Papers of Barbara Miller Solomon, 1888-1995 (inclusive), 1940-1992 (bulk)

The collection documents Barbara Miller Solomon's personal and professional life and contains information on other family members, including her mother Bessie Pinsky Miller Skirball, her husband Peter Solomon, and her children. Included are courtship letters, family correspondence, and professional correspondence; speeches; lecture notes; book reviews; drafts and research materials re: various writing projects; memorabilia; photographs; phonograph records; and audiotapes. Most of the folder headings were created by the archivist; those by Barbara Miller Solomon appear in quotation marks.

Series I, BIOGRAPHICAL AND PERSONAL,1919-ca.1995 (#1.1-15.10, 65CB.1m-65CB.3m, FD.1-FD.2, F+D.1, OD.1), includes address and appointment books; awards; biographical information; Solomon's 1929 diary; schoolwork and college papers; material re: Solomon's memorial service; passports; memorabilia; and personal correspondence (including congratulations on Solomon's appointments as director of the Women's Archives (now the Schlesinger Library) and as Assistant Dean of Harvard College (#11.8) and on her engagement and marriage (#11.6-11.7) and letters of condolence re: the deaths of her mother Bessie Pinsky Miller Skirball (#10.7) and husband Peter Solomon (#10.8-11.3)). Correspondents include Solomon's thesis advisor Oscar Handlin and his wife Mary Flug Handlin, who became her lifelong friends (#12.5-12.9). For Solomon's correspondence with family members, see Series II. The series is arranged alphabetically.

Series II, FAMILY PAPERS, 1888-1993 (#16.1-22.10, Phon-60.1 - Phon.60.3), is closed to all except Solomon family members until August 20, 2042. The series includes material re: Solomon's husband, children, parents, parents-in-law, and other family members and includes correspondence, clippings, certificates, school report cards, yearbooks, and graduation programs, and phonograph records. It is arranged with genealogical material and poems re: the Solomon family appearing first; the remaining material is grouped alphabetically by family member and then chronologically. The series includes a diary kept by Hennie Herman, Maida H. Solomon's mother (#16.3); Barbara Miller Solomon's correspondence with her father (#18.12); and Barbara and Peter's correspondence with her mother (#19.11-19.12), his parents (#21.1), his brother and sister-in-law Eric and Irene Solomon (#20.9), his uncle and aunt James and Bess Rosenberg (#20.4), and with other family members including Peter's sister Babette Solomon Radner (#21.4). The series also includes letters to Barbara and Peter from their children and their spouses (#20.3, 20.5-20.8, 20.10-20.12); Peter's letters to Barbara, many of them written while they were both undergraduates (#19.1-19.6); letters of sympathy re: his illness in 1988 (#20.13-20.14); and a poignant note he wrote shortly before his death (#19.7). The Bessie Pinsky Miller Skirball material includes her correspondence with her parents (#16.12), with her grandchildren and stepson (#18.1-18.2), and condolence letters received upon the death of Benjamin Miller (#17.6); letters from others, including many re: her work for the National Jewish Welfare Board and the USO during World War II (#17.8-17.11) and letters of congratulation re: her marriage to Louis Skirball (#17.12); phonograph records containing greetings from National Jewish Welfare Board workers in Heidelberg, Germany (Phon-60.1 - Phon-60.3); certificates (#17.1); and a passport and travel itineraries (#17.13-17.14). The material re: Harry and Maida H. Solomon includes letters congratulating them on Barbara and Peter's engagement (#21.3), and their obituaries (#21.4). The series also includes letters Barbara Miller Solomon sent her family while traveling in Europe (#19.8-19.9); the Solomon children's correspondence with other family members (#21.6, 22.9); infant feeding charts for Peter Solomon Jr. (#22.7) and Maida E. Solomon (#21.5); Peter Solomon Jr.'s baby book (#22.8); and clippings, etc., re: the weddings of both Peter (#22.10) and Maida (#21.8-21.10). In addition, the series includes itineraries for a trip to Europe Peter Solomon made in 1937 (#21.19), speeches made at his memorial service (#22.4), and letters of condolence received by Maida E. Solomon after the death of Barbara Miller Solomon (#21.12).

Series III, PROFESSIONAL, 1927-1993 (#23.1-64.7, F+D.2-F+D.5, OD.2, T-467.1 - T-467.2), is arranged in three subseries and includes professional correspondence; course syllabi, lecture notes, and other teaching materials; speeches and speech notes; audiotapes of speeches; drafts and notes re: various writing projects; and minutes, certificates, and reports.

