These are copies of letters, chiefly relating to the American Philosophical Society, from Peter S. Du Ponceau, John Vaughan, and James Mease. There are a few original letters, one to Benjamin Franklin Peale.

Relating especially to American Philosophical Society business, these papers contain letters to and from men of science and institutions in Europe on the purchase and shipment of books and on the pubications of the Society. Many of the letters are to or from John Vaughan.

This is a small group of letters written to Johann Ambrosius Beurer, J. von Sprehelson, and Christoph Jacob Trew.

The letters in this small collection concern the Smithsonian Institution, the Colorado Territory, and Humboldt's observations, among many other topics.

This volume includes several printed and manuscript items related to the death of Caspar Wistar, in January 1818.

This is primarily a collection of letters and manuscripts sent to Wistar by prominent men who were among his many correspondents. These documents reflect his broad interests, including botany, paleontology, medicine, the American Philosophical Society, and André Michaux's plans for exploring the Missouri.

Principal correspondents in the lettes of John Fries Frazer include Alexander Dallas Bache, Louis Agassiz, Joseph Henry, and Titian Ramsay Peale who discuss mainly general scientific topics, although personal and family matters are discussed with Bache. Topics include the University of Pennsylvania, boiler explosions, chemistry, education, the National Academy of Sciences, the Smithsonian Institution, fossils, magnetism, solar eclipses, the American Philosophical Society, weights and measures, the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, scientific instruments, the American Civil War, electricity, the United States Mint, the Franklin Institute, scientists of the period, natural history, and publications.

Consists of material chiefly on natural history, shells, and insects, including miscellaneous notes on conchology by Say; photostats of 6 letters from Say to Jacob Gilliams, 1819-1829, from Morristown, New Jersey; and a biographical note on Say. The drawings and impressions of shells are by Mrs. Lucy Way Sistaire Say, prepared for W. G. Binney's edition of Say's complete works on conchology, 1858; also Mrs. Say's refutation of what she considered an unfair attack in George Ord's memoir of Say. Correspondents include André Etienne Férussac, Arthur F. Gray, John Lawrence LeConte, and Charles W. Short. An additional item is a memorial volume (ca. 150 pp.), including a family genealogy and land surveys in watercolor (B Sa95f).

This material relates to Alexander B. Grosart's biography of Wilson. There are notes and copies of letters and documents, including a copy of Wilson's will. There is one poem by Wilson, "The Last Wish," and an 1806 letter to William Bartram.

The primary correspondence (ca. 65 letters) is with William Cooper (1798-1864) on Bonaparte's publications, especially "American Ornithology" and "Observations on the Nomenclature of Wilson's Ornithology," but also included are many references to American and European men of science and learned societies. There are also letters to Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, George Robert Gray, Titian Ramsay Peale, and Wilhelm P. S. Rüppell.

Correspondence from Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon to Thomas Birch, and Nevil Maskelyne to Charles Mason, relating to the survey, and the transits of Venus (1761,1769).

These are primarily papers relating to the work of the United States Army Corps of Topographical Engineers, with special reference to surveys of harbors of the eastern United States. Some papers and letters relate to natural history and are addressed to John Lawrence LeConte. Correspondents include Rutherford B. Hayes, Joseph Henry, Daniel Parker, and E.G. Squier.

This collection contains miscellaneous letters and papers relating to explorations of South America, Cuba, and Mexico; scientific investigations; Latin American antiquities and linguistics; and publications. There are also copies of 26 letters from Humboldt to Pierre Hyacinth Azais and Jules Berger de Xivrey, from originals at the Duke University Medical Center Library.

The collection of about 850 items covers the period from 1782 to c. 1936, with the bulk dating to the 1780s to 1840s. The collection is divided into four series. Series I contains correspondence relating to a wide variety of topics, including French and English politics, business, trade, religious matters, and personal affairs. Many of the items are letters of introduction. There is also information on John Vaughan's immigration to America, Joseph Priestley, vaccines and inoculation (with Jefferson's comments on the same), Vaughan's business in Philadelphia, and the American Philosophical Society. Also included in this series are 2 boxes with copies of Vaughan correspondence as well as miscellaneous notes by E. W. Madeira, gathered in the course of his research on Vaughan in the 1930s. Series II consists of three volumes. Included are two of Vaughan's commonplace books. One, entitled, "J. Vaughan's book," May 17, 1779 (47 pp., in Latin; 870/L34), includes mostly Latin notations. The other commonplace book, dated 1783 (ca. 66 pp.; B V 462.c), includes comments on several prominent Americans, such as Benjamin Rush and David Rittenhouse, as well as American society generally. The third volume is a copybook with thirty letters spanning the period 1784 to 1801 (B V462.1). Series III includes material relating to Vaughan's administration of the estate of the Philadelphia merchant Samuel Merrick, 1796-1822 (Vaughan-Merrick Papers, B V462.m; 2 boxes). Series IV consists of correspondence between Vaughan and the DuPont Co. for which he served as agent (B V462.4; photocopies of 73 letters).

