Collections: N

A national non-partisan, not-for-profit organization based in Northampton, Mass., the National Priorities Project was founded in 1983 by Greg Speeter, Brenda Loew, Ricky Fogel, and Alwin Schmidt to conduct research into the depths of the federal budget. Their first effort was to analyze the dramatic reductions affecting many social programs, but the organization grew around the principle of making the complex federal budget transparent and more publicly accessible so that the public can better influence how their tax dollars are spent. Nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014 in recognition of its pioneering work in tracking military spending, the NPP continues to work toward a federal budget that reflects Americans’ priorities, including funding for issues such as inequality, unemployment, education, healthcare, and the need to build a green economy.

The NPP collection documents over thirty years of a not-for-profit organization devoted to research-informed advocacy for a federal budget that reflects the priorities of most Americans. In addition to a run of NPP publications, the collection includes a series of topical files from Greg Speeter and his associates, selected correspondence, talks, and notes on their work.

Published quarterly by the Northeast Organic Farming Association, The Natural Farmer is a widely circulated newspaper devoted to the support of organic farming. These files are made available courtesy of the editors, Jack Kittredge and Julie Rawson of NOFA Massachusetts.

George Naughton was born in 1951 into an academically inclined family. His father, Thomas, was a writer and magazine editor and his mother a music teacher; his grandfather Julius Seelye Bixler was a college professor and president of Colby College (1942-1960); and his great-great-grandfather Julius Seelye served as the fifth president of Amherst College (1876-1890). Naughton grew up in the 1960s in Old Saybrook, Conn. He graduated from Mount Hermon School in 1969 and from New College in Sarasota, Fla., with a BA in General Studies, in 1973. For the next few years, Naughton lived, worked, and meditated in Cambridge, Mass., and California, then in March of 1978 moved to Amherst and took a job at UMass. From 1978 until his retirement in 2011, he worked in University Information Systems in Whitmore Administration Building. Now president of the Amherst Historical Society, Naughton is also active in the Pelham Historical Society and lives in Pelham with his wife, Cindy.

Naughton’s lifelong interests have included mathematics, science fiction, cultural alternatives, and books, and he accumulated a wide collection of print material on a variety of topics. The Naughton Collection is a reflection of many of those interests and comprises underground comics as well as pamphlets, periodicals, and ephemera on spirituality, new age thinking, counterculture, politics, the environment and sustainability, and intentional communities.

An educator and scholar of educational assessment, Monty Neil is the Executive Director of the National Center for Fair and Open Testing (FairTest). For his doctorate at Harvard in the mid-1980s, Neill examined the impact of the 1974 desegregation order affecting Boston’s public schools and the ongoing search within the city’s African American community for quality and equity in education. He completed his dissertation, The Struggle of Boston’s Black Community for Quality and Equality in Education: 1960-1985, in 1987.

The 33 audiocassettes in this collection include interviews with 29 activists and educational and political leaders in Boston, predominantly from the city’s African American community, include in-depth discussions about the busing crisis in Boston during the late 1970s and early 1980s, its aftermath, and the ongoing search for educational equity and quality. The tapes were recorded between January and April 1986 as part of Neill’s dissertation research.

During the late 1960s, the Department of History at UMass Amherst created a new undergraduate course entitled New Approaches to History, relying almost exclusively on primary sources. The theme of the course varied from the Salem witch trials to Daniel Shay’s Rebellion to the Lizzie Borden murders.

The collection includes the course proposal, correspondence, syllabi, course assignments, and resources for three units: Salem witchcraft, Shay’s Rebellion, and Lizzie Borden.

Formed during the separation of 1845, the Wilburite monthly meeting in New Bedford, Mass., was active until 1865. A member of Sandwich Quarterly Meeting (Wilburite), its members were joined to Dartmouth Monthly Meeting (Wilburite) after it was laid down.

The records of the New Bedford Monthly Meeting (Wilburite) include comprehensive minutes for both the men’s and women’s meetings, along with records of births, deaths, marriages, and removals.

After dissolution of the New England Research Council on Marketing and Food Supply in 1955, a group of agricultural economists from the six state universities in New England formed the New England Agricultural Economics Council to carry on with the mission of promoting education and research on economics and the social problems relating to the production, marketing, and consumption of agricultural products.

Concentrated on the first ten years of the NEAEC, the collection include organizational materials, correspondence, minutes and proceedings, financial records, and newsletters.

Established in 1901, the New England Association of Teachers of English (NEATE) was the first association of English teachers in America. Through conferences, executive board meetings, and the regular publication of The Leaflet, NEATE aimed to bring together New England’s English teachers to study the methodology and history of the field, as well as observe innovations and new practices in the world of education.

While the collection is expected to grow, it currently consists of meeting minutes, conference records, correspondence between members, issues of The Leaflet, two published histories of the organization, and two early record books of NEATE ranging in date from 1901-1938.

The New England Federation of Agricultural Students was organized in 1907 for the purpose of bringing together agricultural students of New England colleges for the study and advancement of agriculture and allied sciences and to learn about each others’ work. The Federation organized annual contests in fruit grading and packing, poultry, field crops, and stock.

Correspondence (1915), minutes (1915), constitution, treasurer’s report (1914-1915), records of the secretary and treasurer (1907-1915), contest scores and results (1914), and judging regulations (1913-1916).

The New England Historical Association, the regional branch of the American Historical Association, was founded in 1965 in an informal meeting at the University of Connecticut. The purpose of the NEHA is to serve the interests of New England historians of all levels: professional, academic, or amateur. These interests include a means to share their research and work, learn about history resources that are available to them for personal study or teaching, or simply to meet socially. NEHA aims to maintain the pursuit of history through both regional and national dimensions.

This collection holds the records of the New England Historical Association including an organizational history, constitution and meeting minutes, correspondence, financial records, membership lists, committee reports, meeting programs, and newsletters.