Scope and Content Note
The papers of Lucretia Rudolph Garfield (1832-1918), First Lady of the United States as wife of President James A. Garfield (1831-1881), span the years 1807-1958, with the bulk relating most specifically to her dating from 1844 until 1918. The collection includes correspondence, genealogical papers, biographical material, addresses, articles, photographs, clippings, financial matter, scrapbooks, memorial poetry, and other papers relating to the Garfield family. The collection is organized in twelve series: Family Correspondence I ; Family Correspondence II ; Special Correspondence ; General Correspondence and Other Papers ; Writings, Diaries, Drafts, and Other Memorabilia ; Miscellany ; Financial Papers ; Scrapbooks ; Other Memorial and Biographical Material ; Abram Garfield Papers ; Irvin McDowell Papers ; and Stanley-Brown Family Papers .
Lucretia Garfield's papers reflect her early interest in the Disciples of Christ Church, in art and literature, in civic and political affairs, in current events, in the careers and families of her children, and in woman's rights. She was dedicated to preserving the record of her husband's career as an army officer, congressman, and president; she maintained and improved their Mentor, Ohio, home, "Lawnfield," that became a museum. She worked assiduously at caring for her husband's papers, aided in publishing his Works of James Abram Garfield, and in 1912 began helping the biographer Theodore Clarke Smith.
Although Lucretia Garfield lived quietly, her correspondence reflects some social life, especially when she visited members of her family in Washington. Her political convictions were originally Republican, but her interest was awakened by the Progressivism of her son James Rudolph Garfield's friend, Theodore Roosevelt. Towards the end of her life she was an admirer of her son Harry Augustus Garfield's friend, Woodrow Wilson.
The general correspondence bulks largest for the period of the eighty days of the president's fatal illness; most of these letters mainly give evidence of the interest and affection of the American people. Letters from prominent people during this period are in the special correspondence .
Among the most significant correspondence is Lucretia Garfield's long correspondence with her children and their families. These communications seem fairly complete except for the letters she wrote to her daughter, Mary Garfield Stanley-Brown; they apparently were not preserved. Lucretia's correspondence with Harry Augustus Garfield and James Rudolph Garfield is contained in their collections of papers, which can also be consulted in the Manuscript Division.
The financial papers show Lucretia Garfield's generosity to her family, her philanthropy, and the expense of maintaining homes in Ohio and California; they include the records of the Garfield Fund raised by the American people for the benefit of the president's widow and children and administered by the United States Trust Company.
The great amount of scrapbook and other printed material resulted from Garfield's published request, made shortly after the president was shot, that anything printed about her husband be sent to her. The bound scrapbooks are numbered 39-63; scrapbooks numbered 1-38 are in the president's papers.
Among the prominent or frequent correspondents in the collection are James Gillespie Blaine, Almeda Booth, Cyrus W. Field, John Hay, Robert Todd Lincoln, James Russell Lowell, Whitelaw Reid, Almon Ferdinand Rockwell, Rebecca Selleck, David G. Swaim, and Victoria, Queen of Great Britain. There are a few letters from presidents or their wives including Frances Folsom Cleveland, Julia Dent Grant, Benjamin Harrison, Rutherford Birchard Hayes, William McKinley, Sara Childress Polk, James K. Polk, and Julia Gardiner Tyler. Among literary correspondents are Frances Hawks Cameron Burnett, William Dean Howells, and Alfred Tennyson, Baron Tennyson.
The papers of Abram Garfield (1872-1958), youngest son of the president, are fragmentary, but include correspondence and addresses and articles giving evidence of his interest in architecture, city planning, politics, American history, the work of the blind, and the preservation of family papers; they extend from 1881 to 1958.
There are obvious gaps in the Lucretia Rudolph Garfield Papers, for she had a unique frank authorizing her to receive as well as send mail free and she doubtless received many letters not worthy of preservation. Others which perhaps should have been preserved were probably destroyed. In accordance with the request of the Presidential Papers Section, Manuscript Division, anything that may have been seen by the president has been withdrawn to be indexed and microfilmed with his papers. The inevitable commingling of family correspondence requires that these papers be examined in conjunction with those of other members of the family: President James A. Garfield, Harry Augustus Garfield, and James Rudolph Garfield.