Commonplace book of Hector Orr, 1789-1804

Hector Orr began recording entries in this commonplace book during his first year as a student at Harvard and continued writing in the volume sporadically until 1804. The entries written while he was a student, from 1789 to 1792, include themes written on the following topics: Time, Discontent, Patriotism, Virtue, Conscience, Patience, Avarice, Compassion, Mortality, Self-knowledge, Benevolence, Morning, Anger, Profanity, Bribery, Autumn and Winter, Hermitage, Conscience and Anticipation. He also wrote detailed entries about the forensic disputations in which he and his classmates participated, explaining both the affirmative and negative positions. One of these disputations involved discussion of the Stamp Act, which was then quite recent history. Orr's entries about the disputations list the names of students involved and specify their position in the argument.

To Mary Ann [passages copied from several poems, written by an unknown student on November 21, 1790]

The creator of this document is unknown, though he was presumably a student at Harvard College, as the name of the college appears on the document twice. Both sides of the document are filled with passages of poetry, including one from Tobias George Smollett's "The Adventures of Roderick Random" and another from John Tapner's "A New Collection of Fables in Verse." The creator seems to have intended the document for someone named Mary Ann.

Notebook of Tristram Gilman, 1757-1761

The small volume holds the notebook of Tristram Gilman interleaved on unlined pages in a printed engagement calendar. The original leather cover accompanies the notebook, but is no longer attached. The inside covers of the original leather binding are filled with scribbled words and notes. The volume holds a variety of handwritten notes including account information, transcriptions of biblical passages and related observations, travel information, community news, weather, and astronomy. The volumes does not follow a chronological order, and instead seems to have been repurposed at various times.

Letter from James Otis, Jr. to James Otis, Sr., and portrait print of James Otis Jr., 1743 June 17

Letter from Otis in Boston to his father, James Otis Sr. on June 17, 1743. In the short, half-page letter, Otis asks his father for money to pay for expenses relating to Commencement including the printing of theses, shoes, buckles, and any entertainment. He mentions that he will share entertainment expenses with his classmate Lothrop Russell.

Guarantee of financial support for student James Savage, signed by William Tudor and John Cooper, 1799 July 25

This legal agreement, a guarantee of financial support for entering student James Savage (A.B. 1803), was signed on July 25, 1799 by his two guarantors, William Tudor and John Cooper. The document was also signed by two witnesses, William Tudor's sons John Henry Tudor and Frederic Tudor. The agreement specifies that, in the event of Savage's failure to settle all financial obligations to the President and Fellows of Harvard College during the course of his studies, the two guarantors would be responsible for a payment of two hundred ounces of silver. It seems that the Tudors and Cooper were relatives of Savage, thus explaining their desire to assure his entry to Harvard by entering into this financial obligation.

Manuscript copy of the book of Harvard, 1767

The pamphlet-sized manuscript includes "The Book of Harvard" signed "Joseph Cummings, scriptis, Janr 7th 1767," an untitled two-page essay beginning, "Wisdom is ye Crown of life" and ending "Draught of Knowledge, let us with a laudable ambition, strive to excel each other in an ardent pursuit of Learning, then shall we raise to ourselves a monument of honest fame, which shall perish only in ye general wreak of nature," and on the last page, "An Accrostick" beginning "Jangling & Discord are thy Souls delight" and spelling out JAMES MITCHEL VARNUM dated July 3, 1767 and signed "The 3d edition revised & improved by Gove & Fogg."

Manuscript copy of the book of Harvard, 1767

Handwritten copy of the Book of Harvard written on one large sheet of paper and signed Boston, January 10th, 1767.

Description of a College Chamber (manuscript copy), ca. 1744

This humorous, rhyming poem appears to have been co-authored by Thomas Handcock of Massachusetts and Richard Waterman of Warwick, Rhode Island. The document is also signed by Catharine Waterman. Neither of the authors attended Harvard College, and the circumstances of this poem's creation are not known. The poem suggests that they composed the poem while visiting - uninvited - the room of "honest Bob." The poem describes the contents of this college chamber, including the following items: an oak table with a broken leg; paper, a pen, and sand for writing; books, including "Scotch songs," philosophy, Euclid, a book of prayer, Tillotson, and French romances; pipes and tobacco; mugs; a broken violin; copperplate and mezzotint prints; a cat; clothes; two globes; a pair of bellows; a broom; a chamber pot; a candle in a bottle; tea; cups and saucers; a letter to Chloe, to whom the room's inhabitant apparently owed money; a powder horn; a fishing net; a rusty gun; a battledore; a shuttlecock; a cannister; a pair of shoes; and a coffee mill. The poem references events related to the War of Austrian Succession (1740-1748); British Vice Admiral Edward Vernon's siege of Portobello (in present-day Panama) in 1739; the "Rushian War" (perhaps the Russo-Swedish War of 1741-1743); and the War of Jenkins' Ear (the cat in the college chamber, like British Captain Robert Jenkins, has lost an ear).