This collection contains mostly entomological material, with much information on the description and identification of particular insects, entomological collections, and the study of entomology in Europe and the United States. In addition, there are materials on medicine and hospitals during the American Civil War, on the Corps of Topographical Engineers, the United States Army, on natural history in the United States, and on the LeConte's family. Some letters are written to President Rutherford B. Hayes and concern the Commissionership of Agriculture, for which LeConte was considered, but not appointed. Letters of John Eatton LeConte and Joseph LeConte are included.

This collection of Robert Patterson family papers is composed primarily of the letters of Robert Maskell Patterson (1787-1854, APS 1809), but includes some of the business and personal papers of his father, Robert Patterson (1743-1824, APS 1783), and a series of letters written from Europe in 1855 by Helen Patterson Robins (1825-1919).

Letters (including some transcripts and photostats) from and to Vaughan from many American and British correspondents, including: Also personal correspondence and business papers of Benjamin, Charles, Petty, Samuel Sr., Samuel Jr., William, William Oliver, and Sarah Vaughan (2 boxes); lectures, mostly in shorthand (3 vols.); a large number of notes and memoranda on a wide variety of topics, such as agriculture, architecture, astronomy, diplomacy, diseases, dueling, electricity, hieroglyphs, internal improvements, medicine, meteorology, land, manufactures, politics, punctuation, religion, silk-manufacturing, stock-breeding, taxation, Unitarianism, Benjamin Franklin, John Locke, Napoleon I, Joseph Priestley, Bowdoin College, town of Hallowell, Maine; notes on the peace negotiations, 1782-1783; miscellaneous legal papers; genealogy of the Abbott-Vaughan families. For a personal account of the collection, see Mrs. Mary Vaughan Marvin, "The Benjamin Vaughan Papers," APS Proceedings 95 (1951): 246-249.

A Sachem and Civil War adjutant to Ulysses Grant, Ely Samuel Parker was an important figure in the Seneca Indian nation during the first half of the nineteenth century. Trained as an engineer, Parker was deeply involved in the Senecas' land disputes with the Ogden Land Company and he played an important role in interpreting Seneca culture for a white audience, most notably as a consultant for Lewis Henry Morgan. Collected by Arthur C. Parker, the Ely Samuel Parker Papers include correspondence, manuscripts, and printed materials relating primarily to Seneca affairs, history, language, and culture, as well as politics, education, engineering, and the Civil War. Among Parker's correspondents were Henry Clay, Millard Fillmore, Henry M. Flagler, Lewis Henry Morgan, Henry Rowe Schoolcraft, Daniel Webster, and Asher Wright. Several letters relate to Parker's service as engineer of public buildings in Galena, Illinois, and to his Masonic activities. Among the noteworthy items in the collection are several essays on Seneca history and culture, a fragment of Parker's diary, 1847, and a significant quantity of material on the Seneca language assembled by Asher Wright.

An important 18th century radical republican theorist and political writer, Thomas Paine was a leading figure in the American Revolution. Despite his humble beginnings and lack of formal education, his reasoned and persuasive writings not only influenced nascent American republican ideology, but profoundly affected the perception of government in England and France as well. His three most influential works are Common Sense (1776), The Rights of Man (1791-1792), and The Age of Reason (1794, 1795, 1807). The Richard Gimbel Collection is a heterogeneous mix of items connected only by the fact that they were all collected by Gimbel (1898-1970) and that most were written by, to, or about the revolutionary Paine. Of primary importance are the approximately sixty-five letters or manuscripts in Paine's own hand, including Paine's 1776 manuscript notes for Common Sense, his letter of January 10, 1781, in which he takes leave of his former commanding officer, Nathanael Greene, and his January 6, 1789 letter to Kitty Nicholson Few, in which he writes of his view of matrimony and other personal matters. The collection includes a series of correspondence between Thomas Paine and Samuel Adams, which were originally marked "forgeries," these appear instead simply to be the letters of two men bearing famous names.

John James Audubon (1785-1851), the American Woodsman, is a legendary naturalist and bird artist. His technique of painting North American birds dramatically as they appeared in their natural habitat was a major contribution to the emerging discipline of ornithology in the nineteenth century. His masterpiece, The Birds of America (1827-1838), elephant folio, was followed by a companion text edition, Ornithological Biography (1831-1849), a smaller octavo edition of Birds (1840-1844) and The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America, published posthumously. This collection of original letters of publication information, ornithology, and some personal notes was sent primarily to Lucy Bakewell Audubon, his wife, from 1826-1834, and to Victor Gifford Audubon, his son, from 1833-1834, 1840-1844, with some sporadic contact with both between 1836-1839. Items in the collection relate to Audubon's Florida, Great Egg Harbor, and Great Pine Forest expeditions but not to his final expedition up the Missouri River. Of particular note, letters of 1833 and 1834 contain references to his response to the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia president George Ord's attacks on his credibility. A partial journal entry from New Orleans in 1821 and a few letters to other correspondents, including John Bachman, round out the material.