The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Family Papers, 1698-1968
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The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Family Papers document the history of one extended family over 270 years - eight complete generations. The collection was the property of the Porter-Phelps-Huntington Foundation, which operates the Porter-Phelps-Huntington House Museum in Hadley, Massachusetts. The papers were deposited on extended loan in the Amherst College Archives and Special Collections from 1980 to 2022 at Frost Library. The PPH Family Papers were processed under the supervision of Archivists Daria D’Arienzo and Peter Nelson. Kari Ann Federer, a University of Massachusetts History major, was responsible for sorting, organizing, and describing the collection. We want to thank Amherst College for housing and caring for this collection for 42 years, making it available to students and researchers and partnering in many teacher institutes including Voices through Three Centuries. In 2022 The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Foundation was searching for a repository that could continue to significantly grow this collection of family papers into the future. Special Collections and University Archives at the University ty of Massachusetts under the leadership of Aaron Rubenstein offered to accept the Porter-Phelps-Huntington Family Papers as a donation. SCUA continues to accept and process this collection. With the exception of some fragile original documents, the papers are directly available to researchers and scholars.
To view the online Finding Aid, click here.
There are links to the history and significance of the papers, the methods of organization, and a list of individuals with brief biographies that are included in the collection of papers.
A rich source for scholarly research on life in America from the early eighteenth century down to the present, the collection comprises over one hundred linear feet of documents - among them letters, diaries, deeds, and account books - all generated by one extended family. Together these papers provide rare and extraordinary access to the personal and civic lives of this family: the Porters, Phelpses, Huntingtons and their descendants.
Forty Acres was a working farm, its name not a true description of the land under cultivation, which consisted of six hundred acres acquired by its first owner, Moses Porter, and a significant growth in acreage under his son-in-law, Charles Phelps. Subsequent generations produced a number of clergy, lawyers, a sea captain, merchants, factory owners, army officers and doctors. There were artists, writers, publishers, an actress, and numerous housewives, of necessity, multi-skilled. The personal papers from these family members contribute valuable specific information to our understanding of the evolution of American society during the last 250 years. Letters and diaries reveal the significant impact of major events in American history, beginning with the French and Indian War up through the twentieth century. These writings provide scholars a glimpse into personal perspectives on wars, political and economic upheavals, religious revivals, social developments, family relationships, divisions of labor between men and women, as well as the day-by-day domestic life of the family, their servants and the enslaved people.
To view a searchable transcription of Elizabeth Porter Phelp's diary
October 1765-December 1778. In The New England Genealogical Register, 1964
January 1779-December 1789. In The New England Genealogical Register, 1965-66.