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The James Norman Hall papers at Grinnell College span the years 1906-54.  About half the collection is correspondence, clippings, photographs, and notebooks, the other half is manuscripts of his writings, including his autobiography, novels, short stories, essays, and poems, published and unpublished.  The 665 letters and post cards are arranged chronologically.  A small portion are from Hall's four years in Boston before World War I, nearly half are from World War I and post war years, and the rest from the last 25 years of his life.  Much of the correspondence is with his family and two Boston friends, George Courtright Greener (1911-53), Director of the North Bennet Street Industrial School, and Roy Cushman (1914-50), Probation Officer in Juvenile Court.  Other correspondence includes letters and cards from Hall to his former Grinnell professors, Charles Payne (1916-44) and George L. Pierce (1911-50), from his college roommate, Chester C. Davis (1910-19), newspaperman, head of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration in the 1930's and president of the Federal Reserve Bank in St. Louis, and a few letters from Ellery Sedgwick, editor of Atlantic Monthly.  The Atlantic Monthly-Hall-Nordhoff correspondence is on 14 rolls of microfilm, and the Sedgwick-Hall correspondence is on one roll in the Archives.  A few letters are exchanges between friends with comments about Hall.  Some letters are typed, some are carbons, most are handwritten.  A typed version of selected war letters is included.  The Archives does not have Robert Dean Frisbie's letters on which Hall's story "Frisbie of Danger Island" is based, nor correspondence with Nordhoff.

Most of the newspaper clippings are reports of Hall's war experiences and reviews of his books, a few are about Hall, Tahiti, and the South Seas.  Most photographs are from World War I and his Iceland trip, a few are of his family in Tahiti.

Twenty-eight small handwritten notebooks, some of which record Hall's travels and outlines of stories and poems, a diary of the 1909 Grinnell College Glee Club tour to the west coast, and Hall's Grandfather Young's small Civil War diary (1864) are also in the collection.  Two rolls of microfilm in the Archives contain war letters, pages of notebooks and other items selected from the Grinnell collection by Paul Briand Jr., who wrote a biography of Hall.

Over half of the collection consists of typescripts, some with revisions or several versions of sections, of nine of the twelve books Nordhoff and Hall co-authored (manuscripts of the first three, published before 1930, are not in the collection), of parts or all of seven of the seventeen books Hall published alone, of scripts of two of Hall's plays, of typescripts or holograph versions of 19 of the more than 80 published magazine pieces, and of about sixty unpublished poems, stories, and essays, most undated.  The Archives owns 28 books Hall wrote by himself or coauthored with Nordhoff, including foreign language editions of some titles.

The Hall papers at Grinnell College are a valuable resource for anyone studying his career as a writer, his travels, experiences, ideas, and the sources of some of his stories.  Hall's war correspondence is particularly enlightening for the World War I scholar interested in the human aspect of the war.

Eighteen original ink drawings and one photocopy, featuring buildings including Goodnow and Carnegie Hall.

The musical scores (and recordings of performances) were composed for a variety of institutions and occasions.  A number of vocal and instrumental pieces were composed for St. Paul’s Episcopal Church (Grinnell, Iowa) and St. John’s Catholic Church (Indianapolis, Indiana).

The composition of the opera Eric Hermannson’s Soul (begun in 1986-87 and completed in 1993) was supported with fellowships from Grinnell College and the Associated Colleges of the Midwest.  The opera was first performed in Grinnell on September 11, 1993 and in Iowa City on September 24, 1993.

Oh Millersville, based on the poetry of Grinnell College alumnus James Norman Hall, was first performed on February 29, 1992 in Herrick Chapel with Amy Johnson, soprano, and Richard Gordon, piano.  The 1991 orchestral version was commissioned by the Dubuque Symphony Orchestra and was performed on February 22 & 23, 1992 with Kristie Tigges, soprano.

Out of the land premiered at the inauguration of Pamela A. Ferguson as the 11th President of Grinnell College, October 12, 1991.  Text was by Associate Professor Paula V. Smith and by Grinnell President George F. Magoun.  The Grinnell Singers performed the piece, conducted by John Stuhr-Rommereim.

