Blog Post #1
The Historical Society of Pennsylvania is located at 1300 Locust St, Center City Philadelphia; this repository is open to researchers from 10 am-4pm on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays, and from 1-7pm on Wednesdays, appointments should be booked in advance. There is a fee of $10 a day for non-members. There are standard procedures in entering the archive and storing belongings into free lockers, no pens- only pencils, laptops and phones are permitted in the reading room; however, upon exiting the reading room, your belongings may be checked for security purposes.
Researchers are permitted to take photos (without flash) of the materials they are looking at, as long as it is for research purposes only. If a researcher is interested in including reproductions in a publication, they can purchase them through the Rights and Reproductions department. Photocopies cost $0.50 per page and requests must be made in advance; if the request cannot be met by the end of the last day of a research trip, the librarians will send you the pages by mail.
There are subject guides available on the HSP’s website which allows for a more effective search that doesn’t require guessing the correct keyword; I entered the digital catalog through the Native American subject guide and found Changing is not Vanishing: A Collection of Early American Indian Poetry to 1930, though it was published in 2012, I think I would enjoy looking at it nonetheless and consulting its notes section. An earlier work that drew my attention was the Abraham H. Cassel description of the Indians Iroquois and Delaware which contains manuscripts from the 1740s; there is no finding aid for this specific collection but from the dates alone I would expect to find some information which might serve as a stepping stone to learning more about changes which occurred during the American Revolution. Anthony DiGiovanni would be the librarian to contact with any questions according to https://hsp.libguides.com/c.php?g=1190777.
The Historical Society of Pennsylvania focuses on all histories that have unfolded within the state borders, the repository houses manuscripts, photographs, publications, and genealogical resources from across the state and two centuries.
