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Samuel Foster Haven became the librarian of the American
Antiquarian
Society in 1838, and held the position for over forty years.
Haven, who
also served as a member of the Council from 1855 until 1881,
earned a
reputation for his dedication to the institution and was admired
for his
scholarly achievements. For many years, he edited the Society's
Proceedings
and Transactions, often contributing papers on American history
and archaeology.
In 1854, when the library had outgrown its first building, he
presided
over the construction of the Society's new building in Lincoln
Square
and oversaw its expansion in 1876. After Haven's death, Society
member
John D. Washburn (1833-1903) recalled, 'He came to the library
when it
was of infantile proportions, himself a young man, a little older
than
the library itself. He grew with it and its material and his
intellectual
growth proceeded, so that, in a greater measure than would at
first be
noticed, each threw light upon the other...[S]urely it is not too
much
to say that without the aid of Mr. Haven's personality and
peculiar powers
and devotion...this institution would have had hardly more than a
local
reputation.'(1)
Haven graduated from Amherst College in 1826 and was admitted to
the
bar in 1829. He practiced law in both Dedham and Lowell,
Massachusetts,
before assuming the librarianship of the Society, a position that
enabled
him to pursue his interests in archaeology. In 1855 the
Smithsonian Institution
published his comprehensive study The Archaeology of the United
States,
or Sketches, Historical and Bibliographical, of the Progress of
Information
and Opinion Respecting Vestiges of Antiquity in the United States.
Over
the course of his career, he contributed several essays to the
Proceedings,
including, 'The Mathers and the Witchcraft Delusions' (April
1874), and
'Humboldt and American Archaeology' (October 1877). In addition,
he was
the editor of the second edition of Isaiah Thomas's The History of
Printing
in America, published in 1874, and Records of the Company of the
Massachusetts
Bay in New England, 1628-1641 (1850). Haven's personal papers,
including
working drafts of several of his publications, are preserved in
the American
Antiquarian Society's Manuscript Collection.(2)
The Swiss-born artist Edward Custer came to the United States as
a child.
As a young man, he returned to Europe to study painting in Munich
and
Dusseldorf.(3) While living in Boston in the 1850s, he exhibited
landscape
and still-life paintings at the Boston Athenaeum, and also worked
as a
portrait painter.(4) His obituary noted, 'His portraits were
uniformly
good likenesses, for no man was more accurate in the observation
of traits
or more faithful in their reproduction. He had the genius of
patience
and attention, and his power of concentration kept him from the
sentimental
and the over-emphatic style of treatment.'(5)
In 1878 several members of the Society, led by Stephen Salisbury
II,
commissioned Custer to paint a portrait of their aging
librarian.(6) It
has been the cherished wish of members of the American Antiquarian
Society
to commemorate in some suitable way the long continued, faithful
and important
services of the Librarian Samuel F. Haven, who has held the office
with
great credit to himself and equal satisfaction to the society.'
The finished
portrait was presented to the membership in April of 1879. Dr.
Charles
Deane (1813-89), one of the Society's Councillors and Haven's
friend remarked,
'The painting itself, as a work of art, is, it seems to me, most
admirable.
I had the privilege of seeing it in the studio of the artist while
it
yet rested upon his easel, and I was impressed with it altogether
as a
superior piece of work, full of life and spirit. But, better than
all
of this, I was struck with it as a most excellent likeness; as a
"counterfeit
presentment," may I say, of our venerable Librarian. It
seemed almost
as if my friend himself lay concealed within that canvas, as if he
might,
at any moment, cast it aside, step forward, and take me by the
hand.'(7)
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1) John D. Washburn, 'Report of the Council,' Proceedings
of the American
Antiquarian Society 2 (April 1883): 259-60.
2) Haven Family Papers 1747-1908, American Antiquarian
Society Manuscript
Collection.
3) George C. Groce and David H. Wallace, New York
Historical Society's
Dictionary of Artists in America 1564-1860 (New Haven: Yale
University
Press, 1974), 160.
4) Robert F. Perkins Jr. and William J. Gavin, The Boston
Athenaeum Art
Exhibition Index, 1827-1874 (Boston: Boston Athenaeum, 1980), 44.
Starting
in 1848, Custer exhibited landscapes including 'View on the
Connecticut
River,' and 'Lake Lucerne.' His last showing at the Athenaeum was
in 1869.
5) Boston Evening Transcript (January 10, 1881), 4. The
obituary listed
several portraits painted by Custer including, 'Judge Bacon of
Worcester,
Judge Charles Allen, Mr. Haven, the eminent antiquarian, and
Stephen Salisbury.'
6) The December 27, 1878 receipt for Custer's $300 fee is
preserved in
the American Antiquarian Society Archives. The artist, who was
living
at 128 Tremont Street in Boston at the time, billed Stephen
Salisbury
directly.
7) Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society (April
1879): 64-65.
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