, and we'll find what it says will be welcomed. After all, we're on the side of the whole. And the whole world hungers to be at peace with nature. We can trigger a change away from suffering, to life'.
(Marshall Massey of Mountain View Friends Meeting, The Defense of the Peaceable Kingdom, Pacific Yearly Meeting, 1985, pp. 21 and 28)
The produce of the earth is a gift of our gracious Creator to the inhabitants, and to impoverish the earth now, to support outward greatness, appears to be an injury to the succeeding age'. (John Woolman, A Journal of the Life, Gospel Labours, and Christian Experiences of That Faithful Minister of Jesus Christ, John Woolman. New edition / edited by John Comly. Philadelphia: Chapman, 1837, p. 364)
FHL has been thinking about Earth Day a lot this year, especially about archives and sustainability. FHL's Jordan Landes and Swarthmore student Lindsey Turner ‘25 worked as part of the year-long President’s Sustainability Research Fellowship to research sustainability in library and archive buildings and make recommendations for McCabe Library, the home of FHL. In collaboration with Facilities Management, peer institutions, architects, and archive staff, they installed 22 new data loggers and discovered the current and future infrastructural needs of a sustainable and accessible archive in the 21st century. We've learned so much and have a much better understanding of how we can work toward a more sustainable archive! College Libraries Swarthmore Sustainability
Don't miss this exciting opportunity to hear a lecture by FHL's former Director, Jerry Frost!
Join the Friends Historical Association in celebrating the 400th anniversary of George Fox’s birth with a focus on his contemporary, arguably the second most important leader in the early Quaker movement: William Penn.
Will you be in view of the 4/8/2024 eclipse? As you're marveling at the natural wonder, marvel also at the scientific expertise of Benjamin Banneker (1731-1806). One of the first African American scientists of renown, he correctly predicted the solar eclipse of April 14, 1789. Born free in Maryland, Banneker went on to publish almanacs based on his own calculations and was on the surveying team that laid out the city of Washington, D.C. Banneker attended a Quaker school, was a friend of the Quaker Ellicott family, dressed in Quaker garb, and attended Quaker meetings for worship. This book about Banneker was written by Martha Ellicott Tyson, one of the founders of Swarthmore College, who remembered Banneker from her girlhood.
Exciting funding opportunity
📣Now is the time!📣 The application period for Friends Historical Association 2024-2025 grants is now open. There are three grant opportunities for contributions to the field of Quaker history: project support, publication subventions, and research funds. All opportunities run on the same cycle, and applications are due May 15, 2024. Details about each opportunity and application instruction are provided at https://www.quakerhistory.org/grants
⏰Time is running out to apply for our research fellowship! Applications are due April 1
Applications are now open for the 2024-2025 Fellowship Cycle. Applications are due April 1, 2024.The Margaret W. Moore and John M. Moore Research Fellowship provides a stipend to promote research that uses the resources of the Friends Historical Library and/or the Swarthmore College Peace Collection...
234 years ago today, Rep. William Loughton Smith of South Carolina gave a long speech in defense of enslavement in Congress. Having taken offense to the petitions to ban the slave trade submitted (one submitted by the Pennsylvania Society for the Abolition of Slavery and one by Quakers from Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, New York, and western New England), Smith not only attacked the petition, he spoke out against Quakers, conflating them with Shakers at least once in his speech. A well known line from the speech is '...for better for worse, the Northern States adopted us with our slaves, and we adopted them with their Quakers'.
You can read the speech on the Library of Congress site, A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: U.S. Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774 - 1875, which has the Annals of Congress, House of Representatives, 1st Congress, 2nd Session. But save some time because it is six pages long! https://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llac&fileName=002/llac002.db&recNum=115
Black History Month may be coming to a close, but our student-created Black Genealogy website is available year-round!
Contributions to Black Genealogy Why Black Genealogy? In Summer 2022, Whitney Grinnage-Cassidy ’24 and Zahara Martinez ’23 created this site to store their work as Black Genealogy Fellows at Swarthmore College. Here, you will find a variety of resources including Quaker manumissions, 1847 Philad...
Here's a beautiful way to observe Black History Month: check out the The BlackQuaker Project's forum on Saturday featuring Peace and Conflict Studies at Swarthmore College professor Sa'ed Atshan!
It is our pleasure to partner with the BlackQuaker Project to present the 2024 Black Quaker Lives Matter Film Festival & Forum, which will take place on Zoom at 1pm EST on Saturday, February 24. This year’s event will focus on civil rights icon Bayard Rustin, whose life and legacy were explored in the 2023 Netflix biopic Rustin.
This free webinar will be hosted by BQP director Harold D. Weaver Jr. and moderated by PCS Chair and eminent Palestinian-American Quaker scholar-activist Sa’ed Atshan. With the recent release of Rustin, Quakerism and the phenomenon of African American Quakers have now gained mass-media attention, including in The New Yorker, giving Friends a rare opportunity to educate each other–and, in turn, others–about one of our most influential leaders. Sponsored again by the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), this event will explore the remarkable life and contributions of Bayard Rustin through a series of presentations from a distinguished panel of scholars and activists, a roundtable discussion led by Sa’ed Atshan, and an audience Q & A. Presenters will include terrance wiley (Africana Studies, Haverford College), Lauren Brownlee (governance leader at the Friends Committee on National Legislation), Sa’ed Atshan, and Harold D. Weaver Jr.
