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American Antiquarian Society

Learned society and national research library

Summary

Learned society and national research library

Field	Value
image	Antiquarian Hall.jpg
caption	View of Antiquarian Hall from the corner of Park Ave and Salisbury St.
country	United States
type	Research library
established
location	185 Salisbury Street,
Worcester, Massachusetts
coordinates
num_branches	1
collection_size	4.5 million
pop_served	1,211 (Membership, 2024)
director	Scott E. Casper
num_employees	45
website
architect	Winslow, Bigelow & Wadsworth
module	{{Infobox NRHP
name	American Antiquarian Society
embed	yes
nrhp_type	nhl
locmapin	Massachusetts#USA
area	1.8 acre
built	1910
architecture	Colonial Revival
designated_nrhp_type	November 24, 1968
added	November 24, 1968
refnum	68000018
criteria_for_collection	Pre-1900 Americana

Worcester, Massachusetts

The American Antiquarian Society (AAS), located in Worcester, Massachusetts, is both a learned society and a national research library of pre-twentieth-century American history and culture. Founded in 1812, it is the oldest historical society in the United States with a national focus. Its main building, known as Antiquarian Hall, is a U.S. National Historic Landmark in recognition of this legacy. The mission of the AAS is to collect, preserve and make available for study all printed records of what is now known as the United States of America. This includes materials from the first European settlement through the year 1900.

The AAS offers programs on a wide variety of subjects including but not limited to Environmental History, Indigenous Peoples Studies, and American Religion for professional scholars, pre-collegiate, undergraduate and graduate students, educators, professional artists, writers, genealogists, and the general public.

The collections of the AAS contain over four million books, pamphlets, newspapers, periodicals, graphic arts materials and manuscripts. The Society is estimated to hold copies of two-thirds of the total books known to have been printed in what is now the United States from the establishment of the first press in 1640 through the year 1820; many of these volumes are exceedingly rare and a number of them are unique. Historic materials from all fifty U.S. states, most of Canada and the British West Indies are included in the AAS repository. An act of congress requires that one copy of the journals of the Senate and of the House of Representatives along with other documents are to be transmitted to the Governor of Massachusetts for the use and benefit of the Society. One of the more notable volumes held by the Society is a copy of the first book printed in America, the Bay Psalm Book. AAS has one of the largest collections of newspapers printed in America through 1876, with more than two million issues in its collection.

Its collections contain the first American women's magazine edited by a woman, The Humming Bird, or Herald of Taste. The collection also contains over 60,000 pieces of sheet music, over 300 games (including puzzles, board games, and cards), a large historical pottery collection, extensive New England diaries and personal papers, a diverse collection of photographs dating from the 1830s to the 1920s, and children's literature dating back to the 1650s.

History

Isaiah Thomas]], founder of the American Antiquarian Society

On the initiative of Isaiah Thomas, the AAS was founded on October 24, 1812, through an act of the Massachusetts General Court. It was the third historical society established in America, and the first to be national in its scope. Isaiah Thomas started the collection with approximately 8,000 books from his personal library. The first library building was erected in 1820 in downtown Worcester, Massachusetts. In 1853, the Society moved its collections to a larger building at the corner of Highland Street, also in Worcester. This building was later abandoned and another new building was constructed. Designed by Winslow, Bigelow & Wadsworth, the Georgian Revival building was completed in 1910 and stands on the corner of Park Avenue and Salisbury Street. There have been several additions to this building to accommodate the growing collection. The most recent addition was completed in 2019 and created room for an updated HVAC system, conservation lab, and multi-use learning lab. AAS was presented with the 2013 National Humanities Medal by President Obama in a ceremony at the White House.

History of printing

Past leaders

Over its two-hundred-year history, the Society has had 14 formal leaders who have shaped the organization's vision, collections, and day-to-day operations. Leadership roles at the AAS have historically overlapped in chronology, as different roles oversaw different aspects of the Society simultaneously.

