The collection is open to research.
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Researchers wishing to cite this collection should include the following information: [identification of item], [box], [folder], Hampden-Sydney College Union Literary Society Correspondence, Ms1993-001, Special Collections and University Archives, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Va.
The Hampden-Sydney College Union Literary Society Correspondence was purchased by Special Collections and University Archives in 1993.
The processing and description of the Hampden-Sydney College Union Literary Society Correspondence commenced and was completed in October, 2023.
The Union Literary Society was founded at Hampden-Sydney College (Hampden Sydney, Virginia) in 1789, to provide the college's students a forum for improving their rhetoric through writing, speaking, and debating. The society had its own hall and library on campus and fulfilled its mission by staging formal debates among its members and engaging in formal debates with competing lierary societies, largely focusing on political issues of the day. In 1929, the Union Literary Society merged with its on-campus rival, the Philanthropic Literary Society, to form the Union-Philanthropic Society. The society remains active today (2023).
This collection contains 16 pieces of incoming correspondence of Hampden-Sydney College's Union Literary Society. The correspondence relates to the society's routine business and includes responses to invitations to join the membership or to lecture before the society. Also included are letters from various vendors relating to purchases of regalia or furnishings for the society. Within the correspondence of potential members and lecturers are letters from John S. Caskie, Thomas Saunders Gholson, James E. Heath, Elias Lyman Magoon, Chesley Martin, Henry W. Miller, Joseph Nimmo, and Harry Robertson. Vendors represented in the collection are H. K. Ellyson, Jos. M. Freeman, Samuel W. Harwood, John W. Hines, Joseph Perkins, R. C. Richardson (for Jaquelin P. Taylor), ad Francis B. Watkins.
The guide to the Hampden-Sydney College Union Literary Society Correspondence by Special Collections and University Archives, Virginia Tech, is licensed under a CC0 (https://creativecommons.org/share-your-work/public-domain/cc0/).