Overview
Correspondence, speeches, other compositions, and notes by Robert Manning, Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs, 1962-1964, and editor of the Atlantic, 1964-1980.
Dates
- Creation: 1938-1993
Language of Materials
Collection materials are in English.
Conditions Governing Access
There are no restrictions on physical access to this material.
Part of this collection is not housed at the Houghton Library but offsite at the Harvard Depository. Retrieval requires advance notice. Please consult Public Services staff in the Library.
Extent
22 linear feet (24 boxes)Biographical / Historical
The journalist Robert Manning (1919- ) began his career on the Binghamton (N.Y.) Press; then after military service was a correspondent for the United Press (1944-1949), and Time magazine (1948-1958). He was chief of the London bureau of Time, Life and Fortune from 1958 to 1960. He was then Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs from 1962 to 1964. He left this office to become Executive Editor of the Atlantic monthly in 1964, and succeeded Edward Weeks as Editor-in-Chief in 1966.
In 1980 Manning was dismissed by the new owner of the Atlantic Monthly Company. The sale of the company gave rise to a long-running lawsuit finally settled in court in 1987. By that time Manning had joined, and left, the Boston Publishing Company, which produced the series of books The Vietnam Experience.
Manning was active in a number of cultural and political organizations at various times, including such diverse ones as the Boston Ballet, Experiment in International Living, Massachusetts Democratic Advisory Council, the Public Broadcasting Service, and the Salk Institute; as well as several clubs in Boston and New York. He has been a prolific speaker and occasionally a broadcaster.
Robert Manning's autobiography is The swamp root chronicle
(1992).
Arrangement
The papers are organized into the following series:
- I. Correspondence
- ___A. Correspondence by Manning by subject: organizations with which he was associated
- ___B. By subject: trips, engagements, publications and other incidents
- ___C. Other correspondence
- II. Compositions by Robert Manning
- ___A. Speeches
- ___B. Broadcasts, interviews, and discussions
- ___C. Dispatches, articles, and books
- ___D. Other compositions by Manning
- III. Compositions by others
- ___A. Copies and proofs of articles written for the Atlantic
- ___B. Other compositions edited or published by Manning
- IV. Notes and other material
- V. Biographical material
Physical Location
Harvard Depository and onsite
Immediate Source of Acquisition
*1997M-33, *2000M-36, and *2001M-43. Gift of Robert Manning, 1200 Washington St., apt. 507, Boston MA 02118; received 1997-2002.
Processing Information
Processed by: J. F. Coakley
Processing Information
Please note that boxes/cartons 1-23, which are housed offsite, contain inner boxes, 1-68. The last box in the sequence, which is housed onsite, is numbered 69.
- Title
- Manning, Robert, 1919-. Robert Manning papers: Guide.
- Author
- Houghton Library, Harvard College Library
- Language of description
- und
- EAD ID
- hou00145
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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