Scope and Content Note for Additions to the Collection
Additions to the Benjamin Harrison Papers have been organized as Series 21 of the collection. The Additions series comprises previously undescribed parts of the original collection and material received by the Library since 1970. It is organized in subseries according to the year each addition was processed. None of the material in the Addenda is microfilmed or indexed.
The 1979 Addition dates from 1780 to 1900 and includes mostly correspondence. It is organized in two parts: originals and photoreproductions. Each part is arranged by type of document and thereunder chronologically. Some original letters are accompanied by typewritten transcripts. Although most of the letters are from Harrison, the files also contain communications from his contemporaries such as Felix Agnus, Thomas F. Bayard, Joseph B. Carr, John M. Doane, James P. Foster, Andrew B. Humphrey, John H. Landis, Charles E. Pearce, John Rooney, James F. Secor, Jr., Charles Emory Smith, and William Henry Woods. Included among the original documents are Treasury Department records, 1889-1892; an inaugural memento, 1889; undated writings about Harrison and his family; and notes concerning politics in Indiana. The photoreproductions include a copy of the last will and testament, dated 1780, of Harrison's ancestor, Benjamin Harrison (circa 1726-1791).
The 1997 Addition contains one letter dated 1932 from Mary Lord Harrison, second wife of the president, to Emily Ryman Burlingham Bogart, and a newspaper clipping dated 1948 announcing the death of Mary Lord Harrison.
The 2020 Addition contains one letter dated 1892 from Benjamin Harrison to Mary Erringer Brown Wanamaker, written in response to a condolence letter Wanamaker sent after the death of Harrison's first wife, Caroline. Wanamaker's letter can be found in Series 16 in a scrapbook containing similar condolence letters.
The 2023 Addition contains ten pages of Tibbott transcripts of Harrison correspondence dating from January 29, 1889, to February 5, 1889, and written from Indianapolis just prior to his presidency.