Administrative Information
Acquisition Information
The papers of Gifford Pinchot, conservationist, chief forester in the United States Department of Agriculture, professor of forestry at Yale University, and governor of Pennsylvania, were given to the Library of Congress by Gifford Pinchot, Cornelia Pinchot, and the Pinchot family in several installments between 1941 and 1953. Additional material has been received through gift and transfer, 1955-1990.
Processing History
Upon arrival in the Library of Congress, the Gifford Pinchot Papers were placed in manuscript containers, with a descriptive container listing providing the only access to the collection. Substantial portions of the papers were reorganized in 1973 into a more coherent arrangement, and new series were created to bring similar material together.
In 1989 the Library of Congress, in conjunction with the United States Forest Service, undertook a cooperative project to organize and describe those portions of the Pinchot Papers that concerned the early period of the conservation movement and the first five years of the Forest Service from 1890 to 1910. Selected records and files were rearranged to document Pinchot's contribution to the founding of the conservation movement. Due to the interfiling, transposition, and removal of material that resulted from this reorganization, gaps occurred in the former sequence of arrangement of the manuscript containers. These gaps are identified in the container list by the statement "removed from collection." Final processing of this segment of the Pinchot Papers was completed in 1991. The finding aid was prepared by Wilhelmina Curry and Michael McElderry with the assistance of Jean Pablo, Francie Schroeder, and Susie Moody, and revised and expanded by Karen Linn Femia.
In addition to the rearrangement of a portion of the collection between 1989 and 1991, new material was appended in 1985 and 1998. Other revisions were made in 2007, and the finding aid was revised again in 2011.
Transfers
Architectural drawings, blueprints, maps, and photographs have been transferred to the Prints and Photographs Division and Geography and Map Division of the Library of Congress where they are identified as part of these papers. Selected financial documents, legal papers, memorabilia, photographs, and printed matter, identified by Jean Pablo during her reorganization of the Pinchot Papers, have been transferred to the Department of Agriculture.
Related Material
Related collections in the Manuscript Division include the papers of Gifford Pinchot's wife, Cornelia Bryce Pinchot, and his brother, Amos Pinchot.
Microfilm
Microfilm copies of Pinchot's diaries on four reels, his letterbooks on seven reels, and his scrapbooks on twenty-six reels are available for purchase from the Library's Photoduplication Service subject to the Copyright Law of the United States (Title 17, U.S.C.). Consult a reference librarian in the Manuscript Division concerning availability for purchase or interlibrary loan. To promote preservation of the originals, researchers are required to consult the microfilm edition.
Preferred Citation
Researchers wishing to cite this collection should include the following information: Container or reel number, Gifford Pinchot Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.