We strongly encourage registrants to watch Rustin on Netflix prior to attending as our forum will not include a screening. Please register here: https://buff.ly/3HNhFX8
Happy Valentine's Day! Send some love to a Friend 💌
March 9, 2024 will be the first day of issue of the Underground Railroad commemorative stamps! This series includes friends (and Friends) such as Frederick Douglass, Catharine Coffin, Laura Haviland, Harriet Tubman, and Thomas Garret, among others. Another reason that we are so excited? William Still is on one of the stamps and his image is in FHL's collections. Learn more here:
From the time slavery was introduced to the Colonies until it was abolished in 1865, enslaved people tried to escape it. Ten new stamps from the U.S. Postal Service commemorate the Underground Railroad, as their resistance efforts became known.
📢📢Calling all scholars of Quaker history, Peace history, and allied topics!📢📢 Swarthmore College Special Collections is now accepting applications for our Moore Research Fellowship for the 2024-2025 cycle.
The Margaret W. Moore and John M. Moore Research Fellowship promotes research during the academic year or summer months using the resources of the Friends Historical Library and/or the Swarthmore College Peace Collection, providing a stipend of $1,500-$6,00 to support such research. Applications are due April 1, 2024.
Please share this announcement with all who might be interested. More details and application instructions are here:
Applications are now open for the 2024-2025 Fellowship Cycle. Applications are due April 1, 2024.The Margaret W. Moore and John M. Moore Research Fellowship provides a stipend to promote research that uses the resources of the Friends Historical Library and/or the Swarthmore College Peace Collection...
If you're looking for resources on maintaining the physical structure of your meetinghouse, take a look at "Living Witnesses: The Care of Quaker Meetinghouses" (2004), newly available on our digital collections platform here: https://digitalcollections.tricolib.brynmawr.edu/node/465794
We hope to see you at the Friends Historical Association's annual meeting and lecture! We're super excited about this year's topic: "Towards a Quaker History of LGBTQ+ Inclusion and Gay Rights" by Brian Blackmore
Friends Historical Association Annual Meeting and fall lecture by Brian Blackmore
Happy World Quaker Day!!! 🥳 We're celebrating with a "Quaker Cookie Face-Off" this Friday - join us if you're in the area 😋 Details at this link: https://archivesmonthphilly.com/2023/01/01/treats-from-special-collections-october-6-2023/
Big Quaker studies conference coming up in summer 2024!
Call for papers, program and registration information, and guidelines for presenters for the Conference of Quaker Historians and Archivists.
It's a great time to stock up on Quaker studies titles!
Two-week sale! Save 40-60% on titles in Quaker Studies w/ discount code NHQ23. Sale ends 9/3: https://bit.ly/3KOQrRC
We're thrilled to announce that the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition was awarded $124,000 by National Historical Publications and Records Commission to digitize 20,000 images from Friends Historical Library at Swarthmore College and Haverford College Quaker & Special Collections
The National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition says it will digitize 20,000 archival pages related to Quaker-operated Indian boarding schools.
FHL staff went on a field trip to The Morgan Library & Museum in NYC this week! We loaned a couple of objects and were eager to see them on display in the exhibit "Nora Thompson Dean: Lenape Teacher and Herbalist." If you don't want to brave Amtrak, you can explore a lot of exhibition materials online here: https://www.themorgan.org/exhibitions/nora-thompson-dean
Today is the 175th anniversary of Seneca Falls, the first women's rights convention! Did you know that we digitized the papers of Seneca Falls organizer Lucretia Mott? Explore them here:
Title Mott Manuscripts Description Lucretia Mott was a prominent Philadelphia Quaker minister and a leader in reform movements, especially antislavery, education, peace, and women's rights. The bulk of the collection consists of material which was assembled at the time of the publication of Life and...
Congratulations to former Swarthmore College Peace Collection Curator Dr. Wendy Chmielewski!
Peace and Conflict Studies Dr. Wendy Chmielewski Awarded 2023 Anna K. Nelson Award for Archival Excellence June 26, 2023 Lee Smithey We would like to congratulate our colleague, the former Curator of the Swarthmore College Peace Collection, Dr. Wendy Chmielewski, for receiving the 2023 Anna K. Nelso...
Guilford College is raising funds to endow the Quaker Archivist position in their library. We encourage you to consider making a donation to help ensure a future where Quaker archives are abundant and accessible!
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)
We're really looking forward to this - hope to see you there! 😃
The Museum of the American Revolution's special exhibition Black Founders: The Forten Family of Philadelphia, introduces visitors to Forten and his descendants as they navigated the American Revolution and cross-racial relationships in Philadelphia to become leaders in the abolition movement in the....
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