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The Human Experience Through Primary Sources
Archives are the records created by people and organizations as they lived and worked. Collections can range in size from a single letter or diary to thousands of boxes of institutional records. They can contain drafts of literary works, financial records, meeting minutes, reports, memorabilia, as well as sound recordings, videos, film, databases, and software.

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Living at NYPL Archives & Manuscripts
Ralph Waldo Emerson
The celebrated essayist, thinker, and poet Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) taught school reluctantly after college and then became minister, but ultimately left the church and found his vocation as a lecturer and essayist. He was a one of the founders of Transcendentalism, a philosophy that bestowed its hope and expectations on the individual soul. His poetry inspired innumerable others, from Walt Whitman to Robert Frost. (In the Berg Collection of English and American Literature.)


What you'll find at NYPL Archives & Manuscripts

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9,502
Collections
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757,758
Described Components
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52,651+
Feet of Documents
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147,024
Names
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120,510
Digitized Pages
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473
Collections Added this Year
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