Children's Literature
The Children's Books collection at the American Antiquarian Society is,
within its scope, the world's finest. Extending from the sober prose of
Thomas Shepard's children's catechism, Short Catechism Familiarly
Teaching
the Knowledg of God (1654), to the cheerful images of children at play
in
Young America's ABC and Pretty Picture Book (1900), the collection
chronicles the emergence of an American literature for children. Books
written for children can provide important evidence of the forces
structuring childhood experience, that is, the ideals and ambitions of the
society that wrote and published them. Scholars studying a variety of
social issues-- the treatment of the physically handicapped, city life,
temperance, and slavery--will find rich materials here. The AAS collection
of books for children is thus an unparalleled resource for studies in such
fields as the history of childhood, child discipline and the education of
children, the history of reading, and the history of publishing, printing,
and the graphic arts.
At present, children's literature at AAS is divided physically among
several collections. Children's books published before 1821 are part of
the Dated Books and Dated Pamphlets collections, while those published
from 1821 forward are housed as applicable among the Children's
Literature, McLoughlin, School Books, Sabbath School Books, Primers, and
Catechisms collections. Children's books issued before 1801 and after 1820
are fully cataloged in the AAS online catalog; the children's imprints
issued between 1801 and 1820 are accessible under the subject heading,
"Children's Literature" in the AAS Imprint Catalog, a card catalog
available in the library reading room.
Children's books issued between 1801 and 1820 are in the process of being
fully described in the AAS online catalog. New
titles are being added every day.
As d'Alté Welch noted in his A Bibliography of American
Children's Books
Printed Prior to 1821 (Worcester, 1972), the Society "has by far the
largest and most interesting collection of children's books seen.... [It]
contains almost two thirds of all extant American [pre-1821] children's
books." After Welch's untimely death in 1970, our already unrivaled
collection was further strengthened by the acquisition of his personal
collection. At 3,500 titles, these early children's books comprise an
unparalleled resource for those seeking to understand the development of
the children's book market in the United States.
Most American books for children printed before 1821 were printings of
English chapbooks--which included traditional tales like "Cock Robin" and
"Children in the Wood," abridgments of literary works like "Robinson
Crusoe," and books of amusement and instruction, particularly those first
issued by the London publisher John Newbery. Many of these chapbooks
originally published by Newbery were reissued for the American market by
Worcester printer and AAS founder Isaiah Thomas. Towards the end of the
eighteenth century, such English writers as Maria Edgeworth and Sarah
Trimmer began producing a literature more especially designed for
children, and their works were quickly reprinted in the United
States.
Welch's bibliography covers only the nonpedagogical genres of pre-1821
American juveniles, but the AAS collection is nearly as strong in early
primers, textbooks, and catechisms. The Society holds the single strongest
collection (about 200 editions) of New England primers printed before
1830, as recorded in Charles Heartman's bibliography The New England
Primer Issued Prior to 1830 (New York, 1934), and nearly half of the
non-New England primers recorded by Heartman in "American Primers, Indian
Primers, Royal Primers, and Thirty-Seven Other Types of Non-New England
Primers Issued Prior to 1830" (Highland Park, N.J., 1935).
After 1820, American writers and publishers made a deliberate effort to
produce a native literature for American children, one suited to instruct
the young citizens of a new republic, and this collection is particularly
rich in materials for the social historian.
The nonpedagogical portion of this collection housed in the Children's
Literature Collection is one of the strongest in the nation. It numbers
about 9,000 editions and includes fiction, poetry, natural history, travel
narratives, Sunday school tracts, and conduct of life manuals. The
collection is especially strong in the works of Louisa May Alcott, William
Taylor Adams (i.e., "Oliver Optic"), Jacob Abbott, Samuel Goodrich, in
chapbooks, and in the publications of the American Sunday School Union and
the American Tract Society. The collection also contains some important
boxed sets and cabinet libraries
One portion of this collection is worth noting separately. The Society
holds approximately 1,400 picture books issued by the New York firm of
McLoughlin Brothers. McLoughlin publications are particularly well known
for their use of colored illustrations, which were hand-stenciled during
the firm's early years and printed using etched zinc plates,
chromolithographs, and photo engravings later on. The collection includes
many copies from the company archives. The bulk of the collection is the
gift of AAS member Herbert H. Hosmer, who had acquired much of it from
Ruth Miller, the daughter of McLoughlin Brothers Vice President Charles
Miller. The collection represents a departure from the usual collecting
policy of the Society, for the imprints within it range from the 1850s to
well into the twentieth century. Current acquisition policy provides for
purchase of McLoughlin publications published to about 1899.
