Search

Letters and documents, the majority written between 1700 and 1900, dealing with both personal and corporate business and financial matters, assembled by Montgomery. The letters are chiefly by American and English writers. Many of the American letters are to and from various United States Treasury officials, usually the Secretary of the Treasury. Of the 107 letters by Joseph Anderson (1757-1835), U.S. Senator and jurist, the majority are written to Samuel Swartwout (1783-1856) when he was Comptroller of the United States and Collector of the Port of New York. Most of the documents are American with New York City firms predominating.

The collection, which reflects these associations, includes correspondence, financial records, memoranda, papers, speeches, and newspaper clippings, relating to the history of life insurance, banking, industrial development, and politics in the early 20th Century.

Professional and personal files including Armstrong's correspondence with professional associations, other engineers, and friends, his research notes, circuit diagrams, lectures, articles, legal papers, and other related materials. Of his many inventions and developments, the most important are: 1) the regenerative or feedback circuit, 1912, the first amplified radio reception, 2) the superheterodyne circuit, 1918, the basis of modern radio and radar, 3) superregeneration, 1922, a very simple, high-power receiver now used in emergency mobile service, and 4) frequency modulation - FM, 1933, static-free radio reception of high fidelity. More than half the files concern his many lawsuits, primarily with Radio Corporation of America, over infringement of the Armstrong patents. Litigation continued until 1967. Other files deal with his work in the Marcellus Hartley Research Laboratory at Columbia University, 1913-1935, and with the American Expeditionary Forces in France during World War I, his Air Force contracts for communications development, Army research during World War II, the Radio Club of America, the Institute of Radio Engineers, FM development at his radio station at Alpine, N.J., the use of FM in television, his involvement in Federal Communications Commission hearings and legislation, and his work with the Zenith Radio Corporation. Also, letters to H.J. Round

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.