Student notes of Elijah Dunbar, 1792-1793

Three unlined pages with notes written by Harvard undergraduate Elijah Dunbar. The documents consist of two pages of chemistry notes compiled in September 1792 when Dunbar was a junior and an undated, untitled list of theological themes. The chemistry notes include a summary of the discipline and a set of laws regarding the "affinity of composition." The verso of the second page was later annotated: "Borrow- He that discerneth Youth & Beau[ty] Elij. Dunar 2'd 1793. Rec'd David Tappan, Professor of Divinity in the University--Elijah Dunbar, jun." followed by a list of students identified as "Alchemists" in the "Ridiculous Society": Joseph Perkins, Isaac Braman, William Biglow, and Elijah Dunbar. The second document is an untitled list of 27 theological themes beginning "1. Doctrine of the Trinity," and ending "27. Family worship," and may refer to sermon or lecture topics.

Elijah Dunbar (1773-1850), a New Hampshire minister, was born in Canton, Mass. in 1773, a son of Elijah Dunbar (Harvard AB 1760). He received an AB from Harvard in 1794 and an AM in 1797. As an undergraduate, Dunbar was described in his classmate William Biglow’s “Junior Classology” poem with the line: "And all-eating, omnimout’d, all-grinning ‘DUNBAR.’” He was ordained on October 23, 1799 as the minister of the Peterborough, New Hampshire church and served there until June 27, 1827. Dunbar died on September 3, 1850.