Name	Dates of Leadership	Role	Occupation
Isaiah Thomas	1812–1831	President	Publisher
Christopher Columbus Baldwin	1831–1837	Librarian	Lawyer
Samuel Foster Haven	1838–1881	Librarian	Archaeologist/Anthropologist
Stephen Salisbury II	1854–1881	President	Landowner
Edmund Mills Barton	1883–1908	Librarian	Librarian
Stephen Salisbury III	1887–1905	President	Politician
Waldo Lincoln	1907–1927	President	Manufacturer
Clarence S. Brigham	1908–1959	Librarian/Director	Author/Bibliographer
Calvin Coolidge	1929–1933	President	Politician
R.W.G. Vail	1930–1939	Librarian	Librarian
Clifford K. Shipton	1939–1967	Director	Archivist/Historian
Marcus A. McCorison	1960–1992	Librarian/President	Rare Books Librarian
Ellen S. Dunlap	1992–2020	Director	Librarian
Scott E. Casper	2020–present	Director	Historian

Notable members

The American Antiquarian Society's membership includes scholars, writers, journalists, historians, artists, filmmakers, collectors, American presidents, and civic leaders. Notable members include the following individuals:

Benjamin Abbot
John Adams
John Quincy Adams
Herman Vandenburg Ames
Roald Amundsen
Edward M. Augustus Jr.
George Bancroft
Alexander Graham Bell
Ned Blackhawk
Ken Burns
Jimmy Carter
Bruce Catton
Harriette L. Chandler
Ron Chernow
Bill Clinton
Calvin Coolidge
Walter Cronkite
Robert Darnton
Charles Devens
Theodore Frelinghuysen Dwight
Edward Eggleston
Drew Gilpin Faust
Moses Fisk
Esther Forbes
Henry Louis Gates
Doris Kearns Goodwin
Annette Gordon-Reed
Amanda Gorman
Samuel Swett Green
Ferdinand Rudolph Hassler
Rutherford B. Hayes
Washington Irving
Andrew Jackson
John Jay
Thomas Jefferson
Tobias Lear
Jill Lepore
David McCullough
Larry McMurtry
James Madison
Othniel Charles Marsh
James Monroe
Pedro II of Brazil
Nathaniel Philbrick
Dorothy B. Porter
John Wesley Powell
Carl Christian Rafn
Franklin Pierce Rice
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
George Dudley Seymour
James H. Salisbury
Thomas Winthrop Streeter Sr.
William H. Taft
Frederick Jackson Turner
Bushrod Washington
Woodrow Wilson
Gordon S. Wood

Awards

AAS was presented with the 2013 National Humanities Medal by President Obama in a ceremony at the White House.

References

"American Antiquarian Society". National Park Service.
{{NRISref. 2007a
Gura, Philip F. ''The American Antiquarian Society, 1812–2012: A Bicentennial History'' (Worcester: American Antiquarian Society, 2012), p. x.
Little, Geoffrey. 2014. “The American Antiquarian Society, 1812-2012: A Bicentennial History.” ''Papers of the Bibliographical Society of Canada / Cahiers de La Société Bibliographique Du Canada'' 52 (2): 474–76.
"National Historic Landmarks Program (NHL)".
American Antiquarian Society. "About the Library Collection".
aaswebsite. (August 25, 2012). "Programs & Events".
aasmaster. (October 2, 2012). "Tours".
"44 U.S. Code § 1908 - American Antiquarian Society to receive certain publications".
Gura, p. 24.
aasmaster. (October 22, 2012). "Newspapers".
MURPHY, JILLMARIE. (2016). ""The Humming Bird; or Herald of Taste" (1798): Periodical Culture and Female Editorship in the Early American Republic". American Periodicals.
Gura, p. 1.
Gura, p. 33.
Gura, p. 32.
Gura, pp. 98–99.
"Development Department of the American Antiquarian Society".
(July 22, 2014). "President Obama Awards 2013 National Humanities Medals".
Gura, pp. 14, 33.
"Conservation at the American Antiquarian Society".
aasmaster. (February 28, 2018). "Members Directory".
"About | American Antiquarian Society".

Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

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