An oration, 1790

This small paper notebook contains a twenty-one-page handwritten oration on learned societies delivered by Phi Beta Kappa member Thaddeus Mason Harris (1768-1842; Harvard AB 1787) during the anniversary meeting of the Alpha Chapter at Harvard University on September 1, 1790. The oration is followed by five pages of "notes and illustrations" on the text.

Thaddeus M Harris A.M. now minister of Dorchester,

This item was donated to the Harvard College Library on July 29, 1926, by B. K. Emerson of Amherst, Massachusetts.

Title transcribed from title page.

Item bound in blue-and-white floral wallpaper covers.

Additional materials related to the Alpha Chapter of Phi Beta Kappa at Harvard University can be found in the Records of Phi Beta Kappa, 1779- (Call number: HUD 3684.xxx) in the Harvard University Archives.

Thaddeus Mason Harris (1768-1842; Harvard AB 1787) was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts, on July 7, 1768. Harris became a member of Phi Beta Kappa in September 1786 and received an AB from Harvard College in 1787. In 1790, Harris received an AM from Harvard, and in 1791 he was appointed librarian at Harvard, a position he held until he became pastor of the First Unitarian church in Dorchester, Massachusetts, in 1793. He was awarded an honorary STD (Doctor of Sacred Theology) by Harvard in 1813. Harris died in April 1842.