Correspondence, 1907-1956, bulk 1924-1942
Scope and Contents
The collection is divided into four series, Correspondence, Speeches and Writings, Diaries, and General, with the correspondence series further divided into artificial subseries based on chronology.
The Speeches series contains both handwritten and typewritten copies and drafts of speeches, articles, addresses, and sermons written by Maurer, some with his additional handwritten notes. Folders are generally named after the titles of speeches.
The Diaries series features President Maurer's 42 years' worth of daily entries, a bound volume covering each year (except 1901-1902) from 1900 through his unexpected death in February of 1942. The CD-R contains black and white scans of all of the diaries in the collection, as well as a few digital photographs, scans of early writings, and supporting correspondence between Beloit College and Margaret Maurer Gibson and Sterling Skinner, the donors of the diaries.
The General series contains the president's reports to the Board of Trustees, other administrative reports and records, photographs, fundraising and promotional materials, meeting minutes, President Maurer's appointment calendars, student/alumni records, and news clippings. Of particular note are correspondence, articles, and various documents regarding his death and its subsequent effects on the college and community.
Dates
- Other: 1907-1956, bulk 1924-1942
Conditions Governing Access
This collection is open for research; however, certain materials are fragile and require Archives staff for handling, or use may be restricted. Some documents marked "Confidential. Not to be printed in whole or in part."
Biographical / Historical
This series contains general correspondence, correspondence to alumni, and correspondence to faculty.
Some correspondence is to or from President Marvin Brannon, other is to or from acting president Bradley Tyrrell. These can be discovered by noting the dates of the correspondence. If it fell outside President Maurer's tenure (1924-1942), it did not belong to him.
Extent
From the Collection: 20.5 Linear Feet (21 boxes)
Language of Materials
English
Arrangement
Subseries date ranges are indicated at the beginning of each folder title.
Irving Maurer's correspondence has, for the most part, been arranged according to his original, slightly idiosyncratic, filing system (or more likely, his secretaries' filing systems). It was arranged chronologically by group of years, then alphabetically within each year group. However, the time frames covered in each A-Z group overlap considerably.
In order to label the folders in a somewhat consistent way, date range groupings (subseries) have been applied by Archives staff (e.g. "Correspondence, late 1930s-1942"), and these groups represent. Nonetheless, there are many cases in which a folder will contain letters from outside the date range indicated in its folder title (e.g. "Correspondence, 1936-1937 - Art Hall, 1933-1935"). The date ranges chosen by the Archives were attempts to best reflect each A-Z group as a whole.
Additionally, there are many folders within the Correspondence series that do not contain any correspondence, or contain predominantly non-correspondence documents; despite this, they have been kept in place in order to respect the original order.
Repository Details
Part of the Beloit College Archives and Special Collections, Beloit, WI Repository