Collections : [Rare Book & Manuscript Library]

This collection contains the correspondence, editorial files and office files of the Columbia University Press, primarily from its reorganization in 1923 by Frederick Coykendall to the present.

The records include addresses, annual reports, correspondence, memos, minutes, program files, newsclippings, administrative records, photographs, video tape, and film. They include material dating from the decades prior to the establishment of the settlement which shed light on the philosophy and motivation of its founders, and offer a unique view of the first wave of the settlement house movement in America. The records document social conditions, demographic change, political activity and philanthropy in New York City. Addresses by East Side House founder Everett P. Wheeler, included in Series I, document his family history and career as a lawyer and civic reformer prior to the founding of East Side House. Wheeler's correspondence details his role in establishing the settlement and managing it during its first decades.

Personal, administrative, political, and investigative files of Nickerson. The papers deal almost entirely with his eight years as County Executive, and consist of correspondence, memoranda, manuscripts of speeches, notes, press releases, photographs, and clippings. Among the major correspondents are James A. Farley, Hubert H. Humphrey, Robert F. Kennedy, Edward I. Koch, and Percy E. Sutton. The Investigation Files, which amount to nearly half the collection, document investigation into corruption and mismanagement in numerous Long Island businesses and governmental departments. These investigations, instigated and overseen by Nickerson, were carried out largely by the Commissioner of Accounts, Milton Lipson, and later by Samuel Greason, the first governmental ombudsman in the United States. These files consist primarily of memoranda, transcripts of hearings, payroll and financial accounts, notes, and tape recordings.

Correspondence, manuscripts, notes, drafts of speeches, appointment books, subject files, documents, photographs, memorabilia and printed materials. There are notes from her lectures on Sociology at Adelphi College in 1911-1912; papers from 1912-1932, when Perkins served on the Commission for Safety and on the Industrial Commission of New York State; the main body of the material is from the period of her cabinet office, 1933-1945; and some items from her days on the Civil Service Commission, 1946-1953. Also included are personal and family papers.

The records include annual reports, board minutes, budgets, by-laws, correspondence, memos, publications, reports, scrapbooks, photographs and printed material. They document the settlement and its antecedent institutions from 1854 to 1994, offering a unique view of the first wave of the settlement house movement in America, as well as related philanthropy and social welfare activities in New York City over a 140 year period. The origins of Goddard-Riverside Community Center are documented in Series I, which includes eight institutional subseries. These records provide a wealth of information on philanthropic, social welfare and settlement work from the mid-19th century through the 1950s. Series II - IV document the activities of the settlement from 1959 to the 1990s, with a particular emphasis on the urban renewal period of the 1960s. Items in Series VII include photographs of staff, activities, facilities of Goddard-Riverside Community Center, as well as several of its predecessor institutions.