Miscellaneous Bound Manuscripts
Item
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Country
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US
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Language of name of institution
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eng
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Contact information: postal address
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1154 Boylston Street, Boston, MA 02215-3695
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Contact information: phone number
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01 (617) 536-1608 (general)
01 (617) 646-0532 (library staff)
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Contact information: email
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reference@masshist.org
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Reference number
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Misc. Bd.
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Type of reference number
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Archival reference number
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Title (official language of the state)
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Miscellaneous Bound Manuscripts
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Language of title
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eng
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Creator / accumulator
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Massachusetts Historical Society
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Language(s)
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eng
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Type of material
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Textual Material
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Scope and content
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The Miscellaneous Bound Manuscripts gather documentary materials of diverse types and provenances. Records are individually catalogued. They include letters addressed to Aaron Lopez, a Portuguese Jewish merchant operating from Newport in the 1750s-1770s, from Joseph and William Rotch, his correspondents in Nantucket, Massachusetts. The following are some examples:
Misc. Bd. 1765 February 12: Letter from Joseph Rotch to Aaron Lopez concerning supplies of whale oil.
Misc. Bd. 1762 November 25: Letter from merchants Joseph and William Rotch to Lopez concerning business matters and the status of their whaling enterprise.
Misc. Bd. 1762 October 30: Letter from Joseph and William Rotch to Lopez concerning business matters.
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Archival history
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The Miscellaneous Bound Manuscripts collection includes items acquired individually. The documents that were particularly valuable or more likely to be consulted were bound in chronological order.
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Administrative / Biographical history
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The foundation of the Massachusetts Historical Society (MHS) dates back to January 24, 1791, when Rev. Jeremy Belknap (1744-1798) invited nine like-minded Bostonians to join him in creating what they would call "The Historical Society". The founding members made the Society the first historical repository of the United States through their pledges of family papers, books, and artefacts from their collections. At the start of 1792, the Society published its first title, becoming the first North American institution to publish in its field.
Without any other American historical repositories in the 1790s, the MHS took on a broadly national role, one still apparent in its collections and publications. As other historical institutions were founded elsewhere, including the New York Historical Society in 1804 and the American Antiquarian Society in 1812, the Society started to direct special attention to Boston, Massachusetts, and New England.
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(source: MHS website)
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System of arrangement
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Records are arranged chronologically.
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Author of the description
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Carla Vieira, 2022
