College and Research Libraries By W A T T P. M A R C H M A N The Rutherford B. Hayes Memorial Library ON A U G U S T 12, 1955, President Dwight D. Eisenhower approved a joint res- olution of the House and Senate of the United States " t o provide for the accept- ance and maintenance of Presidential li- braries, and for other purposes." T h u s was created Public Law 373 which gives official sanction to the trend of establish- ing as separate libraries research institu- tions of American history surrounding the times of the Presidents of the United States. T h e recent fund-raising campaign and ground-breaking exercises for the Harry S. T r u m a n Library in Independence, Missouri, have helped to focus public attention o n the subject of Presidential libraries and their place among special libraries. W h e n a President leaves the White House, he follows the precedent estab- lished by George Washington and fol- lowed by all his successors in office, tak- ing his correspondence, memoranda, books, pictures, memorabilia, in fact ev- erything except the official papers of his office. In early times the collection num- bered but a few thousand items; in re- cent times, a few million pieces. T h e personal papers and records of many early Presidents were scattered or destroyed by the ex-Presidents or by their heirs. A few Presidential collections in whole or in part, have found their way into the Library of Congress. T h e heirs of President Rutherford B. Hayes, nineteenth President of the United States, and particularly his sec- ond son, Colonel W e b b C. Hayes, re- sisted the several appeals made to return Mr. Marchman is director, the Hayes Memorial Library. the former President's papers to Wash- ington. Instead, Colonel Hayes sought, with the cooperation of the state of Ohio, to establish a research institution upon the family's estate. W i t h President and Mrs. Hayes' books and papers as a nu- cleus, the library was to specialize in the period of the former President's life. Colonel Hayes envisioned an institution which would preserve his parents' Ameri- cana as well as retain something of the atmosphere of their times. T h e first step was to deed to the state of Ohio, as a gift, the historic 25-acre Spiegel Grove in Fremont, Ohio, where President Hayes had made his home after 1873. T h e n Colonel Hayes offered the Presidential collections. Accepting the li- brary, Presidential diaries, letters, scrap- books and memorabilia, the state of O h i o appropriated $50,000 to build a fireproof building to house the materials in Spiegel Grove. Colonel Hayes contributed an equal amount, and the first wing of the present structure was erected. A structure of classic architecture in gray O h i o sand- stone, the building was formally opened to the public o n May 30, 1916. It was the first of the separate Presidential libraries to be established. Newton D. Baker, Sec- retary of War, represented President W o o d r o w Wilson at the dedication exer- cises, and all organizations with which President Hayes had been associated sent representatives to take part in the cere- monies. W h e n the original building was com- pleted, Colonel Hayes discovered that it was not large enough to contain the mu- seum and library he had in mind, or to provide for future growth of the library. Thereupon he contributed funds for the erection of an annex, somewhat larger in 224 COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES area than the original building. Con- struction was well under way by the time of the centenary celebration of the birth of President Hayes on October 4, 1922. T h e library and museum building was placed near the Hayes residence in beau- tiful, wooded Spiegel Grove, facing what was at the time the main entrance to the grounds, a triangular plot covered by a virginal growth of forest trees. T h e main floor and the basement floor of the li- brary building are reserved for museum displays and offices. T h e research library, study area and staff offices are o n the second floor. T h e library of nearly 10,000 volumes accumulated by President and Mrs. Hayes, their correspondence, consisting of some 150,000 or more pieces, their pic- tures, photographs, maps, scrapbooks, the President's several diaries, and hundreds of personal items were removed from the residence in Spiegel Grove and placed in the new fireproof building. Provision was made to keep intact all the Hayes papers and the personal library during any sub- sequent growth of the research institu- tion. There followed the mammoth task of organizing, sorting, checking, arrang- ing, cataloging and filing, to provide ready reference f o r scholars and students. In the museum, certain aspects of American history and biography are graphically illustrated. There may be seen interesting original letters written and signed by