Scope and Content Note
The Puerto Rican Collection spans the years 1591-1900, with the bulk of the material dating from 1750 to 1898. The papers are in Spanish with some English. The papers contain documents from the Spanish colonial government of Puerto Rico including financial material reflecting budgets, data on imports and exports, and taxation, military papers from the War Ministry, and orders and decrees from the Spanish government. A wide variety of other papers document other aspects of Spanish colonial Puerto Rico including items concerning slavery, political prisoners, registration of foreigners, the fortifications of “El Morro” in San Juan, baptismal records, and politics. Many of these items had belonged to the Puerto Rican writer, historian, and government official Cayetano Coll y Toste and relate to his research interests. A very few items, mostly concerning education, date from after the Spanish-American War and the subsequent American occupation of Puerto Rico.