Scope and Content Note
The papers of William Gibbs McAdoo (1863-1941) span the years 1786-1941, with the bulk of the material concentrated in the period 1880-1941. The collection documents McAdoo's career as a lawyer and businessman in Tennessee and New York, United States secretary of the treasury and director general of railroads in the United States Railroad Administration during the Woodrow Wilson presidential administration, and United States senator from California. It also documents his role in Democratic Party politics in the 1920s and retirement from politics. The papers are organized into eleven series: Early Family Correspondence and Related Material; Family Correspondence and Related Material; General Correspondence; Letterbooks; Wilson-McAdoo Correspondence; Subject File; Speech, Article, and Book File; Scrapbooks; Miscellany; Addition; and Oversize.
Correspondents include leaders of the Democratic Party for the three decades following 1911 as well as figures from various professions. Woodrow Wilson and members of his cabinet are prominent among the correspondents. Early material includes correspondence of the Floyd, McAdoo, and Gibbs families.