Deady Collection 1

Running Head: MATTHEW P. DEADY COLLECTION ANALYSIS

Pharisee Among the Philistines: Matthew P. Deady Collection

Robyn Ward

809 Archives Management

Emporia State University

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Pharisee Among the Philistines: Matthew P. Deady Collection

The Collection

The Deady Family Papers is one of Oregon Historical Society’s oldest collections.

Lucy Henderson Deady, wife of Judge Matthew P. Deady gifted the manuscripts,

journals, and ephemera to the Oregon Historical Society in 1918. A note included in

Lucy’s papers reads “For the Oregon Historical Society Lucy A. H. Deady 53 Ella St.

Portland, Oregon, Oct 27, 1918”.

Matthew P. Deady arrived in the Oregon Territory in 1849. He was a teacher,

lawyer, politician, and civic leader. In 1850 Deady was elected as a representative for the

Oregon Territorial House of Representatives and in 1853 appointed as an associate justice

for the Oregon Supreme Court in the Umpqua Valley. In 1859, the year Oregon was

admitted into the Union as the 33rd state, Matthew Deady was appointed by President

Buchanan to be U. S. District Judge for the district of Oregon, a position Deady held until

his death in 1893. The collection as a whole consists of hand written letters and journals

relating to Deady’s professional and personal life. It also includes correspondence of

Lucy ranging from 1863-1903 and a carbon copy of an article published in the Oregon

Journal based on an interview with Lucy by Fred Lockley titled “Crossing the Plains to

Oregon in 1846”. Other items included are letters, cards and condolence telegrams to

Lucy after the death of Judge Deady. The bulk of the collection consists of Deady’s

letters and correspondence and journals. Other items in the collections include: bills and

receipts, invitations, thank-you cards, courtesy letters, menus, speeches, and other

ephemera (personal and professional). One example is pressed flowers, one having been

collected from the tomb of John Keats. The folder containing Deady’s outgoing
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correspondence contains intentional copies created by Deady himself, they are

handwritten, not copy transferred such as in a letterpress book. Deady was an avid journal

writer and his journals span from 1871-1892. The collection includes these journals along

with complete typed transcripts of the journals.

Looking at the Collection from Two Different Perspectives

From a new researcher’s point of view, by just looking at the finding aid, one

would think that the sequence of the collection is pretty straightforward and logical:

correspondence, bills/receipts, ephemera, speeches, journals, etc of Deady. But as one

looks further into the collection and gets to look at the items in each box, one realizes that

the collection has been processed at least two or three times. There is information missing

from and about the collection, which is either included in other collections, or housed

elsewhere. Materials that aren’t housed with the main collections are photographs,

scrapbooks, and other writings.

From the archivist’s vantage point one can tell that previous finding aids of

various descriptions existed, a number of different arrangements also existed. The

correspondence has been exhaustively described at the item level. A summary of each

letter and a subject index also exists for the letters. Sections of the collection have been

microfilmed and digitized. There is evidence of an existing photo collection and

scrapbooks. A number of resources aren’t referenced in the finding aid, including

published monographs written by Judge Deady that are in the regular library. It would be

helpful for the researcher to have these materials included in the finding aid. If a

description and location for these items where included it would significantly aid in the

discovery and research process for the user and would also help the archivist keep track
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of related collections and materials. It would also be beneficial to mention the use of the

online catalog in the finding aid to find further information regarding the collection or the

person or institution that is being researched.

Accessioning and Appraisal Decisions

Appraisal is the process where the creators, functions, and activities are identified

and defined. Based on these factors, materials are selected that best reflects or represents

the creator and activities and then are preserved permanently. I assume that the appraising

archivist would have kept the bulk, if not all, of the donated collection as was gifted when

it arrived at OHS in 1918. There is no deed of gift, or a preliminary inventory, but only a

simple handwritten note by Lucy Deady to OHS. There is also no evidence of OHS

thanking Lucy for her Gift, but as mentioned before, these documents are not kept with

the collection for researchers to access.

Accounting for the extent of Deady’s role and functions in Oregon it could be

questioned as to whether all of the ephemera that was kept represented all that was ever

received or if during processing a sampling was instead as a matter of space

consideration.

Since Judge Deady was such an integral part of the history of Oregon it would be

no question that OHS would accept the collection and provide a home for it. To the

appraiser it seemed that Deady’s papers would be useful for continued use in perpetuity.

