Contains correspondence primarily between family members but also letters related to professional, financial, government, and legal matters. The letters written by women (especially Julia F. Adgate Knowles, Eunice B. Adgate, and Hannah Bacon) reveal much about religion, women’s roles, health, education, and local and national issues of their respective periods. Also includes Beatrice Maud (Michell) Knowles’s correspondence related to her role as national chair/president of American Mothers, one of many mothers’ groups devoted to U.S. isolationism during World War II. Printed transcripts of letters are filed alongside originals.