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Papers of a Monongalia County, West Virginia, farm family residing near Maidsville include: the farm account books of John and John J. Courtney, 1831-1877; family Bible records and photographs; college essays of Alpheus Courtney, a West Virginia University student; manuscript ciphering book, 1817; diary of Ulysses J. Courtney, 1878-1883 (7 vols.) pertaining to lumbering, farming, and livestock operations, and community religious and social life; correspondence; steamboat bills of lading, invoices of mercantile stores; Civil War bounty receipts; a record of lumbering operations, 1878; and records of the Bethel (Methodist) Church. Subjects include the construction of the Monongahela Valley Railroad; frontier conditions in Iowa; Morgantown Bridge Company; and Methodism within the Baltimore and West Virginia conferences. Correspondents include Alston G. Dayton.

Typescript copy of the diary of Reverend Edward Evans Parrish, a native of Monongalia County, West Virginia, written during a journey to the Oregon territory from 1843 to 1845. The diary begins in October 1843 when Parrish and his group left Hoskinsville, Morgan County, Ohio, and ends in July 1845. Diary is twenty-seven pages and chiefly consists of brief entries. Parrish primarily describes their route west along the Oregon Trail, including the rivers they crossed and other geographical features along the way. Other topics include the weather and heavy rains impeding their journey; moving up cattle and horses; animals on the prairie, including antelopes and buffalo; hunting buffalo; encounters with Native Americans; the health of his family and others in the camp; activities in the camps; the organization of the camps; and their arrival in Oregon City in December 1844. Transcript was made from a copy of the diary printed in the Transactions of the Sixteenth Annual Reunion of the Oregon Pioneer Association, 1888.

Diaries, correspondence, notes, receipts, and newspaper clippings of a lumberman and stockman from Morgantown, West Virginia. Subjects include Johnson's agricultural activities, his extensive timber dealings in Monongalia County, and the rafting of logs to Pittsburgh and intermediate points on the Monongahela River.

The manuscript diary of Henry Solomon White, a Corporal and Orderly Sergeant in Company N, Sixth Regiment, [West] Virginia Volunteer Infantry, covering the period of 24 September 1861 to 26 September 1864. Company N was organized at Camp White, in 1861 for a three-year tour of duty guarding the B.&O. and North Western railroads. The company was stationed at various times at Burton, Littleton, Barrackville, Fairmont, Clarksburg, Bridgeport, Grafton, and Webster. Squads of this company were detailed for special duty and scouting detail in Cornwallis, Ritchie County; Camp Burne; Camp Wilkinson; and in Monongalia, Marion, and Roane counties; and Fayette and Greene counties, Pennsylvania. Company N was on duty in Fairmont during the Jones Raid in 1863.

The microfilm collection contains 10 diaries and inserted supplementary letters, clippings, and photographs kept by Presbyterian missionary Mary Behner during her years as the first director of The Shack, a settlement house in the Scotts Run Area of Monongalia County. In addition to the microfilm, there is an addendum to this collection dating from 2006. It includes a photograph album kept by Anna Santore DeLancy, who was a Sunday School teacher at the Shack, a Presbyterian neighborhood house operating in Pursglove, West Virginia. Anna was the recreation director after the founder Mary Behner Christopher left in 1938. The photographs document the people and activities of the Shack in the 1930s. There is also correspondence between Bettijane Burger and people who knew Mary Behner Christopher, and clippings regarding the history of the Shack, among other material.

Correspondence, financial papers, diaries, scrapbooks, newspaper clippings, and photographs relating to the Max Mathers family and Monongalia County, West Virginia. The activities of Anna DeGant Mathers, wife of Max Mathers, and Margaret Mathers Barrick, his daughter, as well as of Margaret's two sons, William Mathers Barrick and George Milton Barrick, Jr. are well represented in the family papers. Max Mather's own papers document his personal life, Republican party activities, genealogical and local history interests, and his participation in civil defense planning for Morgantown, as well as his service on the local selective service board. There are letters and financial records of earlier members of the Morgan family, mostly of the Civil War period and later, but including two early 19th century account books and some early letters. Some of the names of Morgan ancestors are Elijah Morgan, Elizabeth Morgan, H.M. Morgan, H.D. McGeorge, N.H. McGeorge, and John R. Morgan. Photographs are largely of the Mathers family, but there are a few of the 175th anniversary of Monongalia County, and the dedication of a monument to Col. Zackquill Morgan, ancestor of Mathers and founder of Morgantown. The newspaper clippings cover personal mentions of Max Mathers and his family as well as local history articles, local events, and the family's involvement in the search for missing soldiers after the Korean conflict. The scrapbook was put together by Eugene L. Mathers, Max Mathers' father, and documents Monongalia County events, 1838-1951. In addition, there is a collection of greeting cards covering the first half of the 20th century and a collection of broadsides going back to the 1850s.

Papers of Hu Maxwell (1860-1927), historian, editor, and author of several county histories of West Virginia, along with papers and records of other family members. There are manuscripts of fiction, verse, and local history written by Maxwell, as well as a number of his manuscripts and publications dealing with forestry which were prepared while he was a member of the Forest Service of the United States Department of Agriculture. Maxwell kept a diary during the years 1901-1919 while residing in Morgantown, Chicago, Illinois, and Washington, D.C., which is extensive for the period of World War I and which contains notes on the diary of Rufus Maxwell (1855-1907). See scope and content note for more detail.

Written by Reverend William Duke (1757-1840), a Protestant Episcopal minister, as a record of his journey from Upper Marlboro, Maryland, to Randolph County, (West) Virginia, to inspect a parcel of land that he had acquired. Documents early West Virginia travel, accommodations, and religious practices. Specifically mentioned are Georgetown, Frederick Town, Harpers Ferry, Potomac River, Old Town, Fort Cumberland, Allegheny River, Morgantown, and Bath. Subjects include: Methodism, Baptists, the Episcopal Church, the Pennsylvania Dutch, travel, and folklore.