In addition to these McLoughlin picture books, the Society holds a
magnificent collection of drawings and proofs originally belonging to the
McLoughlin company archives. Also donated by Herbert Hosmer, this
collection contains over 760 pieces created between the establishment of
the firm in 1858 and its sale to Milton Bradley in 1920. The majority of
the pieces date from McLoughlin Brothers' commercial and artistic halcyon
period between 1880 and 1900, and includes drawings by Enos and Frances
Comstock, Palmer Cox, Georgina A. Davis, Anthony Hochstein, Justin
H. Howard, Sarah Noble Ives, and Ida Waugh. A finding aid providing
access to each piece of art work in this collection is now available
online.
The Society also holds significant collections of pedagogical juvenile
books, although it does not collect as comprehensively in this area. There
are about 1,300 school books, 230 Sabbath school books and primers, and
320 primers published between 1821 and 1876 in the collection.
The post-1820 juvenile collection has become an increasingly well-used
resource, largely owing to the detailed cataloging of this collection
provided through the American Children's Books Project funded by the
National Endowment for the Humanities between 1985 and 1996. These records
provide access in both the AAS online catalog and in RLIN for subject,
genre, publisher, printer, illustrator, engraver, physical characteristics
(e.g., signed bindings), and place of imprint, along with the traditional
entries for author and title. Over 13,500 records describing the post 1820
children's titles are now available. In content and format, this rapidly
growing database of juvenile literature complements and extends the
Society's North American Imprints Program.
An important database that was started during the American Children's
Books Project is the Nineteenth-Century
American Children's Book Trade
Directory. This directory charts the dates and locations of
individuals
and firms involved in the publication of children's books held at AAS,
including publishers, binders, booksellers, printers, ink makers,
stationers, and stereotypers. The database covers individuals and firms
active in towns and cities throughout nearly all lower 48 states, many of
which produced books for adults as well as for children. The
chronological scope covered by the Directory is between 1821 and 1876,
with some exceptions. AAS staff are now working to make this directory
available both as a World Wide Web database and as a printed
publication. This Directory will prove to be an enormously valuable
research tool for book collectors working to date their books, for
bookdealers appraising nineteenth-century American books, and for
researchers of the book trade at large in America.
The AAS collections of children's literature continue to grow
significantly each year, due in no small part to two acquisition funds
devoted to the collection of children's books established by AAS members
and prominent collectors Ruth Adomeit, and Linda F. and Julian
L. Lapides. The Ruth Adomeit Fund, has enabled the Society to procure
scores of children's titles published before 1840, many of them
chapbooks. For over a decade, the Lapides Fund has provided money to
purchase a visually stunning array of picture books, including many
McLoughlin titles. These funds ensure that children's books at AAS remain
a vital resource.
Finally, it should be noted that the Society's holdings include important
supporting materials for studies in the history of childhood and
children's literature, including advice manuals for parents and teachers,
several hundred games, and the largest single collection of American
children's periodicals to 1876. Paper checklists are available for both
the games and the children's periodicals. The AAS Manuscripts Collection
contains strong holdings of juvenile diaries, as well as the papers of
individuals and firms associated with children's book publishing, such as
educators Joseph Lancaster and Goold Brown, illustrators Lydia Very and
David Claypoole Johnston, and publisher Lee and Shepard. The Society
also holds one of the largest collections of amateur
newspapers, many of them written, printed, and distributed by children
under eighteen, which provide a rare source of insight into the world of
nineteenth-century American children and adolescents.
- Richard Fyffe, former Cataloger,
S.J. Wolfe, Senior Cataloger, and Laura E. Wasowicz, Curator of
Children's Literature
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An accordion fold alphabet toy book (New York, 1845?).
Late nineteenth-century watercolor drawing from the McLoughlin Collection
of children's picture books and drawings.
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