Local Resources - Seaver Center for Western History Research at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County

By Beverly Mateer Taylor

Seaver Center for Western History Research
at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County
Exposition Park,
900 Exposition Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90007

Hours: 10am-4pm Monday and Thursday
Closed 12noon - 1:00pm
Telephone (213) 763-3359
Collections Manager: John Cahoon
Web: http://www.nhm.org
E-mail: jcahoon@nhm.org

The Seaver Center is one of two libraries in the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. It con­tains a unique collection of manuscripts, historical records, photographs, and ephemera. The collection also includes 7,000 books and 2,000 periodical volumes, most of which can be found in other libraries.

The focus of the collection is the history of the trans-Mississippi West from the earliest days of exploration to the 1940s. Materials covering the last half of the 20th cen­tury are more limited.

The collection's primary emphasis is on Southern California and Los Angeles, but it is not limited to this area. The Map Collection documents Southern California history and development, including real estate, transporta­tion patterns, tourism, etc. The Photograph Collection includes everything from historical and publicity photos to unknown family albums.

This article will focus on the general collections and the Photograph Collections.

Guides for both are on the Website as well as in the library. Each individual collection has been assigned a number and a title. A brief summary follows each title. An asterisk precedes titles for which a container list or other finding aid for individual items is available at the center.

The organization of the guides is by number and no search engine is provided as yet. The guide is updated and more derailed descriptions are added regularly. The card catalog in the center references printed materials, books, serials, etc.

"General Collections" is the term used for the Seaver Center's holdings of manuscripts and ephemeral printed materials. These include papers of individuals and fami­lies, records of organizations and businesses, and collec­tions of materials devoted to a single theme, person, or event. Manuscript collections consist of various items including letters, diaries, telegrams, memos, financial records, legal papers, and research notes, as well as manu­scripts and typescripts of books, scripts and short stories. There is even a group of term papers by students of Professor Coy from the 1930s. Ephemera includes pam­phlets, brochures, and booklets primarily relating to California, especially Los Angeles County and city.

A wide variety of topics is covered in the collections, from cattle brands to produce labels to timetables to restaurant menus and theater programs and maps of all kinds.

Listed below are the names of individuals and families for whom information is contained in the collection, some extensive and some limited:

• Del Valle Family Papers, 1818-1920
• Antonio F. Coronel, 1770-1912
• Dwight Franklin Collection
• Mode Wineman Papers, 1897-1932
• Roscoe P. Conkling, 1872-
• Jonathan D. Dunlap Papers, 1868-1890
• Loraine York Collection, 1924-1928
• Florence Lawrence Papers, 1904-1930
• William Surrey Hart Papers, ca. 1889-1947
• Florence Turner Scrapbooks, 1910-1928
• Tibbets Family Collection, 1932-1937
• George S. Pelton, 1886-1967
• Ogden Scoville, 1940s-1970s
• Hudson (John and Lydia) Family Papers, ca. 1887-1907
• Hammel & Denker Collection, 1880s-1905
• Sepulveda/Mott Collection, personal letters 1800s
• M. H. McKinnon Papers, ca. 1910s-1960s
• Frank G. Bonelli Collection, L.A. County Supervisor
• Gladys Stening Papers, [Stening was a musician]
• Julius Jones Papers, ca. 1820s-1860s
• Eloise Fowler Millegan Collection, primarily before 1900
• (John) Tirrel/(Nathaniel) Spear Collection, ca. 1728 -1829, 1863
• Hodge Family Papers, ca. 1840-1900, including a printed roll of members of the North Presbyterian Church of Buffalo, N.Y., ca. 1872
• Henry Wade in Death Valley '49ers Committee Records, 1951-1960
• William Alanson Bryan Collection 1921-29
• Laura Burmeister Diaries, 1904-1907
• Frank A. Buell Collection, 1905-1919
• Fred Armstrong Papers, 1917-1919
• Thomas E. New Papers, 1901-1963
• Alfred R. Waud Collection (a Civil War illustrator)
• August Berg Military Papers (Spanish American War)
• Joseph Trevitt Hudson Estate Records, 1874-79, 1865
• Stephen Mallory White Scrapbooks, 1894-1900
• Joseph Pomeroy Widney Scrapbooks, 1870-1890
• Leah Hellman Meyberg Scrapbook, ca. 1885-1901
• Munroe McFarland Collection States Army, 1884 to 1922
• Holdridge Ozro Collins Scrapbooks, 1857-1924
• Charles Louis Ducommun Collection, 1839-1977
• Gerard Barnes Collection, letters dated 1850 to 1868 (Thomas Loftin, Narcissa Hanson, and James Lee)
• Hattie A. Pease, 1846-1933
• Samuel K. Baker Letters, 1851-1905
• William Woodhead Collection, 1860-1881
• Russell E. Danforth Scrapbook, 1918-1919
• Hortense Sacriste White Letters, 1874-1935
• Cordelia Matheson Birken and Leonard E. Birken letters, 1889-1900
• Daniel E. Reeme Diaries, 1863-1864
• Sam Moore Papers, 1931-1936
• Philip J. Lauber (b. 1874-) Military Records, 1860 - 1926
• Joseph Plaisted Military Records
• Avila Family Papers
• Theodore C. Bowles Military Records, 1863-1867
• Vignes Family Papers
• James J. Meyler and Robert G. Meyler Papers, ca. 1891-1916.

