Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-03-18
MISS ANTH0NY'S GIFT
DONATION TO THE LIBRARY OF
CONGRESS.
Collection Of Letters From Eminent
Men, Books and Files OF
Newspapers.

gress. ----r-' -
Miss Anthony was in Washington Monday
looking after the arrangement and placing
Of her valuable gift to the library. 1t is
collection which the librarian expressed
himself as delighted to obtain. The library
provides a separate alcove for this donation.
assumes all the expense OF having It
brought from Miss Anthony's home in
Rochester. N. Y. and Of placing the books
on the shelves and preparing the catalogue
OF them. The library will also provide
handsome book plate for the books.
There are in the Library OF Congress but
four collections designated by names-the
Toner collection of Westinghouse. the King.
81 number of miscellaneous books: the
Srlithson collection and the Peter Force
collection OF books, papers and manuscripts,
for which the government paid 100000.
The Toner collection Is kept to itself. The
others are scattered throughout the library.
but book plate was provided for each by
the library
The Susan B. Anthony collection is the
first presented by woman. Miss An
thongs life has been one long romance, de-
spite the battles she has fought for the
leader among women, for while others
struggled along single lines, she has con-
tended for women in every walk Of life, and
this has brought her in contact with every
sixty years. During her vigorous. active
life she has had the friendship Of men like
Lincoln. Thomas B. Reed, William Lloyd
Garrison, Thurlow Weed. Thomas Went
worth Higginson. Henry Ward Beecher.
William Henry Charming, George William
Curtis, Stanton, Seward, Horace Greeley,
Longfellow. Whittier. Alcott. Theodore TIL
ton. Hawthorne. Emerson, Holmes, Bryant,
Lowell-the list would be too long to print
in its entirety. 1t would include nearly all
a hn TeQp "a a
of history in the last half century.
Collection Of Letters.
Among the thousands and thousands of
letters which Miss Anthony will place with
her collection in the Congressional Library
will be many received from these men.
Miss Anthony has been a voluminous cor
respondent in her day, and the letters
which she has preserved contain many
rich gems Of thought from the men who
are now deemed great in craftsmanship and
literature. 1t was not her intention to put
those letters with the rest Of the collec-
ton, but at last to destroy them. She
never destroyed a letter in her life. Each
has been annotated and filed away, and in
the famous old attic Of the home in Ro-
chester there are probably 5000 or more
letters of almost priceless literary value.
They are tied up in neat packages and
placed in bags. Miss Anthony has been
persuaded by her friends to give these
The collection which will be placed in
the library will not be catalogued as a
suffrage" collection, for that would be q
misnomer. The number Of books is not
SO very large, only about 200. but they are
rich from a collectors point Of view, as
many of them, in fact, most Of them, are
autograph copies Of the books that men
of fame whom she numbered among her
friends have sent her, many Of them con-
tanning complimentary references to her
self.
Works on Suffrage.
The complete history of woman's suf-
frage in four volumes (from 1910 to 1900
is a part of the collection. The first vol
umes were written by Miss Anthony and
Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and the last by
Miss Anthony and Mrs. Ida Hustled Har-
per. In these four volumes Miss Anthony
put all the long story Of struggle and suf-
ferng for the suffrage cause. "It is COM
plete" she declared, "to 1900. and there
my connection with 1T ends. l have put
into it all that there was in me of energy
and effort My work Is about ended now"
There are also two volumes of her life,
written by Mrs. Ida Hustled Harper, who
spent the greater part of three years with
Miss Anthony in that wonderful 'attic'
going over the old diaries. letters, pam
phlets, manuscripts and newspapers which
now form this Anthony collection. Into
quaint personality Of Miss Anthony. and
has shown her tender, home-loving side. 1t
gives the high lights to the picture which
the world needs to make 1t understand
this wonderful woman.
In the collection are also works OF Lucy
Stone, Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and
Lucretia Mott, and the scrap books kept
by Miss Anthony for the past fifty years.
These form in themselves magnificent col
lection of historical data, for they are not
confined to the suffrage question, but con-
tain the newspaper history OF pol1t1cai
changes during that half century In which
ha of world MADE
over many times.
Personal Recollections.
An interesting addition. because Of the
personality and individualism Of 1t all,
would be the diaries of Miss Anthony. She
began to keep diary when she was a
child and she has kept it up for sixty years.
With these diaries and the scrap books, one
would need but little else In the way of
history for Miss Anthony discussed every
thing in her diary from the pink roses in
side of her bonnet brim to the emancipation
proclamation and the annexation of Porto
Rico. while the scrap book collection COW
ers almost as wide range, though prob
ably less original. Whether Miss Anthony
will put these diaries In the collection Is
not quite settled.
The collection Of newspapers Is unique.
and 1t is the only complete one OF Its kind
in existence. There are bound volumes of
the Revolution" the suffrage paper pub
lished by Miss Anthony and Mrs. Stanton,
in which Miss Anthony sunk thousands of
dollars. There are also complete sets Of the
"Lily?" Una" the Ballot Box, the Wo-
mans Journal" and the ''Womans Tri-
bune," all suffrage papers.
Miss Anthony has been all her life an
ardent temperance woman, and she was as
energetic an abolltionst as ever existed.
Among her newspapers are complete files
of temperance journals. and of the Lib
orator" and the "Anti-Slavery Standard"
published by Wendell Phillips, Parker
PillsDury and William Lloyd Garrison, over
fifty years ago.
Her Prediction.
"All that have fought for will not come
in my day." she said Monday. speaking Of
her long struggle for equal suffrage, II
shall not live to see all accomplished that
had hoped for. But 1t will come. l know
ii will come. Fifty years ago who would
have dreamed that all this should ever come
about-that women could preach and prac-
tice law: that they could go forth as heal
ers of tfe sick, the halt, the lame and the
blind; that they would teach men, even
men. higher mathematics, astronomy and
philosophy. That they should sit on schoo;
boards. in legislatures and senates, be
county treasprers. county superintendent
of public instruction. mayors of cities del
egates TO political conventions There Is not
much OF anything that a woman may not
be now, except q voter, and she will get