Arrangement

The collection is arranged according to series. There are four series, A-D. Series A

consists of Lucy Deady’s letters, Series B is letters to Judge Deady, Series C is letters

from Deady and personal documents, and Series D consists of Deady’s journals. The
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materials in each series are arranged to different levels. Deady’s incoming letters are

arranged and described by item as well as his journals. The other series are arranged and

described to folder level.

All correspondence of Deady’s and Lucy’s had originally been folded and filed

according to the filing conventions of the day, i.e. folded in half then folded in thirds with

the date and individual correspondent written on the top back of the letter. Then filed in

the cubbies of the desk. Most of the collection has been processed and looks that it was

processed and described under a previous system as initially arranged by the Oregon

Historical Society. The letters have numbers that have been crossed out and with a

different number replacing the existing one. The current numbers correspond with the

legacy files and the current finding aid. A previous finding aid explains the numbering

system:

“At one time, most of the letters in the collection were given item numbers
consisting of the first letter of the correspondent’s surname followed by a serial
number, such as H195” (a letter from John Hughes). An earlier numbering system
was abandoned, but those numbers still appear on each item along with the more
recent numbers. The recent numbers generally follow an alphabetical
arrangement, however some items are not filed in alphabetical order. In addition,
letters written by Deady were all designated “DD” followed by a serial number,
such as “DD35”. The present arrangement of the letters follows the item
numbering system, although some numbers are missing from the sequence.”

A legacy finding aid specifically for Deady’s correspondence alone is housed in 4

drawers of a card catalog file. Deady’s correspondence is described on the item level.

This level of description is rare within the collection. Each card contains information

regarding the content of the letter. An analog subject index exists in a 3-ring binder for

the correspondence. The beginning of the index includes a typed finding aid (the

collection at the time consisted of 13 boxes instead of 17). The index itself includes typed
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and handwritten entries. Along with the subject guide, it also included an author guide for

the letters and “calendar of letters sent by Lorenzo Sawyer to Matthew P. Deady, as

microfilmed by Joseph A. Schiwek, Jr. for the Oregon Historical Society, 1983-1984.

This list shows the chronological relationship of the entire correspondence, thus a card

has been microfilmed in its proper place to indicate this.” This consists of two rolls of

microfilm dating from 1869-1889 letter numbers S329-S641. Apparently there was a time

when OHS had a microfilming facility and if a part of a collection was requested or a

collection was requested, say for example, by the U of O, a film copy was created and

sent to the requesting institution and a copy kept at OHS.

The current arrangement of the collection seems very straightforward and logical.

There could be debate as to why Lucy’s letters and records are at the beginning of the

collection. The correspondence is arranged by author’s last name then by date. Lucy’s

letters aren’t arranged by item, there are no identifying numbers on them (on folder only

identifying how many pieces should be in the folder) not processed, i.e. (most letters

unfolded, but still contain staples and pins) but looks as though the letters are arranged

(loosely) chronologically, letters are handwritten with paper and inkwell and pen. The

dates on the folder indicate letters up to 1903, but a letter dated 1906 was found. Maybe

includes larger date frame than initially thought. Lucy’s papers also contain the

condolence telegrams. These are glued to pieces of paper that are then sewn together.

These seem to have been part of a previous arrangement? This is assumed since the

telegrams have numbers written in purple colored pencil. But maybe they are numbered

for some other processing reason by the telegraph or post company? The numbering is

very random but not duplicated. Invitations, cards and courtesy letters are arranged
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alphabetically by correspondent. The items in the ephemera folder are not cataloged

individually and have not been previously processed. The journals are not arranged in

chronological order and included among the journals is an account book and travel

journals. The transcripts of the journals look like they had previously been housed in 4-

ring binders and the transcripts are typed on a typewriter. The transcripts are rough,

having many handwritten notes and corrections on them.

Description

The bibliographic sketch of Deady, the summary and the actual description of the

collection does a fair job of giving a good overview of the activities of how the collection

came into being and why it would be important for OHS to have them. There could be

some inclusion in the finding aid of the other holdings the library has concerning Judge

Deady such as the microfilm, other monographs written by Deady, the photo album

collection, and the scrapbook collection. One other thing worth mentioning is that while

investing the collection one periodically comes across “Manuscripts Imaging

Worksheets”. These sheets are evidence of an earlier project that has long been

abandoned due to lack of funding. There was an initial digitization project that was under

way where some of the items in the collection were digitized with the idea to make them

available on the website. The scanned images where transferred over to a disk and are

still accessible to view, but since the scanned images were from an older process, they

aren’t supported by the new system. An explanation of this could be included on the

finding aid as well.

