Collections: mss

Called “the Howard Hughes of the wind business,” Stanley Charren played a crucial role in the development of the modern wind power industry. A native of Providence, R.I., and an engineering graduate of Brown University (BS 1945) and Harvard (MS 1946). After marrying Peggy Walzer in 1951, who later became famous as founder of Action for Children’s Television, Charren embarked on a career that merged a penchant for innovation with an entrepreneurial streak, working with Pratt and Whitney, Fairchild, and Baldwin-Lima-Hamilton before becoming CEO of Pandel-Bradford (later Compo). Although he successfully developed products such as the swim spa and carpet squares, Charren is best remembered for his role in commercializing wind power. Taking an interest in wind during the Nixon-era energy crisis, he and his partner Russell Wolfe founded US Windpower in 1974, working on the idea of linking arrays of intermediate-sized windmills into a single power plant tied to the grid. US Wind built the world’s first wind farm in 1978, consisting of 20 units at Crotched Mountain, N.H., and after relocating to northern California in 1980 and changing name to Kenetech in 1988, the company emerged as the largest wind energy firm in the world. However the collapse of oil prices in the 1980s and federal regulatory hostility to alternative energy seriously impinged upon the company’s growth, ultimately contributing to its bankruptcy in May 1996. Charren retired from Kenetech in 1995.

The Charren Papers include scattered but valuable materials on the founding and operations of US Windpower and Kenetech, including early business plans, correspondence, technical reports, and informational brochures, along with materials documenting some of the legal challenges they faced in the 1980s and 1990s. The collection also contains ephemera relating to some of Charren’s work outside of the windpower industry.

An electron microscopist affiliated with the Sepulveda Veterans Administration Hospital, David Chase (1935-1986) was known for his skill in fixation, staining, and sectioning and for the exceptional quality of his micrographs. During his career, Chase applied his skills to produce thousands of images of the structure, ultrastructure, and morphology of prokaryotes, ranging from filamented, segmented bacteria to the flagellate Giardia, and gram-negative bacteria. In collaboration with Lynn Margulis of the UMass Amherst Department of Biology, Chase worked on a series of papers on the symbiotic flagellated protozoan communities in the hindguts of four species of California termites.

The Chase collection consists of over 1,800 TEM photos and their negatives, 134 polaroid prints, and about half a linear foot of loose notes and a register.

Mariner from Harwich, Massachusetts, who was involved in the cod and mackerel fishing industry in Barnstable County. Two account books include expenses, income, and final settlements with those involved with annual voyages of 1837 and 1848. They also contain lists of crew members and part owners, many of whom were members of the Chase family.

An attorney from Boston, Theodore Chase became a noted scholar of gravestones. He served variously as president of the New England Historic Genealogical Society, keeper of the cabinet of the Massachusetts Historical Society, and he was both a president of the Association for Gravestone Studies and editor of its annual publication, Markers.

This collection document Theodore Chase’s long involvement as an officer of the Association for Gravestone Studies during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Among other materials, the collection includes records of Board of Trustees meetings (1988-2003), materials on organizational legislation, official presidential correspondence (1981-1986), and files from Chase’s tenure as editor of Markers (1988-1992). This collection also includes a significant set of gravestone rubbings.

A resident of Brainerd, Minn., Elaine Chesley (1927-2011) was a woman of strong convictions and an activist in several causes, particularly the antifluoridation movement. As a member of Minnesotans Opposed to Forced Fluoridation in the mid-1970s, Chesley and the more strident Irene Johnson successfully prevented fluoridation of the water supply in Brainerd, and she remained active in the movement as a researcher and activist. She was also involved in several civic, environmental, and peace groups, including the League of Women Voters, the Green Party, Women Against Military Madness, the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, Brainerd Coalition for Peace, and Save Our Northland. Chesley died at the age of 84 on May 25, 2011.

The Chesley Papers consist of materials collected in relation to antifluoridation activism. In addition to copies of a handful of historic documents on fluoride toxicity, the collection includes selective publications and correspondence.

Nathaniel Chickering came to Enfield, Massachusetts, in 1800 with his son Otis and operated a grist mill for twenty years. One of Otis’ children, Bertrand, operated the Enfield telephone system in the Howe family store and lived with the Edwin H. Howe family.

Includes land and pew deeds of Nathaniel Chickering and Mrs. Otis Chickering’s account booklet with C.F. Wood and Co.

Children’s Aid and Family Service was an agency providing traditional child and family service and extensive mental health services. Working closely with the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, CAFS was a member of the Child Welfare League of America and the Northampton representative for the National Association of Travelers Aid Societies.

This collection includes ten versions of the CAFS constitution, typed personal recollections from the 25th anniversary, annual reports, minutes, and the correspondence of president Miriam Chrisman (1952-1957). Of special note, Mrs. Calvin Coolidge was the chair of the Home Finding Committee of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, which helped to found the CAFS.

In 1986 demonstrations against CIA recruitment on the University’s campus led by activists Abbie Hoffman and Amy Carter, daughter of former President Jimmy Carter, resulted in the takeover of two school buildings and more than sixty arrests. The CIA on Trial Project was a group established in Amherst to support the individuals arrested as well as to raise funds for their legal defense.

News clippings covering the protests, fliers, memos from the University’s administration, and correspondence with Chancellor Duffey capture the mood on campus during and after the protests.

Founded in 1864, the Cigar Makers were charted by the AFL in 1887. The collection consists of two minute books for Local 39 of New Haven, Connecticut, the earlier dating from 1886-1891 and the later volume dating from 1930-1941. Beginning in 1880, cigar manufacturers who negotiated labor contracts with the union affixed blue labels to boxes of “union made” cigars. A sheet of these union labels are laid into the back of the earlier minute book.

Temporarily stored offsite; contact SCUA to request materials from this collection.

In 1992 after lightening struck the Yankee Rowe reactor in western Massachusetts, concerned citizens organized with the goal of educating themselves and their communities about the potential dangers of nuclear energy. Citizens Awareness Network (CAN) worked to reveal the hidden costs of nuclear power on the health and safety of communites surrounding a reactor, and as a result of their efforts Yankee Rowe was pressured into closing down in 1993. When CAN learned that much of the nuclear waste removed from the site was shipped to a town in South Carolina, the group was outraged that the waste which hurt their community would now be imposed on another community. Once again they were moved into action, this time transforming from a small local group into a regional group with multiple chapters. Today, with seven chapters in five states, CAN continues to uncover the hazards of nuclear energy, proposing instead the use of clean energy produced locally.

This large collection documents every facet of the group, and includes publications, financial records, research files, correspondence, and realia such as t-shirts, bumper stickers and buttons.