Collections: mss

A noted figure in modernist theater, Edward Gordon Craig was born in Stevenage, Hertfordshire, on Jan. 16, 1872, the illegitimate son of the renowned actress Ellen Terry and the architect Edward William Craig. Although the most productive portion of his career was brief, he exerted a strong influence on the field of set design and lighting, and was fairly prolific as a writer on theatre.

The six audio recordings that comprise the Craig collection originated from a series of BBC radio talks in the early 1950s. The reel to reel tapes include Craig’s reminiscences of Ellen Terry, Isadora Duncan, the old school of acting, celebrities, masks, and how he played Hamlet in Salford, Lancashire, but are more generally his thoughts on acting, the theater, and art.

The horticulturist, Jim Crockett (1915-1979) earned wide acclaim as host of the popular television show, Crockett’s Victory Garden. A 1935 graduate of the Stockbridge School of Agriculture at UMass Amherst, Crockett returned home to Massachusetts after a stint in the Navy during the Second World War and began work as a florist. A small publication begun for his customers, Flowery Talks, grew so quickly in popularity that Crockett sold his flower shop in 1950 to write full time. His first book, Window Sill Gardening (N.Y., 1958), was followed by seventeen more on gardening, ornamental plants, and horticulture, culminating with twelve volumes in the Time-Life Encyclopedia of Gardening. He was the recipient of numerous awards for garden writing and was director of the American Horticultural Society. In 1975, he was contacted about a new gardening show on PBS, Victory Garden, which he hosted until his death by cancer in 1979.

Documenting an important career in bringing horticulture to the general public, the Crockett Papers contain a mix of professional and personal correspondence and writing by Jim Crockett from throughout his career. The collection includes a particularly extensive set of letters from George B. Williams, Crockett’s father in law, and copies most of his publications.

In the late 1870s, a middle-aged farmer from Richmond, Minnesota, Samuel Crouch, married a woman eleven years his junior and asked her to relocate to the northern plains. Possessed of some solid self-confidence, Rebecca left behind her family a friends and set out to make a life for herself, adjusting to her new role as step-mother and community member, as well as the familiar role of family member at a distance.

The Crouch Papers includes approximately 225 letters offering insight into life in Minnesota during the late 1870s and early 1880s, and into the domestic and social life of a woman entering into a new marriage with an older man. Rebecca’s letters are consumed with the ebb and flow of daily life, her interactions with other residents of the community at church or in town, the weather, and chores from cooking to cleaning, farming, gardening, writing, going to town, or rearranging furniture.

Farmers who provided services (such as putting up fences, shingling, butchering, and cutting brush) for townspeople. Seventy page book of business transactions, and miscellaneous papers including mortgage payments, highway building surveyor assessments, and poems.

In 1923, Katherine Frazier established the Playhouse-in-the-Hills as a venue for theatrical performances in the small Berkshire County town of Cummington, Mass. Frazier’s vision, however, soon led her to expand the project into the Cummington School of the Arts (later the Cummington Community of the Arts), which she envisioned as “an environment congenial to creative activity.” Over its seventy years of operation, the School emphasized creative collaboration across the fine arts, offering not only performances, but summer residencies and six-week courses where writers, artists, performers, and musicians could study and practice under the guidance of visiting artists. Among its noted alumni were luminaries such as Helen Frankenthaler, Willem de Kooning, Diane Arbus, Marianne Moore, and Archibald Macleish, and the school was a starting point for Harry Duncan’s renowned Cummington Press. The increasing financial challenges facing not-for-profit organizations led a cessation of operations in about 1993.

The records of the Cummington School of the Arts offer a cross-sectional view of the School across its years of operation. In addition to a very small selection of personal material from Katherine Frazier, the collection includes valuable correspondence and ephemera relating to the school’s philosophy and founding, and nearly a third of the collection consists of records of students, often including their applications, comments on the work accomplished in Cummington, and occasionally, copies of work produced. The balance of the collection consists of many of the school’s publications, administrative materials (including curricula and planning documents), and financial and fundraising materials.

Mary Curran Doyle and dog

Born in Holyoke, Massachusetts in 1917 and a graduate of Massachusetts State College, Mary Doyle Curran was an author, editor, and professor, who published her only novel, The Parish and the Hill, in 1948. Curran taught English and Irish Literature at Wellesley College, Queens College, and UMass Boston before retiring; she died in 1981.

The collection includes unpublished drafts of novels and short stories; photographs; correspondence from family and friends; publishers and literary associates such as Saul Bellow and Josephine Herbst. The Parish and the Hill, Curran’s only published novel, is today considered a classic among Irish American literature.

Located at 14 and 16 Main Street in Haverhill, Mass., W.A. Currier dealt in kitchen goods, home furnishings, and stoves around the time of the Civil War. His trade seems to have been diverse and dynamic: in the Haverhill city directory for 1865, he is recorded variously as a furniture seller, junk dealer, and carriage maker, while two years later, he is listed at the same address under stoves and tinware.

Covering the immediate post-Civil War years, Currier’s daybooks document customers, items purchased, prices paid, and transactions relating to the trade in home goods, stoves, and rags.

Born in Newfane, Vermont in 1814, David F. Cushing journeyed to West Medway, Massachusetts, at the age of sixteen to learn the tailor’s trade. There he met and married Polly Adams (b. 1821), who gave birth to their son, Winfield, in 1843, the first of at least nine children. Shortly after starting his family, Cushing returned home to Vermont, establishing a general store in the village of Cambridgeport, situated on the border of Grafton and Rockingham. He enjoyed considerable success in his work, rising from being listed as a “retail dealer” in the early years to a merchant; by 1860, Cushing owned real estate valued at $4,000 and personal property worth $7,000. A deacon of the Congregational church, his frequent appointment as a postmaster hints at a degree of political connection within the community to accompany his financial and personal success. He remained active in his store for 56 years until his death in 1899.

Cushing’s daybooks (1860) include lists of stock, how he acquired his goods, and the method and form of payment (cash or exchange of goods and services). The receipt book, comprised of printed forms, records freight hauling activities, with records of the freight (usually hay or oxen), weight, and date.

Farmer from Cohasset, a shipbuilding and fishing town in eastern Massachusetts. Includes customer accounts, the services he performed (such as plowing up and hauling field stones to the wharf, and carting wood, merchandise, and iron), products he sold (potatoes and calves), and documentation of a hired Irish-born laborer.

Access restrictions: Temporarily stored offsite; contact SCUA in advance to request materials from this collection.

Born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire on July 20, 1952, Robert D. “Renny” Cushing was a co-founder of the Clamshell Alliance, an antinuclear coalition that opposed the construction of the Seabrook Station Nuclear Plant, and a leader in organizing the occupation of the site in Seabrook (N.H.). Following the murder of his father in 1988, Cushing became an outspoken advocate to repeal the death penalty in New Hampshire. As an elected member of the state House of Representatives over several non-consecutive terms, he eventually succeeded in the effort to pass legislation that would abolish the death penalty including securing enough votes to override the governor’s veto. Cushing’s dedication to improving the lives of the people of his state was coupled with his deep passion for New Hampshire’s history. In 2020, Cushing was diagnosed with stage four cancer, but continued to serve as Democratic leader in the state House of Representatives until March 2, 2022 when he took a leave of absence for health reasons. He died five days later at the age of 69.

Cushing’s papers chronicle his tireless advocacy for two issues of great importance to him: the antinuclear movement and the repeal of death penalty in New Hampshire. His long-time service to the state is detailed in his political papers, which document not only his activities as a member of the state House of Representatives but also his involvement in political campaigns at the state and federal level.