• Moses/Reed Collection, 1890-1950
• Nelson C. Price Collection, 1930-1949. Post-1945 material relates primarily to POW camps in the Philippines.
• Sons of Veterans, U.S.A., California Division (Los Angeles) Records, 1885-1901.
• Philippines Veterans Claims Collection. Material pertains to World War II claims of the Armed Forces of the Philippines and Filipino veterans against the govern­ment of the United States.
• War History Committee of California Records, 1920-21, completed survey forms that the War History Committee sent to veterans of World War I, arranged alphabetically by the last name of respondent.
• Civil War Manuscript Collection
• WWI Manuscript Collection
• WWII Manuscript Collection
• War History Committee Records, Los Angeles area. WWI lists of local induction boards, correspondence of the committee, and biographies and photos of veterans of the war, including those who died while in service.
• "Four-Minute Men" Records. WWI Committee on Public Information, Division of Four-Minute Men (a group of men organized to give four-minute-long speeches on various subjects related to war efforts on the home front).
• "America!" Scrapbook, 1918-1927 (primarily from 1918). Pictures and articles about American troops fight­ing in WWI, especially American "Aces." Includes reports of men who died in service and a few photographs.
• California Army and Navy Posts, Research Files
• American Legion Scrapbook, 1941-1954 (Columbus Park, Illinois, Auxiliary, Unit 688, and American Legion, Santa Barbara, Post 49).

Another significant area of coverage in the collection is American Indians. Materials at the Seaver complement rather than dupli­cate those in the County of Los Angeles Library's American Indian Resource Center in Huntington Park.

The Thomas Temple Collection contains materials relating to Indian schools throughout the Southwest as well as photostats and translations of original records per­taining to Spanish California, including mission records.

A large and varied group of items relate to the history of Los Angeles. Among these are the following:

• Fine Arts League of Los Angeles Records, 1905-1915
• Alcalde/L.A. County Court Records, 1830-1860 [partial index]
• Ancient Order of United Workmen Ledgers, 1883-1899
• 1886 L.A. County Poll Lists and Index to 1880 Census
• L.A. County Tax Collectors Office Records, 1888-1933
• Los Angeles County Jail Registers, 1887-1914
• Los Angeles County Hospital Birth Registration Book, 1916-1920
• L.A. County Records (poll tax records) Account books from 1880s-1890s. Poll tax books list surnames and tax information
• Los Angeles County Great Registers, Registrar of Voter records, 1866-1914
• L A. County Incorporation Records, 1854-1922 Records for businesses, organizations, and churches incor­porated in Los Angeles County

Several collections relate to theater and motion pic­tures, There are theater-program collections from New York and Los Angeles theaters and a few from other parts of the United States. Some are as recent as 1976 and some as old as the 1880s. Some of these collections also include clippings and notes about plays and players.

The Photograph Collection consists of more than 300,000 images recorded on different photographic media, such as daguerreotypes, ambrotypes, tintypes, glass and cellulose negatives, and a variety of paper prints Subject coverage is similar to that of the General Collections. Military collections include photographs and memorabilia of early women in the Marine Corps and WAVEs, the West Point class of 1888, official U.S. Navy photographs of officers and sea action in the Pacific dur­ing WWII, and Harrison Gray Otis's Mexican military photographs from the early 1900s.

Native Americans are depicted in the Adam Clark Vroman collection, 1895-1912 Andrew Alexander Forbes, cal 890-1915 Theodore G. Lemmon Collection, ca 1885-1916 and Don Louis Percival Collection, circa 1870s-1904.

Among the family photographs, one finds the names listed below, as well as several unknown albums.

• Alfred R. Waud Collection
• Upham Collection
• Carl Victor Jonasson Collection, ca.1898-1902
• Maldonado Collection, ca. 1900-1920
• Harry White Family Collection, late 19th c.
• Miriam Spicer Collection
• Sepulveda-Mott Collection
• D. C. Vinson Collection, late 19th c.
• Lugo Family Collection, late 19th-early 20th c.
• Antonio Franco Coronel Collection, ca. 1850-1900
• Schreier Family Photo Collection, ca. 1924-25
• Strong Family Collection, ca. 1880-1910
• Bennie Pico Collection
• Banning Collection, ca. late 19th-early 20th c.
• Pingrey Family Photo Album, late 19th c.
• William M. Ferry Family Photograph Albums, 1860s
• Knight Family Photograph Albums, ca. late 1800s
• Ellen Soo Moon Photograph Albums, ca. 1905-55
• T. E. Boudinot Scrapbook, ca. 1926-27
• Del Valle Family
• Strong Family Collection, ca. 1880-1910
• George Steckel Collection, ca. 1900s-1920s

Other Los Angeles-related collections that may be of interest to genealogists include:

• Putnam-Valentine Collection, ca.1880s-1930. growth and development of Southern California
• Frank Layton Washburn (1867-1950) Collection, ca.1900-35, Los Angeles
• Chinatown photos, ca.1902-05, significant because they feature the Chinese inhabitants while other photog­raphers at the time did not
• Japanese-American Collection, ca. 1900-1940s, copies of photographs made by various photographers dealing with the Japanese community in Los Angeles and Southern California
  Motion Picture Collection, early-mid 20th c. Stills arranged alphabetically by actor, director, and by film title, as well as several other categories
• Los Angeles Fire Department, 1908
• Pierce/McConnell Album, ca. 1894, business estab­lishments
• Union Station Collection, ca. 1939, includes some shots of maintenance staff
• Los Angeles Schools Activities Collection, ca. 1917-1930s
• California Artists Collection, ca. 1900, with photos of artists and their studios, mostly friends of the donor, California painter J. Bond Francisco (1863-1931).

The Seaver Center is located in the museum. Study space and staff time are limited, so you must make reservations and let them know what you are look­ing for so that the appropriate materials can be transferred to the reading room. It is not always possible to view records and/or photographs the same day they are requested.

Photocopies are made by the staff with a service charge, in addition to a per-page charge. Telephone refer­ence service is not provided, beyond letting callers know whether specific information is likely to be available.

© Beverly Mateer Taylor. Used with permission.