Guide to the Andrew Dickson White Papers,
1832-1919

Andrew D. White was born in 1832 in Homer, New York. He attended Geneva College, (now Hobart College), Geneva, New York, and Yale University, graduating in Yale's class of 1853. After teaching history and English literature at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, he was elected to the New York State Senate, and served as senator for the Syracuse area from 1864 to 1867. There he met Ezra Cornell, and as chairman of the Senate Education Committee, he became involved in efforts to charter Cornell University as the state's land grant college. The bill chartering Cornell University was passed in April 1865; White became the University's first president in 1866. White was instrumental in developing the history and political science departments at Cornell, and took special interest in the library and the architecture of the new university. His 20-year tenure as University president was interrupted by a visit to Santo Domingo with a Presidential commission in 1871, by a European tour from 1876 to 1878, and by a term as United States Minister to Berlin from 1879 to 1881. White resigned the University presidency in 1885, and traveled extensively in Europe. After the death of his first wife, Mary Amanda Outwater, he gave a lecture tour in the United States, returned to Europe, and finally joined Willard Fiske for a journey to Egypt, Greece and Turkey.

In September 1890, White married Helen Magill, the daughter of Swarthmore College President Edward Hicks Magill, and the first woman to receive the Ph.D. in the United States. White served in many diplomatic roles, as Minister to Russia from 1893 to 1894 and Ambassador to Germany from 1897 to 1902. He was president of the American delegation to the Peace Conference at The Hague in 1899. White returned to Ithaca in 1904, where he remained until his death in 1918. He authored many books, including A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom, and other articles and essays.

Collection consists of incoming correspondence, manuscripts of lectures, speeches and articles; manuscripts of presidential reports; manuscripts of books; copies of publications; financial records; clippings; photographs, engravings, diplomas and memorabilia; family documents and diaries. Also, some of White's outgoing correspondence including his letters to Charles Kendall Adams, Cornell University's second president, and William Channing Russel, Andrew D. White's vice president; correspondence and dispatches from White during his service as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Germany, and later as Ambassador to Russia; diplomatic instructions from the U.S. Department of State; correspondence from George Frederick William Holls on various topics of state, national and international politics, and correspondence pertaining to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Also, correspondence relating to family affairs and finances, White's college days at Hobart College and Yale University, his professorship at the University of Michigan, his service in the New York State legislature, the founding and administration of Cornell University, educational ideas, civil service reform, the policies and activities of the Republican Party, the proposed annexation of Santo Domingo, and the study and writing of history and the study of art and architecture.

Personal correspondence includes letters from or about many family members, including Andrew White Newberry, Arthur Cleveland Newberry, Clara White Newberry, Spencer B. Newberry, Emily Outwater, Lucia Phillips Outwater, Andrew Danforth White, Andrew Dickson White II, Andrew Strong White, Ann Bruce White (Mrs. Frederick Davies), Frederick Davies White, Hamilton Salisbury White, Helen Magill White, Hilda White, Horace Keep White II and Horace Keep White III, Karin Andreevna White, and Mary Outwater White. Also, drafts of White's will drawn by Mynderse Van Cleef. Other correspondents include people involved with Cornell University such as Liberty Hyde Bailey, George Lincoln Burr, Ezra Cornell, Hiram Corson, Daniel Willard Fiske, Francis Miles Finch, Hiram Sibley, Henry W. Sage, Goldwin Smith, Robert H. Thurston, Moses Coit Tyler and other members of the Board of Trustees and faculty; historical and literary figures such as Lord Acton, Herbert Baxter Adams, Lord Bryce, Andrew Carnegie, Theodore Dreiser, Charles William Eliot, Ulysses S. Grant, Justin Smith Morrill, Theodore Roosevelt, Leo Tolstoy, Hendrik Willem van Loon, Queen Victoria, Booker T. Washington and Woodrow Wilson.

Letter from White to the Cornell University Board of Trustees about the placement of the White Library, 1887.

Also, miscellaneous notes and lists on the French Revolution and Napoleon Collection; list of contemporary imprints; index to autographs; and various prose miscellany. Includes a White family genealogy. Also, a letter from Andrew Dickson White to Rabbi Joseph Krauskopf, March 27, 1911.

Includes collection 1-2-531, Albert Hazen Wright's research material on White.