This collection contains 25 letters and 1 book that historian Jared Sparks wrote about his work, about historical manuscripts, and about the historian's profession in the mid-19th century.
Jared Sparks corresponded with historians and other acquaintances in the United States and England about books and prominent figures in American history, among other subjects. Many letters pertain to his attempts to procure manuscripts written by George Washington and to a proposed publication of Benjamin Franklin's papers. Between 1852 and 1857, Sparks most frequently wrote to bibliographer and antiquarian Henry Stevens. In his final letter, he described Japanese tourists visiting New York City (June 16, 1860). Mary C. Sparks wrote 1 letter to Henry Stevens (on behalf of her ill husband) in March 1855, and Josiah Quincy added a brief note to Sparks's letter of December 30, 1842. The collection also contains a copy of Sparks's Reply to the Strictures of Lord Mahon and Others on the Mode of Editing the Writings of Washington (1852) and a spine from an edition of his Life of Washington (enclosed in October 28, 1858).
For more information on each item, see the Detailed Box and Folder Listing below.
Jared Sparks was born in Willington, Connecticut, on May 10, 1789, the son of Eleanor Orcutt. His mother married Joseph Sparks soon after Jared's birth, and the boy spent much of his early life in the care of aunts and uncles in Camden, New York, and Tolland, Connecticut. Sparks attended Phillips Exeter Academy from 1809 to 1811. He received two degrees from Harvard: a bachelor's degree (1815) and a master's degree in theology (1819). In 1819, he became pastor of a Unitarian congregation in Baltimore, Maryland, and in 1821 he served as the chaplain of the United States Congress. He returned to Boston in 1823, where he bought and edited the North American Review. Sparks served as Harvard's president from 1849 to 1853, and edited and published several major works on American history including The Writings of George Washington. He had one child with his first wife, Frances Anne Allen (d. 1835), and five children with his second wife, Mary Crowninshield Silsbee. Jared Sparks died on March 14, 1866.