all the Presidents of the United States from the time of George Washington to the present; many per- sonal objects associated with the Presi- dents, including a pair of gloves of Abra- ham Lincoln, his slippers, an original handbill of Ford's Theatre for the per- formance o n the night he was assassinat- ed, a book from his private library, The Last Men of the Revolution, and a fine old desk which he used. A collection of American Revolution items, mostly of a military nature, includes leather helmets worn by a private American soldier and a captain, a Hessian helmet, American canteens, stirrups, powder horns, and pis- tols given to President Hayes by Sarah Smith Stafford, of Trenton, New Jersey. Hundreds of souvenirs and memorabilia of President and Mrs. Hayes include the military field equipment used by Hayes as a colonel, later brigadier general, in the Civil War, as well as many other things associated with earlier and later periods of his and Mrs. Hayes' life. There is the stately old carriage used by President Hayes in Washington and later in Fremont, Ohio. It was used for a time by President Garfield. Many of Mrs. Hayes' elaborate gowns worn at White House receptions, including her simple wedding dress worn at her wed- ding in 1852, are on exhibition in mod- ern museum cases. Also on display is $ magnificent doll house given to President Hayes' ten-year-old daughter, Fanny, when she was in the White House. There are hundreds of relics of the American Indians presented to President Hayes by Indian delegations to Washington or by Indian agents. T h e exhibit includes thousands of items gathered from all parts of the world by Colonel and Mrs. W e b b C. Hayes: a sizable collection of Chinese and Korean curios, a magnificent weapons collection, and objects from In- dia, the Philippine Islands, South Amer- ica, Alaska, the Holy Land and the is- lands of the South Pacific. T h e library collections have grown steadily since 1916, and continue to grow daily. At present there are about 60,000 volumes in the research library, thou- sands of pamphlets and periodicals, an MAY, 1956 225 important group of maps, a large collec- tion of photographs, prints and pictures, a number of important newspaper files, and a manuscripts division containing more than a half million pieces (the Hayes papers f o r m the nucleus). T h e li- brary has an expanding department of microfilm, all modern aids to research and writing, and a staff ready to provide the researcher with excellent individual cooperation. More and more students and writers from all parts of the nation are making use of the research possibili- ties for projects in American history. T h e Rutherford B. Hayes Memorial Library is intended to be a research cen- ter for the study of American history for the period between the Civil W a r and the beginning of the twentieth century. Emphasis continues to be placed on ev- ery phase of the life and times of Presi- dent Hayes, and on his special interests and contributions. T h e library is par- ticularly strong in printed sources on the following subjects: the Civil War; recon- struction in the South following the Civil War; the Spanish-American War; civil service reforms; currency; monetary and prison reforms; O h i o history since 1840; Sandusky (Ohio) Valley history; educa- tion, particularly in the South; this his- tory of the Negro and his problems; bib- liography; social history; general Ameri- can biography; the American Indian; American travel and description; and American local history. T h e Hayes papers contain: the bulk of correspondence received by the President and Mrs. Hayes during their lifetime; a few thousand copies, or originals, of let- ters they wrote; the diaries of President Hayes in 28 volumes; his White House notes and memoranda for cabinet meet- ings; social registers of the White House; several volumes in manuscript of ab- stracts of letters received by the Presi- dent between 1877 and 1881; 130 vol- umes of scrapbooks of newspaper clip- pings kept during the Hayes administra- tion, as well as numerous other scrap- books of an earlier and later date; pro- ceedings of executive sessions of the Sen- ate; correspondence on Indian affairs; Civil W a r regimental records of Hayes' regiment; notebooks used for his various political campaigns for Congressman and for the three terms he ran for the gover- norship of Ohio; and other materials. T h e manuscripts division contains also collections of materials about all the Presidents of the United States and the papers of the children of President and Mrs. Hayes, as well as numerous rela- tives. Sizable groups of papers of inter- est and significance include: collections of papers of I. H. Burgoon, Mary Clem- mer, Governor William Claflin of Mas- sachusetts and Mrs. Claflin, Benjamin Franklin Coates, A. L. Conger, George