This commonplace book is filled mostly with poetry and quotations from printed materials.

Printed version of Hopkinson's poem illustrated with pen and ink sketches. Contains 22 pen and ink sketches by B.F.Bensel.

These are letters of William Hewson, Mary Stevenson Hewson, and Thomas Tickell Hewson, chiefly to members of the family on personal affairs. There are also a transcript of a draft of William Hewson's account of his quarrel with Dr. William Hunter and a letter from Barbeu Du Bourg to Mary Stevenson Hewson.

These papers contain seven letters to his wife (1808-1833), a fragment of autobiography on his painting and studies, a notebook containing copies of correspondence about his portrait of Washington, John Godman's Ode suggested by Rembrandt Peale's National Portrait of Washington (1824), and a commonplace book containing kitchen and medicinal recipes.

Papers of Stephen Laurent, son of Joseph Laurent (1839-1917), Chief of the St. Francis Abnakis and author of New Familiar Abenaki and English Dialogues (1884), and grandson of Joseph Laurent, also chief. Primarily contains outgoing letters from Stephen Laurent's wife, Margaret Fisher, to her family, and miscellaneous documentation relation to Laurent's activities as an interpreter of Abenaki history in New Hampshire. The main Abenaki language material in the collection is found in one catechism and prayer book in Abenaki from 1846 by Joseph Marrault, a Jesuit.

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 correspondence (1869-1883) is primarily routine business, i.e. navy orders and letters of recommendation, and also includes some personal letters. In addition, there are several notebooks and diaries, including notes from Pennsylvania Hospital clinical lectures, 1867-1869 (2 v.); diaries, 1865-1875 (7 v.); a volume of poetry; and general study notes. There is also early material (1745-1813) on the Cassin family, including a letter of indenture dated 1758.

The collection consists of correspondence, notes, memoranda, extracts from publications, reprints, drafts of essays, poems, magazine and newspaper articles, comic strips, popular songs, and other material on bioluminescence, collected principally between 1945-1959 for his History of Luminescence from the Earliest Times until 1900 (American Philosophical Society Memoirs 44, 1957). Other topics are chemistry, military medicine, natural history, and professional associations.

Reel one contains account books, including Agness Minshall (1784-1810), Jacob Minshall (1773-1818), Enos Painter (1802-1863), Minshall Painter (1842-1873), and John J. Tyler (1890-1910). Reel two contains almanacs, receipts, and bank books of Jacob Minshall (1843-1877), Enos Painter (1852-1854), Minshall Painter (1840-1873), and John J. Tyler. Reel three contains day books for Minshall Painter and Jacob Minshall, Mathew Carey's "Account of the Yellow Fever Epidemic," Society of Friends burial records for the Middletown Friends' Meeting graveyard (1787-1859), and complaints against the Painter family (1699-1807), genealogies of the Dutton family, Painter family, Tyler family, Minshall family, and Gilpin family, and journals of travels of John J. Tyler (1841-1900). Reel four contains miscellaneous records on observations of the Liberal File (1853-1856) and a women's rights meeting (1851), an essay by Oran Hazard on slavery (1796), taxes for the Enos Painter estate (1864-1873), and travel guides of the United States and Canada (1844, 1874). Reels five and six contain the shelf list cards for the John J. Tyler Arboretum Library.

This collection includes correspondence to and from Boskovic; a travel journal in Europe; and a large number of manuscripts on astronomy, hydrography, hydro-mechanics, mathematics, geometry, mechanics, and optics; and a volume of poetry.

This collection includes letters, diaries, notebooks, and early photographs, relating primarily to the Wister family of Germantown and Philadelphia. Much of the correspondence concerns domestic news and consists of letters from or to Sarah Wister. These include interesting observations on Germantown and Philadelphia society from other families as well, such as the Bayntons and Bullocks. There are numerous letters from various Wisters, including Casper, Charles Jones, Elizabeth (including a journal of a trip to Bristol, 1783), Hannah, John, Owen Jones, and others. There is also poetry by Sarah.

The manuscripts of father William Mitchell and daughter Maria Mitchell are not easily separated, and are treated here together. The collection includes William Mitchell's autobiography, his memoir of Judge Walter Folger of Nantucket, astronomical and meteorological observations, lectures, family and other correspondence.

Personal and professional correspondence of the chemist Robert Hare, including drafts of letters to editors of journals on such varied topics as fish guano, slaughterhouses, paper money, and the meaning of the term "Yankee annexations." The collection originally contained over 300 scrolls, since disbound, which contained drafts of letters, essays, and lectures, composed by Hare on ordinary sheets of paper, then pasted end to end, and rolled up. The essay and lecture topics include: chemistry, storms, slavery, currency, fire-fighting, capital punishment, railroads, the Smithsonian Institution, Michael Faraday, religion and Spiritualism, riots in Philadelphia, epidemics, underwater blasting, and Ralph W. Emerson; there is some verse. The collection also contains an account book of Hare and his wife, 1806-1829 (180 pp.; B/H22#3); a volume by Hare on Cyclones (tornadoes), n.d. (ca. 60 pp.; B/H22#4); and Samuel Powel, Jr.'s "Short notes on a course of antiquities at Rome... under M. Byre Antiquarian," 1764. (60 pp.).

After a brief career in the Congregational church, J. Peter Lesley (1819-1903) left the ministry in 1852 to work full-time as a geologist. Having gained experience in structural geology and stratigraphy with the First Pennsylvania Geological Survey (1836-1842), Lesley became an expert in the geology of coal, working for the Pennsylvania Railroad and other corporations and conducting some of the first systematic studies of the state's hydrocarbon resources. A long-time professor at the University of Pennsylvania, he was elected to the APS in 1856, serving variously as its librarian, secretary, and vice president, and he was selected as Director of the Second Pennsylvania Geological Survey (1875-1889). The Lesley Papers include letters to and from Peter Lesley and his wife, Susan on geology, coal and iron mining, abolition, educational reform, organized charity, and Unitarianism. The collection offers important insight into academic and applied geology in late 19th century Pennsylvania, the development of the coal and iron industries, as well as into the Lesleys' progressive social and intellectual milieu. It is divided into three series: Lesley's general correspondence, his correspondence with his brother Joseph, and microfilms of Lesley's research notes.