The collection has undergone a number of levels of description. The description

of the collection existed as the individual card files listed above for each item of
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correspondence, included in this was a subject guide also mentioned above. Along with

this was also a bound guide to all manuscript collections at the library that had been

printed in 1971. The listings are arranged alphabetically by collection surname. In this

publication are 13 “cards”/boxes referring to the Deady collection. The microfilm is

represented in this guide. Before NWDA a finding aid existed in html. The html index

provided an index by last name of correspondent. James Labosier processed the

collection again in September of 1996. The library’s online catalog and legacy card

catalog also contain information regarding the Deady collection. There are MARC

records for items and other collections relating to the Deady collection, but there is not a

MARC record for the collection itself. Performing a search on variations of Deady’s

name in the online catalog resulted in different number of results each time. This was a

little disconcerting and not very helpful to the researcher. But performing an online

search provided the researcher information needed to know that there were photographs,

scrapbooks, monographs and other related materials at OHS. The Deady collection has an

exhaustive subject list. Every correspondent is included as a subject heading. Library of

Congress subject headings are used, examples of these include Oregon history, politics

and government, judges, legislators, etc. The subject headings cover a wide area and

should allow for discovery when searching on any of these subjects. A search in OCLC

WorldCat resulted in relevant and quite a few records of writings by and about Deady.

The Deady Collection is not included in the National Union Catalog of Manuscript

Collections.

Why is certain information not included in the current finding aid? Encoding the

Deady finding aid was part of a recon initiative which consisted of getting a number of
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collections processed and included in the Northwest Digital Archives website. The

finding aids aren’t as information rich as they could be because of time and possibly

money constraints. A private firm, ArchProteus was hired to do the encoding in 2003.

Physical Condition of the Collection/Preservation Problems

At first glance, the collection as a whole looks to be in quite good condition.

There is little evidence of tearing and foxing. No mold or insect damage found. There

was a little damage from paper clips. Items that exhibited damage were Lucy’s

correspondence regarding Judge Deady’s death. It looked as if the letters had once been

glued to a long rectangular paper/board then sewn together to keep the collection of

letters together. At some point the letters had been pulled apart and all the letters in this

folder are quite damaged. Every letter has evidence of glue and remnants of the paper to

which they were once glued. The same had been done to the telegraphs, which still are

attached to the paper/board. Deady’s journals are also a point of preservation need. The

hardbound diaries are fragile. The spines are deteriorating, the boards are hanging on by

the original binding tapes and not much else, and there were signs of red rot from one of

the journals. One of the spines looked like someone had tried to put the journal back

together (not very cleverly) with book tape. The sewing had practically completely come

apart on the same journal. Also within the ephemera items, it looked as if certain cards

where transferring color and images onto the items next to them. Judge Deady’s speeches

(published and unpublished) some of the published had been interleaved with archival

paper. The collection seems to be stabilized and with proper handling should not be in

danger of further deterioration. This is an important collection for the Oregon Historical

Society and the cost for preservation efforts would be worth the effort.
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Gaps in the Collection

Deady’s journals were edited and published in a two-volume monograph titled

Pharisee Among the Philistines by Malcolm Clark. In the introduction Mr. Clark makes

mention that only 8 of the 9 journals were gifted to OHS. The journal covering April

1886-September 1889 belonged to Carol McMinimee Merchant. This journal is still not

part of the OHS collection. Clark also indicated that the collection of journals as a whole

is not complete. Evidence suggests that Deady began as early as 1849 to keep a journal.

The journals that are included in the collection begin at the tail end of 1871. There is

question as to whether the opening section was lost or destroyed.

There is a Deady collection held at the University of Oregon. Deady was very

involved in the University. Deady Hall was named after him.

There are a few items that have been removed from the collection and included in

different collections. A silk sash, worn by Matthew Deady at a celebration marking the

arrival of the first transcontinental railroad to Portland in 1883, was removed in 2005 to

the Artifact Collection. There is also a copy of an original letter that indicates it is in the

Postal Collection.

Conclusion

The Matthew P. Deady collection is an old collection that has been handled a

number of times. The library contains a number of access points (online catalog, NWDA,

legacy card catalogs and finding aids, and an analog subject guide) to parts of the

collection that aren’t represented in one place. One has to search and figure out where to

find information regarding the actual entire collection.

The effort put into the arrangement and description seem good enough for a
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researcher to go in and look through the information. There is pretty good description on

the series and folder level for the rest of the collection other than the correspondence

which has been exhaustively attended to.

Obviously this is an important collection to the history and establishment of

Oregon. It contains a variety of information regarding the professional and personal life

of not only judge Deady but other characters that played a vital role in this history as

well.