By Caitlin Walker, Digital Archivist and Metadata Analyst The MHS collects, preserves, and provides access to collections that document the history of Massachusetts and the nation up to the present day. Information is increasingly being created and communicated in a digital environment, which means many twentieth and twenty-first century collections include or consist entirely of […]

by Susan Martin, Senior Processing Archivist This will be my eighth and final post about the Perry-Clarke additions, and in the hot seat today is Susan Cabot (Lowell) Sohier (1823-1868). Her daughter Alice married into the Clarke family, which is how Susan’s papers became part of this collection. The oldest child of John Amory Lowell, […]

by Alexandra Moleski, NHD Program Coordinator Calling all history enthusiasts! Did you know that the Massachusetts Historical Society is the sponsor of National History Day in Massachusetts? The NHD in MA team is putting out the call for volunteers to judge at our regional and state competitions in March and April 2025. National History Day […]

by Brandon McGrath-Neely, Library Assistant When family and friends come to visit Boston, there are a few places we always visit. We wind through the North End’s narrow streets, grabbing treats at Bova’s Bakery. We stand at the site of the Boston Massacre and look up at the Old State House, with modern buildings soaring […]

by Heather Rockwood, Communications Manager Saying goodbye to those who are dear to us is always difficult. But maybe less so for letter writers who say goodbye at the end of their letters instead of in person. Here are a few of my favorite letter signoffs from the MHS collection and archives. “yours affectionatly AA” […]

by Hannah Elder, Associate Reference Librarian for Rights & Reproductions  Long time readers of the blog may recall a series of posts that ran from 2015 to 2019, transcribing a line-a-day diary from exactly one century before. This series was run by Anna Clutterbuck-Cook, who at the time of her passing in 2023 was the […]

by Susan Martin, Senior Processing Archivist In previous Beehive posts, I’ve introduced you to several members of the Clarke family. Well, the Clarkes were related by marriage to the illustrious Boston Lowells, so the Perry-Clarke additions at the MHS also include papers from members of that family. If there were prizes for the most prevalent […]

by Sarah Hume, Editorial Assistant, Adams Papers On 7 September 1842, John Quincy Adams took his seat on the 6 o’clock A.M. train from Washington, D.C., to Baltimore. The weather was warm, with more than thirty people crowding onto the train. Among them were Robert Tyler and John Tyler Jr., sons of President John Tyler. […]

by Alexandra Moleski, NHD Program Coordinator kkʷey! In part 1, we explored the life of Pial Pol Osunkhirhine, author of the 1830 Wo̲banaki kimzowi awighigan that is held in the MHS archives. Now we are back with part 2 because it turns out that Osunkhirhine’s learning book is not quite written in the language we […]

by Thomas A. Rider II, PhD Candidate: University of Wisconsin-Madison       As darkness fell on August 16th, 1775, 143 New England soldiers, of the colonial army besieging British-occupied Boston, quietly left their fortifications outside Cambridge and advanced into the mile-wide, no-man’s-land that separated the opposing lines.  This ad hoc force included officers and men from […]

by Heather Rockwood, Communications Manager I was recently thinking about Hamilton, the Broadway-hit musical written by Lin-Manuel Miranda and first performed in 2015, and wondered what MHS collection and archive pieces we have that connect to Alexander Hamilton (1757–1804), one of our Founding Fathers. To my delight, I found two letters from him to his […]

by Susan Martin, Senior Processing Archivist I’m returning today to one of my favorite collections here at the MHS, the Perry-Clarke additions. One of the reasons I enjoyed processing this collection so much was because of all the fascinating people it introduced me to. One of them was Cora Huidekoper Clarke (1851-1916). Cora was a […]

By Alexandra Moleski, NHD Program Coordinator Kwaï! Welcome to National History Day in MA 2025! Here at the Massachusetts Historical Society, the NHD in MA team is getting excited for contest season. In preparation, we have been brainstorming topic ideas that relate to this year’s NHD theme, Rights and Responsibilities, to share with students as […]

by Gwen Fries, Adams Papers Dear Reader, How did you enjoy the “rich mental feast” of Anne MacVicar Grant’s Letters from the Mountains? (Not ringing a bell? You have a bonus blog post to read!) I so enjoyed getting to know Mrs. Grant. It’s easy to fall in love with someone through their letters—what merits […]

by Heather Rockwood, Communications Manager On 22 April 1790, John Adams and Congress learned of Benjamin Franklin’s death due to pleurisy, a lung condition. Upon learning of his friend’s death, Adams wrote an imagined conversation between four historical figures, as they waited for Franklin’s arrival in the afterlife. Adams then filed it away and more […]

by Susan Martin, Senior Processing Archivist In honor of Election Day tomorrow, I searched the MHS stacks for material related to elections. Unsurprisingly we have a lot! One collection I discovered tells the fascinating story of Charles N. Richards of Quincy, Massachusetts, who, in November 1864, traveled all the way home from Washington, D.C. to […]

by Jordan T. Watkins, Associate Professor, Brigham Young University The archive inevitably opens unseen roads of research, luring even the most focused historical travelers from their set paths of inquiry. In April of this year, when I again entered the Massachusetts Historical Society, and passed those columns that feel like portals to the past, I […]

by Elaine Heavey, Director of the Library The MHS houses hundreds of photograph collections, mostly family photographs containing posed portraits and candid photos like this one.  In some cases, a family member meticulously labeled every photo, letting us know whose images have been captured for future generations to see.  Other collections are not so well […]

by Samantha Couture, MHS Nora Saltonstall Conservator & Preservation Librarian Welcome to Part 3 of our series on conservation at the MHS. Here, we will discuss a few of the conservation treatments that Samantha performs in our lab. The purpose of any conservation work is to reverse or repair damage to extend the useability and […]