Subseries A, Academic, 1940-1992 (#23.1-45.8, F+D.2-F+D.3, T-467.1 - T-467), is arranged in the following four groups: alphabetical correspondence (correspondence re: specific writing projects is located in Series III, Subseries B), chronological correspondence, speeches, and teaching. The alphabetical correspondence includes material re: the American Historical Association; American Jewish Committee, including correspondence re: Maida H. Solomon's oral history (#23.7-23.9); letters of recommendation for fellow historians, students, employees, and family friends (#26.15-28.3); letters of appointment for Solomon's various positions at Harvard and at Wheelock College (#23.10); various committees on which Solomon served, including the Coordinating Committee on Women in the Historical Profession (#24.5) and the Standing Committee on Women at Harvard (#28.19); grant applications (#24.18-24.21); correspondence with fellow historians and other colleagues; and correspondence about historical figures such as Olympia Brown. The chronological correspondence includes letters from students and from colleagues; correspondence re: Solomon's classes and conferences and other speaking engagements; and administrative matters. Speeches, arranged chronologically, includes speeches, speech announcements, and correspondence re: conferences and speaking engagements. Speech topics include the history of higher education for women, academic women in international affairs, coeducation, Sacco and Vanzetti, and the history of Radcliffe College. Solomon spoke frequently to Radcliffe alumnae groups and to organizations in Cambridge, Massachusetts, as well as at meetings of the Organization of American Historians, the American Historical Association, and other professional organizations. Of particular note is a speech she made in her capacity as director of the Women's Archives at one of Lady Bird Johnson's White House Lunches, in 1964 (#33.21). She also wrote books and articles on several of these topics; for related material, see Subseries B, Writings and research. The teaching material, which is arranged alphabetically by course name, includes lecture notes, syllabi, course outlines, course evaluations, examinations for religion classes Solomon taught at Wheelock College and for history, women's studies, and religion classes she taught at Harvard University. Much of this material concerns the first lecture class on women in America offered by Harvard University, Solomon's "Women and the American Experience" (#41.16-45.8), which she began teaching in the early 1970s. This class later evolved into "The Emergence of Women as a Force in Modern Society" (#39.4-39.15) and helped lead to the establishment of a formal women's studies program at Harvard. Students for both these classes wrote papers on the women in their families (#39.5-39.7, 42.7-42.15). Some material on Radcliffe Seminars is also included (#41.9-41.10)

Subseries B, Writings and research, 1927-1993 (#45.9-63.10, F+D.5, OD.2), reflects Solomon's interests in the rights of women and immigrants, and in the education of women. The subseries is arranged alphabetically and includes drafts, correspondence, reviews, distribution lists, and reader's comments for Solomon's books Ancestors and Immigrants: A Changing New England Tradition (#47.1-47.14), Pioneers in Service: The History of the Associated Jewish Philanthropies of Boston (#59.11-60.11), and In the Company of Educated Women: A History of Women and Higher Education in America (#54.4-56.2). In addition, the subseries includes considerable background material for Solomon's writings on Ada Comstock: From Western Prairies to Eastern Commons: A Life in Education, Ada Louise Comstock Notestein 1876-1973 and A Pioneer in Women's Education: From Moorhead, Minnesota, to Cambridge, Massachusetts, with Ada Louise Comstock. This includes correspondence (including with May Sarton (#50.10) and Comstock's niece Susan Clemedtson (#50.5)), chapter drafts, and interview notes. The subseries also includes essays and articles Solomon wrote for Black Women in Higher Education (#48.3-48.4), The Dictionary of American Biography (#48.9), Notable American Women: A Biographical Dictionary (#59.9-59.10), and other anthologies. There is also considerable material on an unfinished study of women such as Vera Micheles Dean who were active in both academic and political circles (#45.9-46.19), and on studies of Radcliffe College Alumnae (#52.2, 56.15-57.5). Other material includes notes and drafts re: Travels in New England and New York (a book of writings by Timothy Dwight, the eighth president of Yale University, edited by Solomon); research material for a study on women profiled in Notable American Women: A Biographical Dictionary (#57.6-59.8); correspondence and notes re: the Sacco and Vanzetti case (#60.14-60.19) including letters written at the time of the trial (#60.14); essays on Solomon's parents (#47.15) and on her experiences at Radcliffe College (#56.9); correspondence and drafts for a volume celebrating the life of her dissertation advisor Oscar Handlin (#53.7-53.10); book reviews (#48.7-48.8); and notes and drafts on America in the 17th-20th centuries, women, education, feminism, and women and professional identity. For related speeches, see Subseries A, Academic; for additional information on Radcliffe alumnae questionnaires, see Records of the Radcliffe College Alumnae Association, and for further material re: Notable American Women: A Biographical Dictionary, see Notable American Women Records. Additional material received as electronic files will be reformatted at some future date for inclusion in this series.

Subseries C, Commissions on the Status of Women, 1964-1972 (#63.11-64.7, F+D.4), includes correspondence, minutes, reports of the Special Commission on the Status of Women and the Governor's Commission on the Status of Women, as well as certificates appointing Solomon to each commission.

Series IV, PHOTOGRAPHS, 1922-1990 (PD.1f-PD.5), includes images of Solomon, her parents, husband, and children, and other relatives .

Most of the photographs in this collection are or will be cataloged in VIA, Harvard University's Visual Information Access database. Others, referred to as "uncataloged" photographs, are not of sufficient research interest to warrant cataloging and are simply treated as part of the documents they accompany; they are marked on the back with an asterisk in square brackets [*].