Guide to the Madge Sills Hamlin Collection 1921-1984 MG 1634

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Descriptive Summary
Biographical Note
Scope and Content Note
Restrictions
Access Points
Related Material
Administrative Information

Container List

Madge Sills Hamlin Collection

Finding aid encoded by Julia Telonidis. August 2005. Production of the EAD 2002 version of this finding aid was made possible by a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Finding aid written in English.

Biographical Note

Madge Sills Hamlin was the daughter of James Everett Sills and Fannie Montgomery Smith Sills, both originally from Brunswick County, Virginia. Sills Hamlin was born in Newport News, Virginia in 1897 and attended Greensboro College in North Carolina. After graduating college, Sills Hamlin traveled throughout Europe and Asia for a three year “trip around the world”, most notably living and teaching in Japan for over a year. During her travels, she took great interest in the people, history and folklore of these places and in her later life credits her travels for being an invaluable asset in her work as an educator.

After she returned to the United States, she attended graduate school at Columbia University to attain a degree in education. She received her Master’s Degree in 1928. In 1932, she and her husband, Paul Mahlon Hamlin, founded the Hamlin School, located at 41 Morlot Ave. in Fair Lawn, New Jersey, a progressive private school for K-12 students. The school seems to have been in operation from the 1930s to the mid-1950s. In 1957 to 1958 she again visited Japan. In 1958, she established the Paul Mahlon Hamlin Award to perpetuate the lifelong interest in scholarship of her husband, a Rutgers University professor emeritus of political science. Madge Sills Hamlin died in 1988.

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Scope and Content Note

This collection consists of the notes and letters written by Sills Hamlin about her travels, newspaper articles both collected by her and reprinting her journal entries, travel brochures and pamphlets, business cards, photographs of the workings of the Hamlin school and of Sills Hamlin’s time abroad, personal financial statements, resumes and letters of recommendation, an oversized photo-album of Sills Hamlin’s travels and documents pertaining to the Hamlin school including correspondence and educational and promotional material.

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Restrictions

Access Restrictions

There are no access restrictions on this collection.

Photocopying of materials is limited and no materials may be photocopied without permission from library staff.

Use Restrictions

Researchers wishing to publish, reproduce, or reprint materials from this collection must obtain permission.

The New Jersey Historical Society complies with the copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code), which governs the making of photocopies or other reproductions and protects unpublished materials as well as published materials.

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Related Material

Manuscript Group 1163, Whittier House Social Settlement.

Manuscript Group 1525, Leo Litzky Collection.

Manuscript Group 1562, Hoboken Academy Report Cards.

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Administrative Information

Preferred Citation

This collection should be cited as: Manuscript Group 1634, Madge Sills Hamlin Collection, The New Jersey Historical Society.

Acquisition Information

Donated by James B. Cook, Jr., 2003.

Processing Information

Some of the documents, mostly the hand-written notes, are slightly brittle; these documents should be handled with care.

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Container List

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