Collections

Correspondence, business records, press releases, photographs, newspaper clippings, and printed material, regarding the resettlement of unemployed coal miners and their families to Arthurdale, West Virginia. Collection contains the papers of Bushrod Grimes (1888-1957), Project Manager of the Arthurdale Subsistence Homestead Project, 1933-1935, and pertains to the planning and administration of the Project. Correspondents include M.L. Wilson, Guy W. Numbers, Eleanor Roosevelt, Arthur Woods, W.E. Muldoon, O.B. Smart, Kathryn Fenn, H.W. MacGregor, J.G. Sillenbeck, Charles E. Pynchon, and G.M. Flynn. Oversize item is panoramic photograph titled "View of the Experimental Homestead Farm, Reedsville, WV; Mansion in the foreground to be made into school building," dated 1933/12.

The collection includes microfilm of six letters from Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt and her personal secretary concerning the school and Woman's Club at Arthurdale (1936-1937); a picture of Franklin D. Roosevelt with Arthurdale graduating class of 1938; and a pamphlet illustrating the products of the Mountaineer Craftsmen's Co-operative Association. Also includes a mimeographed fact sheet (1937); a news story on the resettlement project (1936); and an article titled "Footnote on Arthurdale," by Millard Milburn Rice, Harper's Magazine, March 1940. There are three copies of this article, including one cut out of the magazine, one inside the complete issue of the magazine, and one typescript copy. The fact sheet, news story, and articles are originals.

Scrapbooks, correspondence, business papers, and memorabilia of a prominent Charleston family that were long time owners of the Charleston Gazette. There are papers of W. E. Chilton, Sr., and for his son and grandson, W. E. Chilton, Jr. and W. E. Chilton, III. The papers of Chilton senior include some correspondence, but mostly land papers documenting the coal mining district in Webster and Braxton Counties. There are also scrapbooks, and contracts pertaining to the family newspaper business; and volumes on the education of W. E. Chilton, Jr. at Woodberry, VA Forest School, and at Yale. The military service of the Chiltons is documented by the service papers, photographs, and other material for W. E. Chilton, Jr. and W. E. Chilton, III in World War (WWI) I and World War II (WWII) respectively.

Three letters addressed to Edna Ferber, an American Novelist, from varying individuals including Mayor of New York, John Lindsay and Eleanor Roosevelt.

The Historical Photograph Collection is largely comprised of materials created by or for the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association. Some of the earliest photographs of the estate were created and sold to visitors by the Association as a means of income. Those efforts helped to establish an important collection of 19th century views. The collection spans the 1850s to 2000s and includes over 140 linear feet of analog material providing a visual history of the Mansion, outbuildings, tombs, grounds, events, visitors, collection objects, personnel, and changes throughout the estate.