Biography
The American Antiquarian Society's collection of almost 30,000
biographies is a major resource for scholars. Generally speaking,
the collection consists of two types of biographies. First are the
"traditional" biographies of prominent historical and contemporary
world figures published in the United States and Canada between 1821
and 1876. The second type is composed of sources generally
considered ephemeral: funeral orations and sermons, commemorative
memorials, masonic tributes, and privately printed tributes of
individuals not sufficiently well known to warrant more standard
biographies. Represented in this group are individuals who were
resident in the United States or Canada and who were born before the
year 1851.
Historically, AAS cataloging mirrored practices at other
research libraries with access under the author and the
subject of the biography. As new acquisitions are added to the
Society's collection or long-standing holdings converted to
the online catalog, current practice calls for additional
subject access under topical and geographical headings
subdivided by the term "Biography." Thus A Discourse on the
Life and Character of the Rev. Aaron Bancroft, D.D. Senior
Pastor of the Second Congregational Society in
Worcester (Worcester, 1839), by Alonzo Hill, is accessible
not only under Hill as author and Bancroft as subject, but
also under the headings "Clergy--Biography" and "Worcester
(Mass.)--Biography." As appropriate, current cataloging
practice also calls for access under genre terms
"Autobiographies," "Biographies," "Eulogies," "Funeral
addresses," "Funeral sermons," "Memoirs," and "Memorials
(Commemorative)."
There are also collective biographies in the Society's
holdings, designated as "Biography, Collective" (RC) and
"Biography, Collective, by subject" (RCS). Among the former are
standard national biographical dictionaries including the
Dictionary of American Biography, the Dictionary of Canadian
Biography, and the Dictionary of National Biography. The
collective biographies in RCS are arranged under such headings
as artists, educators, literary persons, women, and
eccentrics. Included among this genre are Experience Mayhew's
Narrative of the Lives of Pious Indian Women, Who Lived on
Martha's Vineyard (Boston, 1830), The Life and Sketches of
Curious and Odd Characters (Boston, 1840), and Alan Schroder's
Directory of 19th Century Iowa Architects (Iowa City,
1982). A few collective biographies, such as William B. Sprague's
multivolume Annals of the American Pulpit (New York,
1857-69), have been indexed by Society staff to provide easy
access to individual entries, and the American Biographic
Index (ABI), 2nd edition, published by K.G. Saur in 1998 is an
invaluable tool providing access to individual entries in more than 500
sources.
- Doris O'Keefe, Senior Cataloger
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Casper, Scott E. Constructing American lives (1999).
Catalog
record
Portrait authors (1873).
For current information on the cataloging status of this and
other AAS collections, choose "Collection Access" below.
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