Triennial Catalogue annotated by Jeremy Belknap, 1791

The collection holds a heavily interleaved 1791 Triennial Catalogue annotated, in part, by Jeremy Belknap. A note by Harvard Librarian John Langdon Sibley, on the verso of the flyleaf, indicates a second annotator: "It should be observed that this catalogue is in the handwriting of two persons, Dr. Belknap & probably interlineations & additions by Rev. Dr. [John] Eliot. The interlineing part should not be too confidently relied on for accuracy. J. L. Sibley, April 14, 1848." The volume contains biographical notes, newspaper clippings, excerpts from manuscript and printed sources such as New England's First Fruits, the manuscript memoirs of Charles Chauncey, and John Winthrop's Journal, and a 1795 letter from Isaac Mansfield. In the letter, Mansfield references an item he believed to be written by his grandfather, Ames Cheever (Harvard AB 1707), and briefly describes his grandfather. A list of election sermon orators with dates is also pasted into the inside back cover, along with an obituary of the Rev. John Wales (Harvard AB 1728) from the Boston Post-Boy, March 4, 1765.

Settlement of chambers, 1741-1764

The book is comprised of folio-sized pages conserved in a modern soft-cover binding. The volume consists of yearly handwritten lists of dormitory room assignments for the years 1741-1753 and 1761-1764. Students are listed by last name and building names are often abbreviated as "M" for Massachusetts Hall, "S" for Stoughton Hall, and "O" for Old College or Harvard Hall. The organizational pattern varies by list, some are alphabetical, others arranged by building and room number. The lists for 1743, 1748, 1749, 1761-1764 also note students living outside of the College and their locations. The lists for 1761-1764 also include the waiters and monitors for the academic year.

A catalogue of books in the College library: [which Benjamin Welles wished to read], 1797

In this small paper-bound catalog, Benjamin Welles (1781-1860) listed books in the Harvard College Library which he wished to read. He presumably compiled the list by consulting the Library's 1790 printed catalog, as the works are categorized according to subjects outlined in that catalog (Antiquities, Astronomy, Ancient Authors, Biography, Sacred Criticism, Ethics, Geography, Geometry, History, Nature, Travels / Voyages, Natural Law, Logic, Metaphysics, Miscellaneous Works, Dramatic, Phililogy, Natural Philosophy, Poetry, Rhetoric, and Theology). The final pages of Welles' catalog, which he titles "Another Selection," list additional volumes he wished to read. These are listed alphabetically, A - G. Some titles throughout the catalog have been marked with a "+" perhaps to indicate that Welles had read them.

A system of ethicks: Of morall phylosophy in generall & in speciall

This hardcover volume contains manuscript copies of Charles Morton's "A System of Ethicks," "Pneumatics. Or a treatise of the Rev'd Mr. Charles Morton about ye Nature of Spirit," "Appendix of the Souls of Brutes," "Some Theological Questions Answd," and a one-page list "Texts of Scripture to prove if ye head of Christ &c." copied by Harvard student Ebenezer Williams in February 1707/8.

" Banish the self debasing principles, and scorn the disingenuity of readers. Humility has depressed many a genius into a hermit" : commencement essay, 1793

Two-page handwritten essay composed for the July 17, 1793 Harvard University Commencement by an unattributed author. The title is a quote from William Shenstone's essay "On Allowing Merit in Others." The essay begins, "Notwithstanding Philosophers have ever considered the human mind as a simple being..."

Mr. Marsh's catalogue, ca. 1764

A half-page handwritten list of books with the author's surname, title, and location in the old Harvard Library, signed "Mr. Marsh." The list includes the note, "Shuckford's Connection is charged to you." The document is undated but presumably was created following the Harvard Hall Fire of 1764 as part of the College's efforts to inventory volumes that were spared because they were checked out at the time of the fire. Many of the books are listed in a charging record for Thomas Marsh recorded in a Harvard library account book (UAIII 50.15.60, Volume 1, Box 95), including "Shuckford's connection" which was charged to Marsh on September 23, 1763.

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.