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Jesse W. Fell Papers

A Finding Aid to the Collection in the Library of Congress

Prepared by Thelma Queen
Revised by Harry G. Heiss

Manuscript Division, Library of Congress

Washington, D.C.

2009

Contact information: http://lcweb.loc.gov/rr/mss/address.html

Finding aid encoded by Library of Congress Manuscript Division, 2009

Finding aid URL: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/eadmss.ms009196

Table of Contents

Collection Summary

Selected Search Terms

Personal Names

Organizations

Subjects

Locations

Titles

Occupations

Administrative Information

Provenance:

Processing History:

Transfers:

Copyright Status:

Access and Restrictions:

Microfilm:

Preferred Citation:

Biographical Note

Scope and Content Note

Arrangement of the Papers

Container List

Collection Summary

Selected Search Terms

The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the Library's online catalog. They are grouped by name of person or organization, by subject or location, and by occupation and listed alphabetically therein.

Personal Names

Organizations

Subjects

Locations

Titles

Occupations

Administrative Information

Provenance:

The papers of Jesse W. Fell, editor, educator, and lawyer, were given to the Library of Congress by the estate of Robert D. Richardson between 1970 and 1972.

Processing History:

The papers of Jesse W. Fell were arranged and described in 1976. The collection and finding aid were revised in 1998. The finding aid was revised again in 2009.

Transfers:

Some engravings have been transferred to the Prints and Photographs Division where they are identified as part of the Jesse W. Fell Papers.

Copyright Status:

The status of copyright in the unpublished writings of Jesse W. Fell is governed by the Copyright Law of the United States (Title 17, U.S.C.).

Access and Restrictions:

The papers of Jesse W. Fell are open to research. Researchers are advised to contact the Manuscript Reading Room prior to visiting. Many collections are stored off-site and advance notice is needed to retrieve these items for research use.

Microfilm:

A microfilm edition of these papers is available on eight reels. Consult reference staff in the Manuscript Division concerning availability for purchase or interlibrary loan. To promote preservation of the originals, researchers are required to consult the microfilm edition.

Preferred Citation:

Researchers wishing to cite this collection should include the following information: Container or reel number, Jesse W. Fell Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

Biographical Note

Scope and Content Note

The papers of Jesse W. Fell (1808-1887) span the years 1806 to 1965 with the bulk of the material produced during the period 1830-1887. Fell's papers reflect his pursuits as a lawyer, land speculator, educator, newspaper editor, and political leader in Illinois and include biographical material, broadsides, calling cards, college catalogs, correspondence, genealogies, land grants, ledgers, lithographs, maps, miscellaneous notes, newspaper clippings, notebooks, obituaries, petitions, photographs, poems, printed matter, scrapbooks, speeches, stock certificates, wills, and writings. The papers have been arranged in three series: Correspondence, Speeches and Writings File, and Subject File.

The Correspondence series consists of three subgroups of Family Correspondence, General Correspondence, and Published and Transcribed Correspondence. It was Fell who urged Abraham Lincoln to write his autobiography, and much of the correspondence in the Family Correspondence, particularly that of Emmet L. Richardson, centers around the three-page autobiography and an accompanying letter. Lincoln sent the autobiography to Fell in December 1859, and Fell arranged for its publication in eastern newspapers prior to the 1860 election. Both items were ultimately acquired by the Library of Congress and are now among the papers of Abraham Lincoln and published in The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. Second Supplement, 1848-1865, Roy P. Basler and Christian O. Basler, editors (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, circa 1990). Members of the Fell and Brown families, including Fell's wife Hester Vernon Brown Fell, his father Jesse Fell, and his daughters Alice and Fannie Fell, are also represented in the Family Correspondence. Fell's Quaker heritage is reflected widely in these letters.

National and local figures of the time are represented in the General Correspondence. Some of Fell's views on Reconstruction can be found in a letter to James Gillespie Blaine of March 1885. Most of the letters from national figures, such as David Davis, Stephen A. Douglas, Horace Greeley, Abraham Lincoln, Owen Lovejoy, Horace Mann, John G. Nicolay, and Lyman Trumbull, however, primarily concern local and state issues.

The Published and Transcribed Correspondence contains typed transcriptions of selected letters sent and received by Fell. The original letters are in the Family Correspondence and the General Correspondence.

A brief autobiography written by Fell in 1886 is found in the Speeches and Writings File, along with assorted speeches dated 1830-1833 and 1870. The file also includes a paper written in 1845 on the repudiation of Illinois state debt and handwritten notes on the founding of Normal, Illinois.

The Subject File contains material relating to the Lincoln autobiography, including letters to and from Fell descendant Adlai E. Stevenson (1900-1965), Collier's magazine, the Library of Congress, the University of Chicago, and Illinois State Normal University. Also in the Subject File are several biographical sketches of Fell, his admission papers to the Ohio bar, his certificate to practice law in Illinois, genealogies of the Fell and Brown families, an obituary of his mother-in-law, Hester Milner Gordon (1777-1871), and land grants awarded to Henry Flesher, Robert Miller, Joseph Gilleys, and James Ordway for their military service during the War of 1812. The Subject File also contains items reflecting the history of Fell's adopted town of Bloomington, Illinois, the adjoining town of Normal, and nearby Normal University (later renamed Illinois State Normal University), which Fell helped found.

Fell was an fervent arborist, and he was well known for the thousands of trees and shrubbery that he planted in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Iowa, and Illinois. The Subject File includes a pamphlet and a photocopy of a plat of Larchwood Colony in Lyons County, Iowa, a farming development where Fell planted over one hundred thousand trees and cuttings.

Arrangement of the Papers

This collection is arranged in three series:

• Correspondence, 1806-1957
• Speeches and Writings File, 1830-1886
• Subject File, 1816-1965

Container List