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Explore unique digital collections from Bryn Mawr, Haverford, and Swarthmore Colleges.

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In Her Own Right

In Her Own Right is a project executed by members of the Philadelphia Area Consortium of Special Collections Libraries (PACSCL), with funding from the National Endowment of the Humanities (NEH) and the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR). This collection contains digitized items from the Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College, Swarthmore College Peace Collection, Bryn Mawr College Special Collections, and Haverford College Quaker & Special Collections that illuminate women's efforts to assert their rights and work for the rights of others in a variety of spheres in the century leading up to the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment. Visit http://inherownright.org to view additional collections from other PACSCL libraries.

9209 items

Photograph of Pandita Ramabai Sarasvati's head and shoulders

Quaker Relief in Europe, 1914-1922

English and American Quakers were engaged in relief and reconstruction work in Europe during and following World War I involving civilians in Russia, Serbia, Austria, and Poland. In 1919 Friends extended their efforts to include a program of child-feeding in Germany. This collection of almost 1000 glass lantern slides assembled by the AFSC shows the damage caused by war, rebuilding efforts, hospitals and orphanages, and other projects.

501 items

A line of poor children headed by an adult on the sidewalk in front of a rundown building

1918 Pandemic at Bryn Mawr College

COVID-19 is not the first pandemic that Bryn Mawr College community members have experienced. As World War I was coming to an end, the world found itself facing a similar crisis with the outbreak of the Influenza Pandemic of 1918, sometimes referred to as the Spanish Flu. The College Archives holds records from both students and the college administration from 1918 which capture both the administrative decisions made during the pandemic and the effects of those decisions on some members of the Bryn Mawr community. This is a curated collection of digitized material from the College Archives; not all material related to the 1918 pandemic at Bryn Mawr is available online.

31 items

Abby Hopper Gibbons Papers

Abigail Hopper Gibbons (1801-1893) was an important figure in many of the reform movements in the middle and late nineteenth century. Like her father, Isaac T. Hopper (1771-1852), "Abby" Gibbons was an ardent abolitionist and dedicated to prison reform. Of particular note is the correspondence sent and received by Abby Hopper Gibbons, including family letters and and related to her work to assist Union Soldiers during the Civil War. Also includes letters from Union soldiers, prominent Americans such as Theodore Roosevelt, Joseph Choate, and Lydia Maria Child, and correspondence reflecting Quaker family life and concerns.

1287 items

Portrait of Abby Hopper Gibbons and her family, including James, William, Sarah, Julia, and Lucy

Carrie Chapman Catt Papers

Carrie Lane Chapman Catt (1859-1947) was an internationally recognized suffragist, feminist, and political activist. This collection contains six of Catt’s personal photograph albums, circa 1840 to 1940. The albums contain approximately 815 photographs related to the women's suffrage movement, including portraits and records of parades, demonstrations, conferences, and other events. The albums cover both the American and international suffrage movements. Notable figures depicted include: Louisa May Alcott, Dr. Josephine Baker, Carrie Chapman Catt, Emmeline Pankhurst, Mark Twain, Theodore Roosevelt, Mary Wollstonecraft, and Woodrow Wilson.

289 items

College Women

College Women was a consortial project of the libraries and archives of the institutions formerly known as the Seven Sisters. The project began in the spring of 2014 with a Foundations Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) to support the development of an online portal, which continues to be accessible at https://collegewomen.org. This collection includes diaries and letters of several Bryn Mawr College alumnae/i originating from several personal paper collections held in the Bryn Mawr College Special Collections.

1782 items

Cope Evans Family Papers

The Cope Evans Family Papers contain the letters of the closely related Quaker families of Cope and Evans who lived in Germantown, Pennsylvania. The materials in the collection were created between 1730-2009. Letters discuss family, friends and home life, and reflect the social environment of these Quaker families. Other topics to be found within the letters include Philadelphia history, Haverford history, travels in Europe, education, illness and death, and discussions of national events such as the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the assassinations of Presidents Lincoln and McKinley. They are a rich source of information on a large number of topics.

Collection Guides for HC.MC-1170 Cope Evans Family papers and HC.MC-1242 Cope Evans Family papers

5077 items

Documenting COVID-19 at Bryn Mawr College

A community-sourced archive of personal experiences and reactions to the pandemic. All members of the Bryn Mawr College community are invited and encouraged to participate. The College Archives welcomes any documentation that represents your individual experience or the experiences of your community. This could take many forms, including material you're already creating. Maybe you're keeping a journal, making art or poetry, or recording a vlog—perhaps you're turning to social media and making memes or taking photos and videos of your life to share with friends. We're interested too in stories about the impact of the shift to remote learning, instruction, and work. How has working or studying from home affected you? How are you and your friends and family keeping in touch during this period of social distancing and quarantine? Are you an essential service worker or living with someone who is unable to self-isolate? We want to hear your story. Submit material to the project here. If you have questions about the project or need assistance, please check out our FAQ or contact the College Archivist, Allison Mills.

3 items

Documenting COVID-19 at Bryn Mawr College

Mohandas K. Gandhi Correspondence

This collection of images of 33 letters written by Mohandas K. Gandhi includes twenty letters written to Reginald Reynolds between 1929 and 1946, six letters to Richard B. Gregg between 1927 and 1953, and single letters to Jane Addams, Horace Alexander, C.Y. Chintamani, John H. Holmes, Hannah C. Hull, Dorothy Newman, and one unknown recipient. An essay about the Gandhi-Reynolds correspondence is available.

33 items

Handwritten letter from Mohandas Gandhi discussing the use of one of his speeches

Quaker Broadsides and Pamphlets

The Quaker Broadsides and Pamphlets collection consists of over 800 titles from the collections of Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College and Haverford College Quaker & Special Collections. It includes works from 1657 to the present. Some of the items in the collection are composed of a single, unfolded sheet with printing on only one side. Many others, however, are multiple pages and smaller sizes. Topics of the broadsides include: exhortations by Quakers against the slave trade; testimonials regarding deceased Friends; petitions to government authorities for recognition of various Quaker testimonies, including conscientious objection to war and refusal to take oaths; advice and caution to Quakers regarding their conduct of life; and theological arguments both within the Society of Friends and regarding other religions.

891 items

Close up of the printed beginning of "William Penn's Answer to John Faldo's Printed Challenge"

Quakers and Slavery

The Religious Society of Friends was the first corporate body in Britain and North America to fully condemn slavery as both ethically and religiously wrong in all circumstances. It is in Quaker records that we have some of the earliest manifestations of anti-slavery sentiment, dating from the 1600s. After the 1750s, some Quakers actively engaged in attempting to sway public opinion in Britain and America against the slave trade and slavery in general. At the same time, some Quakers became actively involved in the economic, educational and political well being of the formerly enslaved.

Quakers and Slavery was a consortial project of Haverford College Quaker & Special Collections and Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College. Funding was provided by the Federal Institute of Museum and Library Services, through a program stipulated by the Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA). This program is administered in Pennsylvania through the Office of Commonwealth Libraries for assisting libraries in providing all users access to information, developing partnerships, and increasing information access for persons who have difficulty gaining it.

1149 items

Newspaper engraving of emancipated slaves and their fair skinned children in an attempt to depict former slaves sympathetically as white