Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library: Guide to the Microfiche Collection
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Early American History Research Reports from the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library: Guide to the Microfiche Collection Chadwyck-Healey Pro uesf Start here. This volume is a finding aid to a ProQuest Research Collection in Microform. To learn more visit: www.proquest.com or call (800) 521-0600 About ProQuest: ProQuest connects people with vetted, reliable information. Key to serious research, the company has forged a 70-year reputation as a gateway to the world's knowledge-from dissertations to governmental and cultural archives to news, in all its forms. Its role is essential to libraries and other organizations whose missions depend on the delivery of complete, trustworthy information. 789 E. Eisenhower Parkway • P.O Box 1346 • Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 • USA •Tel: 734.461.4700 • Toll-free 800-521-0600 • www.proquest.com Early American History Research Reports from the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library: Guide to the Microfiche Collection Gregory L. Williams Principal Compiler Chadwyck-Healey 1992 © 1992 Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. Library. Early American history research reports from the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library : guide to the microfiche collection I Gregory L. Williams, principal compiler. p. cm. ISBN 0-89887-086-0 1. w;mamshurg (Va)--History--Bibliography--Microform catalogs. 2. Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. Library-Microform catalogs. I. Williams, Gregory L. II.Title. Zl346.W55c65 1992a [F234.W7] 016.97554252-dc20 92-9251 Contents Users' Note v Preface vii Introduction ix Report Number List 1 Archaeological Reports(AK 1-AK 162) 1 Architectural Reports(AR 1-AR 208) 12 Decorative Arts Reports(DA 1-DA 27) 26 Historical Reports(HI 1-HI 477) 27 Historic Trades Reports(TR 1-TR 56) 56 Title List 59 Author List 117 Users' Note This guide provides access to the reports in the microfiche edition in three ways: by report number, by title, and by author. The report number list is arranged alphabetically by subject abbreviation and thereunder numerically. The subject abbreviations are AK(Archaeological Reports), AR(Architectural Reports), DA(Decorative Arts Reports), Hl(Historical Reports), and 1R(Historic Trades Reports). The title and author list are arranged alphabetically. If a report has more than one author, it is listed under each author. Author names are noted as they appear on the title page of each report i.e., initials or full names and therefore there are name variations from report to report. All entries cite report number, author, title, and original title if applicable. v Preface eyton Randolph, president of the first Continental Congress and resident of Williamsburg, Virginia, was an avid reader; or so historians presume from the large number of books he acquired and the fact that gentlemen often P prided themselves on their extensive book learning. Randolph's library occupied two downstairs rooms in a large old house on the north side of Market Square. He stored his books in four mahogany book presses. Each measured four feet wide and stood over six feet tall. Together they enclosed upwards of two hundred cubic feet of shelf space, and their great bulk dominated the rooms where they stood. Two centuries later Williamsburg is still a town of readers, many of whom are historians. Accordingly, the titles in their libraries include a great many histories about Williamsburg, the American colonies, England, and Europe. The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation-the outdoor history museum that restored Peyton Randolph's house, refurnished bis library, reproduced his four book presSes at the Anthony Hay cabinet shop three doors down the street, and refilled their shelves-also employs many of the scholars and authors who have written these more recent histories. Their reports number many hundreds, and they continue to accumulate. They would have filled Randolph's book presses to overflowing. For years they did overflow the library shelves at Colonial Williamsburg: not any more. Technology came to the rescue. Now the complete works of Colonial Williamsburg's historians, curators, archaeologists, architectural historians, and librarians have been miraculously miniaturized and reproduced on a deck of plastic microfiche cards that Peyton Randolph could have carried around in the crown of his hat. Such a ludicrous anachronism nevertheless illustrates something about the progress of intellectual culture over the last two centuries. When Williamsburg was a colonial capital, perhaps as many as eight out of ten white men in Virginia were literate in the sense that they could sign their names. Far fewer were readers of books, and fewer still owned them in any number. Only gentlemen of Peyton Randolph's standing enjoyed the luxury of personal libraries and the education and leisure to use them. Since then, public education has vastly expanded literacy in the United States and, more important, opened the life of the mind to millions of women as well as men. They include everyone who now visits Colonial Williamsburg to learn history in the buildings and on the streets where it happened. They also include the Foundation's staff historians who wrote the reports included in this series. And now, thanks to the decision to publish the Foundation's collection of research reports on microfiche, they include users around the country and around the world with whom we can share our scholarship quickly, conveniently, and economically. Ten years ago Colonial Williamsburg had no idea how many reports had been written in the course of restoring and interpreting the eighteenth-century capital of Virginia. Initial inquiries set in motion a search that took a decade to find and collect more than nine hundred reports for this comprehensive publication. The sleuths were originally archivist John Ingram and librarian Louise Merriam. Their goal was to compile an in-house catalog of the research reports they received from the departments of Historical, Architectural, and Archaeological Research, Collections, Archives and Records, and Historic Trades. Later, under the direction of a new librarian, Pearce S. Grove, the dragnet was enlarged and the objective became a microform publication. Besides Ingram, other staff members-Eileen Parris, Elizabeth Ackert, and Gregory Williams-undertook the painstaking work of preparing the reports for photography. Library volunteers and student assistants were recruited as copy editors, proofreaders, and typists. Meanwhile Pearce vii Grove had negotiated a contract with OPUS Publications, Inc., which brought out the first two hundred tides in the series. Later, OPUS sold its interest in the project to Chadwyck-Healey Inc., which now publishes the remainder of the series. Our chief ambition initially was to make the collection of reports more accessible to our own interpreters and researchers. Later conversations with prospective microfiche publishers opened our eyes to a much larger potential readership in museums, historical societies, colleges and universities, and elsewhere. That prospect-to employ modem technology to share our work with students who cannot visit our library-was entirely consistent with Colonial Williamsburg's educational philosophy and mission. A body of knowledge that could never have been contained even inside Peyton Randolph's four large book presses is now compressed into the deck of microfiche cards that accompanies this guide and thus becomes accessible to all. Cary Carson Vice President for Research viii Introduction or more than six decades researchers at the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation have been seeking answers to questions about the history and culture of early America in general and about eighteenth-century Virginia in F particular. The results of the research of these hardworking individuals have been carefully preserved at Williamsburg and now form the basis for a major microfiche project: Early American History Research Reports from the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library. First issued as a group of two hundred reports covering topics in history, architecture, archaeology, historic trades, and decorative arts, the series bas been greatly expanded to encompass more than nine hundred individual essays, compilations of source documents, and research and investigative reports. Research at the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation bas a long history of "going to the source." From the earliest days of the restoration in the late 1920s, museum administrators have appreciated the need to investigate the little-explored resources of libraries and historical societies on both sides of the Atlantic for necessary information. Early in the Foundation's history, researchers were sent to England to sift through collections of manuscripts and rare books in public and private repositories such as the Bodleian Library, the Public Record Office, and the British Museum. Historians, architects, and curators also visited many important repositories in the United States. In an effort to secure additional information, the museum staff invited the public in and around Williamsburg as well as beyond to give or sell to Colonial Williamsburg original manuscripts, newspapers, and other eighteenth-century primary sources to increase the Foundation's fund of knowledge about colonial Virginia. From the beginning researchers realized that despite many successful search efforts, they would not have access at Williamsburg to all the original documents and rare books necessary for their work. They