Scope and Content Note
The papers of George Washington Goethals (1858-1928) span the years 1830-2014, with the bulk of the material originating between 1907 and 1927. The collection includes desk diaries, family and general correspondence, reports, memoranda, photographs, clippings, family papers, and scrapbooks. The papers are organized into eight series: Desk Diaries, Family Correspondence, General Correspondence, Subject File, Miscellany, Scrapbooks, 2021 Addition, and Oversize. The two series of correspondence dominate the collection.
The major portion of the collection concerns Goethals and the construction of the Panama Canal and his term as governor of the Panama Canal Zone. The remainder relates briefly to his service as general manager of the United States Shipping Board Emergency Fleet Corporation, his chairmanship of the board appointed to report on the Adamson Eight-Hour Law, and his tenure as fuel administrator of New York during the 1922 anthracite coal miner's strike.
Prominent correspondents include Newton Diehl Baker, John Barrett, Joseph Bucklin Bishop, William Herbert Bixby, Sol Bloom, Edward William Bok, William Edgar Borah, Josephus Daniels, Edwin Denby, Lindley M. Garrison, William Crawford Gorgas, A. W. Greely, Chester Harding, Harry F. Hodges, Robert Lansing, Henry Cabot Lodge (1850-1924), William Loeb Jr., M. O. Lorenze, Alfred Thayer Mahan, John J. Pershing, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt, Francis Bowes Sayre (1885-1972), William L. Sibert, Henry L. Stimson, William H. Taft, Joseph P. Tumulty, and Woodrow Wilson. The correspondence to and from Woodrow Wilson is found in the Subject File concerning the United States Shipping Board.
The 2021 Addition was donated by Thomas R. Goethals Jr., grandson of George W. Goethals, and is split between two major groupings. The family papers contain primarily correspondence between family members George W. Goethals and his wife Effie Rodman Goethals, their sons George Rodman Goethals and Thomas Rodman Goethals, and Thomas' wife Mary Addison Webb Goethals. A significant portion of the family papers belong to Thomas Rodman Goethals, who served as a medic in World War I and the commanding officer of the Sixth General Hospital during World War II. Of particular interest is a handwritten manuscript detailing the history of the Sixth General Hospital's activation and organization alongside the extensive correspondence between him and his father. The second grouping of the 2021 Addition contains the papers of Thomas R. Goethals Jr. The majority of these papers were collected in service of an unpublished biography written by Thomas R. Goethals Jr. for his grandfather, George W. Goethals, and includes the drafts of the biography, research, and genealogy on the Goethals family. Additional material includes correspondence, other writings on the Panama Canal and George W. Goethals, and records of donations of family papers to various institutions.