Collections : [Rare Book & Manuscript Library]

Correspondence, notes, drafts, research files, printed material, etc.

Field notebooks detailing the customs and ceremonies of the Native American Hopi tribe, collected by Elsie Worthington Clews Parsons, PhD (1874-1941). Thirty of these volumes were the notebooks of Alexander M. Stephen (d. 1894), a U.S. Army officer who, in about 1882, started observing Hopi life. Although chiefly concerned with the Hopis, there are some notes on Hopi-Navajo relations and a few references to the Native American Tewa and Hokya tribes. Stephen's penciled notes and drawings were edited and published by Dr. Parsons as the Hopi journal of Alexander M. Stephen (New York: Columbia University Press, 1936). Also included are three unpublished notebooks of observations made by a young American physician with the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), Jeremiah Sullivan (1850-1916), who lived among the Hopis (1881-1888) in the village of Sichomovi. A letter from anthropologist Alfred L. Kroeber, PhD (1876-1960) to Dr. Parsons explains the provenance of one of Sullivan's notebooks. These last three notebooks [Vols. 31-33] have also been attributed to Alexander M. Stephen by Alex Patterson (February 1994). [See, Alex Patterson's full note at subseries I.2. Jeremiah Sullivan (Vols. 31-33).]

Correspondence, manuscripts, and notes. This collection contains the manuscripts for most of his books and articles. There are also copies of his many book reviews and articles by other authors analyzing the impact of his interpretations of American history. The correspondents include: H.S. Commager, C. Vann Woodward, Stuart Bruchey, S.E. Morison, Clarence Ver Steeg, Alfred A. Knopf, Helen Frankenthaler, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., and others. There are also 70 books from his library