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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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Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, 121 Wall Street, 06511
New Haven, CT
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Contact information: phone number
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001 (203) 432 2977
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Contact information: email
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beinecke.library@yale.edu
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Reference number
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GEN MSS 1475
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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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Ezra Stiles papers
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Language of title
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eng
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Creator / accumulator
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Ezra Stiles
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Date(s)
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1667/1991
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Date note
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Bulk: 1740/1795
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Language(s)
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eng
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fra
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heb
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lat
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Extent
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12.26 linear metres (89 boxes and 3 broadside)
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Type of material
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Textual Material
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Graphic Material
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Cartographic Material
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Scope and content
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This collection comprises records produced by or related to Ezra Stiles (1727-95), including correspondence, autograph manuscript writings, maps and drawings; personal papers and artefacts, family papers, and writings by others and printed material owned by Ezra Stiles or the Stiles family. As Stiles was close to some members of the Jewish community of Newport, this collection includes letters exchanged between him and some Sephardim (series 1), such as Aaron Lopez (2 letters in 1781), Jacob Rodrigues Rivera (2 letters in 1772 and 1783) and Isaac Pinto (3 letters in 1773 and 1790). Also of particular interest is the correspondence exchanged with rabbi Raphael Haim Isaac Carigal of Hebron (1729-77), who visited Curaçao (1761-63), Jamaica (1771), New York, Philadelphia and Newport (1772-73), Suriname (1773-74) and Barbados (1775). Stiles' literary diary (series 3) also contains references to the Jewish community of Newport, Rhode Island.
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Archival history
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The collection is a bequest of Ezra Stiles. Additions were acquired by gift and purchase from Stiles family descendants and other sources from circa 1805 to 2011. Detailed information regarding the acquisition of materials can be found here:
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Provenance of Additions to Stiles Bequest
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Administrative / Biographical history
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Ezra Stiles (North Haven, CT, 1727 - New Haven, CT, 1795) was a Congregational minister, theologian, educator and Hebraist. Son of Rev. Isaac Stiles, he graduated from Yale in 1746 and was ordained in 1749. In 1753, Stiles resigned from the ministry to study Law and practice in New Haven. He returned to the ministry two years later when he became pastor of the Second Congregational Church in Newport, Rhode Island.
There, Stiles served as librarian of the Redwood Library and Athenaeum. In 1764, he was one of the founders of the so-called College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, the predecessor of Brown University.
On the occasion of the visit of Rabbi Haim Isaac Carigal to Newport in 1773, Stiles struck a friendship with him and enjoyed the opportunity to improve his Hebrew. He also already had a close relationship with some members of the Jewish community of Newport, such as Aaron Lopez and Jacob Rodriguez Rivera.
In 1778, Stiles moved to New Haven after becoming the seventh president of Yale College, a position he held until he died in 1795. He introduced the study of Semitics in the College, initiated Yale Medical School and conceived the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences. By 1780, he was already a member of the American Philosophical Society and the new American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
On May 8, 1783, Stiles gave a sermon to the Connecticut General Assembly, which was later published with the title The United States Elevated to Glory and Honor. In this sermon, he compared the United States to the Biblical nation of Israel.
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System of arrangement
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The collection is organised into seven series: I) Correspondence, 1703-1903; II) Itineraries, 1760-1794; III) Literary Diary, 1769-1795; IV) Meteorological Journals, 1763-1795; V) Miscellaneous Volumes and Papers, 1667-1948; VI) Sermons, 1751-1794; VII) Information About Ezra Stiles and the Stiles Papers, 1957-1991.
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Access, restrictions
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These materials are open for research. Materials acquired from 1805 to circa 1975 are available on microfilm from Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.
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Author of the description
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Carla Vieira, 2022