William Curtis, Andrew E. Douglass, Minnie L. Failing, Gustavus A. Gessner, Murat Halstead, General Russell Hast- ings, Colonel William E. Haynes, Eliza- beth Mitchell Heyl, William Dean How- ells, John Little, General James B. Mc- Pherson, Warren P. Noble, J. P. Rey- nolds Company military escutcheons, Dr. John B. Rice, William K. Rogers, Admi- ral Charles O'Neil, Anne Tressler Scott, John Sherman, William Henry Smith, the Stem family, Colonel F. W . Swift, Dr. James W . Wilson, and many others. T h e microfilm files include: copies from public and private depositories of papers of many of Hayes' contemporaries, important newspaper files for the Hayes period, the official records of the Hayes gubernatorial administration in Ohio, and several hundred rolls of film repre- senting the first step in collecting at the Hayes library the records created by the Hayes administration in Washington. T o the south of the library and mu- seum building is the Hayes homestead, a stately mansion surrounded by majestic old trees. T h e home, preserved and main- tained privately, is still the residence of President Hayes' descendants and not open to the public at any time. It was built in 1859-60 by Sardis Birchard, 226 COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES bachelor uncle and legal guardian of Hayes, as a summer home for his neph- ew. T h e old trees surrounding the house bear the names of well-known men w h o have been guests at Spiegel Grove. Along the southern ridge of the Spiegel Grove estate, for nearly a half mile, winds a famous old Indian trail, the San- dusky-Sioto route, traversed by the In- dians before white settlement and later used by General William Henry Harri- son as a military supply route during the War of 1812. By the side of the trail, o n a quiet wooded knoll and enclosed by an iron fence, is the monument of Vermont granite marking the final resting place of President and Mrs. Hayes. At each of the six entrances to the Spiegel Grove estate are impressive iron gates that once guarded an entrance to the White House grounds before and during the Hayes administration. T h e Rutherford B. Hayes Memorial Library and the Spiegel Grove estate are operated jointly by the state of Ohio, through the Ohio Historical Society, and by the Rutherford B. Hayes and Lucy W e b b Hayes Foundation, founded in 1921 by Colonel W e b b C. Hayes. T h e state provides for the care and mainte- nance of the grounds and the library and museum building and provides most of the physical improvements. T h e Hayes Foundation is interested in the use of the resources and improvement of facilities for research and investigation in Ameri- can history. T h e growth and develop- ment of all branches of the library are supported by the foundation, collections are acquired to improve the resources, and library equipment added when need- ed. Recently the trustees of the Hayes Foundation have authorized a program of publication of source materials of American history, principally from re- sources in the manuscripts division of the Rutherford B. Hayes Memorial Library, in keeping with the recommendations of the National Historical Publications Commission, suggesting that the Hayes correspondence and papers be published. Several books have been published dur- ing the past few years in which the au- thors have acknowledged research aid received from the Rutherford B. Hayes Library. T h e most extensive recent use of the source materials in the library was made by Harry Barnard in writing his Rutherford B. Hayes and His America (1954). Authors of other recent books making use of the manuscript resources of the li- brary include J. J. Perling, Presidents' Sons (1947); Hampton M. Jarrell, Wade Hampton and the Negro: The Road Not Taken (1949); Jessie Pearl Rice, / . L. M . Curry: Southerner, Statesman and Edu- cator (1949); Bess Furman, White House Profile (1951); Holman Hamilton, Zach- ary Taylor: Soldier in the White House (1951); C. Vann Woodward, Origins of the New South (1951) and Reunion and Reaction: The Compromise of 1877 and the End of Reconstruction (1951) ; T . R . Hay, James Longstreet (the Politician) (1952); Bell I. Wiley, The Life of Billy Yank, the Common Soldier of the Union (1952); James H. Rodabaugh, editor of The Governors of Ohio (1954) ; and M. B. Schnapper, The Grand Old Party, the First Hundred Years of the Republi- can Party: A Pictorial History (1955). Numerous dissertations and theses have been written from resources in the li- brary, and there is usually one or more in progress every year. T h e library maintains a prompt and liberal interlibrary loan service for its books. Its printed resources are included in the union catalog of the Library of Congress and the regional union cata- logs located at Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio. MAY, 1956 227