Collection of photographs, artwork, and printed material associated with Sol Smith
Overview
Photographs, portraits, and printed material associated with theater personality Sol Smith and his family.
Dates
- Creation: circa 1818-1930
Condition Description
Some printed material shows discoloration and damage; some photographs are worn at the edges; the portraits show small amounts of damage.
Conditions Governing Access
There are no restrictions on physical access to this material. Collection is open for research.
This collection is shelved offsite at the Harvard Depository. Retrieval requires advance notice. Readers should check with Houghton Public Services staff for retrieval policies and times.
Extent
.6 linear feet (3 boxes)Two portrait paintings said to be of Sol Smith and his wife (removed from original frames); two ambrotypes, of Sol Smith, his family, and son; approximately 44 cartes-de-visite and cabinet card photographs of Smith family members, friends, theater managers, actors, and other personalities; over 20 printed plays, theater programs, and other ephemera; a manuscript play, "The Carpenter of Rouen"; and two copies of Smith's Theatrical Management in the West and South for Thirty Years (1868).
Biographical / Historical
Solomon Franklin Smith (1801-1869) was born in Norwich (N.Y.), then went west in the 1820s to study law. By 1823, he began his career as a theater manager in Cincinnati (Ohio). Smith formed a partnership with fellow actor Noah Ludlow in Mobile (Ala.) in 1835; it lasted until 1853. Together, Smith and Ludlow built the first theater in St. Louis (Mo.). Smith was well known throughout the Mississippi Valley and considered one of the greatest Shakespearean actors in St. Louis in the mid-19th century. Smith was also at times a printer, editor, preacher, and lawyer. A Jacksonian and strong Unionist. he opposed slavery and secession. Smith spent the final years of his life practicing law in St. Louis, where he died on 20 April 1869.
Arrangement
Arranged as received, in groups by form.
Physical Location
Harvard Depository
Immediate Source of Acquisition
2024MT-10. Purchased from Auger Down Books with the Robert Gould Shaw Fund, 2023 August 29.
Processing Information
This collection was processed to a basic level with minimal rehousing, organization, and preservation. (Melanie Wisner, 2023)
Subject
- Smith, Sol. (Solomon), 1801-1869 (Person)
- Title
- Collection of photographs, artwork, and printed material related to Sol Smith, circa 1818-1930 (MS Thr 2296): Guide
- Status
- completed
- Author
- Houghton Library, Harvard University.
- Date
- 2023 September 11
- Description rules
- dacs
- Language of description
- eng
- EAD ID
- hou03598
Repository Details
Part of the Houghton Library Repository
Houghton Library is Harvard College's principal repository for rare books and manuscripts, archives, and more. Houghton Library's collections represent the scope of human experience from ancient Egypt to twenty-first century Cambridge. With strengths primarily in North American and European history, literature, and culture, collections range in media from printed books and handwritten manuscripts to maps, drawings and paintings, prints, posters, photographs, film and audio recordings, and digital media, as well as costumes, theater props, and a wide range of other objects. Houghton Library has historically focused on collecting the written record of European and Eurocentric North American culture, yet it holds a large and diverse number of primary sources valuable for research on the languages, culture and history of indigenous peoples of the Americas, Africa, Asia and Oceania.
Houghton Library’s Reading Room is free and open to all who wish to use the library’s collections.
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