Broken Ground was commissioned by the Des Moines Symphony Orchestra, the Iowa Sesquicentennial Commission, and Grinnell College to honor the 150th anniversaries of the state of Iowa and of Grinnell College in 1996.  The texts were composed by Iowa poets Michael Carey, Edward Hirsch, Dan Hunter, Paula V. Smith, Mary Swander, and Ray Young Bear.  The world premier was in May 1996, performed by the Des Moines Symphony and The Grinnell Singers.

Two stock certificates (#3404 and #3405) issued to the Trustees of Iowa College. Dated August 21, 1981. Each certificate is worth 12 shares. Note with stock certificates indicates that a third certificate (#3503) is framed and on display in the Cubs Room of the PEC (Physical Education Complex). The plan is to display the framed certificate in the new Athletic Facility when it is completed in 2010. Destroyed in 2010.
Processed by Cheryl Neubert, February 2008.

Materials collected by the class agents relating to the Grinnell College Class of 1957.

In preparing his book, Pilgrims of Iowa, published in 1911, Truman Douglass compiled extensive biographical information about Congregational ministers in Iowa up to 1900. He had hoped to publish this material in additional volumes to his book, but left only a typed manuscript.  The preface in volume I suggests further sources for information about some of the ministers.

The bulk of the collection contains correspondence and reports concerning Reed's work of the American Home Missionary Society of the Congregational Church in the 1845-1869. Among the topics addressed are slavery and how the church should regard congregations in slave-holding states, founding of churches in Iowa, church finances, and founding a college in Iowa. This is a rich collection for the study of early Congregationalism in Iowa.

Professor Kleinschmidt amassed countless photocopies, copies of microfilm and Sanborn maps, copies of newspaper articles, correspondence, and black and white photographs of local buildings (residences, commercial, college).  In the 1990s, Professor Kleinschmidt expressed his interest in having his collection deposited with the Grinnell College Archives.  Members of the Grinnell Historic Preservation Commission (Lisa Adkins, Don Irving, Cheryl Neubert), conducted interviews with him to access much of his accumulated knowledge about this history of the town, the occupants and the buildings.

Series 1: Materials contained in this collection are largely related to the President's Committee for a Stronger Minority Presence (PCSMP). Also included are eleven undated photographs.

Series 2: 2022 Accretion.

Consists of holograph, typescript, and proofs of Joseph Wall's biography, Andrew Carnegie (1970), holograph and typescript of Henry Watterson: Reconstructed Rebel (1956), and of the page proof of Interpreting Twentieth-Century America (1973).  A small part of the collection includes some correspondence connected with Andrew Carnegie. Also included is a typescript of the Grinnell College Faculty Handbook (1969) and talks and memos concerning the Abler-Woodworth controversy of 1974.

Consists of lantern slides of late 19th and early 20th century chemical aparatus and four notebooks of chemical notes.  Professor William C. Oelke suggests that Hendrixson had equipment to copy pictures from books and may have photographed the portraits and laboratory apparatus from published material to use in his class teaching.

Collection contains 16 volumes.

The collection contains 24 different volumes that are collections of essays, lectures, eulogies, toasts, letters, reminiscences, etc. The subjects of the essays range from dogs to writing and from poetry to hunting and fishing, reflecting the broad range of interests of the author. Also included is an autobiography, family stories, travel accounts, and reflections on the academic life. There are histories of Grinnell Federal Saving and Loan Association and of the Kiwanis Club. Some of the essays were papers delivered at the Fortnightly Club. The speeches include ones given on retirements, dedications, commencements, and inaugurations.

President George Drake and his brother, Professor Richard Drake of Berea College, donated family papers to Grinnell College Archives January 1991.  The bulk of the material is from their father, George Bryant Drake. It consists of correspondence, notes for sermons, family financial and business records, clippings, photographs, ca. 1920s-80s.  One box contains writings of Richard Drake, one box correspondence and writings of George Drake and family, one box papers of Alberta Drake, a box of Nell Drake's writings and publications.

George Bryant Drake (1895-1979) was a Congregational Minister and President of Doane College in Nebraska. He and his wife, Alberta Stimson Drake, had three children: George Albert Drake (1934-), professor and President of Grinnell College; Richard Bryant Drake (1925-), professor at Berea College; and Alberta Jane Drake (1928-). George Bryant was called Bryant; his parents were Nellie Jennie Rice Drake and George Burton Drake.