Publications
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- From the Editor
- Peter Ayers, Defender of the Faith by Galen Beale
- Free Press of the House of Israel: The First Publication of Benjamin Purnell Reprint
- Commentary by R. James Taylor
- Making the Bible Argument: John H. Noyes’ Mission
- Statement for the Oneida Community by Anthony Wonderley
- Hamilton College Library “Home Notes”
- New Publications from Richard W. Couper Press
Front cover illustration: Garden Seeds, Raised at New-Lebanon, Columbia County, New-York, and put up in papers, for sale by [blank]. [Albany: Printed by Packard & Van Benthuysen, between 1816 and 1824]. 33 x 21 cm.
Hamilton College has recently acquired this seed order form, one of the earliest known examples printed for the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. An example similar to this one is in the collection of the American Antiquarian Society but there are distinct typographical and a few price differences between the two. Neither is dated, and the date range given for this example is based on the cataloging of the example at AAS. The Hamilton College copy has the “N.B.” (nota bene, or note well) post-script about ordering seeds in July, which is not present on the AAS copy. Additionally, the Hamilton copy has been completed in manuscript, while the AAS example was never completed. -
- From the Editor
- How the Harmonists Suffered Disharmony: Schism in Communal Utopias by Donald E. Pitzer
- The Story of Brother Ricardo’s Song by Darryl Charles Thompson
- Pilgrims and Martyrs: The Engraved Title Page of Ephrata’s Martyrs Mirror by Jeff Bach
- Hamilton College Library “Home Notes”
- Reopening the Rare Book Room
- Communal Societies Collection: New Acquisitions
Front cover illustration: Detail from the engraved title page of Martyrer=Spiegel der Tauffs-gesinnten, druckts und verlegts der Brüderschaft in Euphratha.
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Shaker Studies, no. 3. 89 pages, illustrations, music, 2011.
ISBN: 978-1-937370-00-8 ($15)
Among the various forms of Shaker song, hymns have sustained the worship of the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing — or Shakers — for over two hundred years. Distinguished from other song types by their lengthy texts of metrical rhymed poetry, hymns can accommodate an endless range of theological and spiritual ideas. During the nineteenth century, Shakers produced hundreds of individual hymns, which were recorded by countless individual Shakers in myriad manuscript hymn books. Yet from this enormous body of hymnody, a core group of hymns readily emerges — hymns that were used and beloved for decades across the Shaker world, from Maine to Kentucky. Remarkably, the hymns in this core group are virtually unknown today. This study helps today’s reader to “partake a little morsel” of a relatively untapped vein of American folk hymnody, revealing a fresh understanding of the Shakers’ amazing complexity and vitality.Topic -
American Communal Societies Series, no. 5. 106 pages, 2011.
ISBN: 978-0-9796448-9-4 ($20)
"The Days of My Youth is a memoir of childhood in the utopian Oneida Community that limns the past with loving acuity. In successfully conveying what it felt like being a young girl there, it is an important source of information about one of the longest-lasting and most successful ventures in utopian living in American history." (Anthony Wonderley, Curator, Oneida Community Mansion House) This intimate memoir is made available for a third printing through the tireless efforts of Jessie Mayer who compared every word of the transcript to the original. -
American Communal Societies Series, no. 6. 212 pages, 2011.
ISBN: 978-1-937370-01-5 ($20)
The Shakers through French Eyes contains fourteen essays by thirteen authors originally written in French about the Shaker religious sect. Translated into English and presented in chronological order, the essays cover a wide range of topics, each author writing within the context of his or her own background and interests. For example, Henri-Baptiste Gregoire wrote as a learned theologian, while Marie Therese de Solms Blanc, wrote as a woman of letters and a critic. Some authors simply recorded facts about the Shakers as they understood them, and others penned thoughtful observations and analyses. One essay is more than 15,000 words long; some are less than 1,000 words. The essays add to the ever-growing bibliography on Shakerism, which began three centuries ago with reports in the Manchester, England, press about how Shaker leader Ann Lee and her followers challenged the culture and conventional religious practice of their time. Each essay, important in its own right, should be of interest to those already acquainted with or new to the Shakers.
About the author:
E. Richard McKinstry is Library Director and Andrew W. Mellon Senior Librarian at the H.F. du Pont Winterthur Museum. McKinstry has written four books describing the Winterthur library's holdings, including The Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, articles on bibliographical topics, a newspaper column on ephemera, and a number of book reviews. -
- From the Editor
- “Freedom of the Press is Guaranteed Only to Those Who Own the Presses” by Henry M. Yaple
- Two Early Photographs of Amana by Peter Hoehnle
- The Shakers in Eighteenth-Century Newspapers Part Two: Voyages of the Shaker Ship and Other Adventures, both Legal and Social by Christian Goodwillie
- Richard W. Couper Press order form
Front cover illustration: Amana Society. Indigo Blue. Prints. [Product label]. 1890s. 7½ x 6 inches. Amana did not have the capability of four-color printing in the early 1890s so this label must have been commercially produced for the Society. According to Peter Hoehnle, the 1890s were the high point for calico production at Amana. It is likely that an outside person was commissioned to develop this label, whose design was more elaborate than the typical Amana label.
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- From the Editor
- Black Shaker Minstrels and the Comic Performance of Shaker Worship By Robert P. Emlen
- Medical Practice in the Harvard Shaker Church Family 1834-1843 By Merry B. Post
- Shaker Seminar 2010
- Hamilton College Library “Home Notes”
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- From the Editor
- “We Live at a Great Distance from the Church”: Cartographic Strategies of the Shakers, 1805-1835 by Carol Medlicott
- The Shakers in Eighteenth-Century Newspapers Part One: “From a Spirit of Detraction and Slander” by Christian Goodwillie
- Hamilton College Library “Home Notes”
- Richard W. Couper Press Order Form
Front cover illustration: “A General View of our Journey and of Several States” map from the Youngs/Kendall collection. See the article by Carol Medlicott. From the Library of Congress, Geography and Maps Division.
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- From the Editor
- The History of the Shaker Gathering Order by Stephen J. Paterwic
- The Mob at Enfield
- Introduction by Elizabeth De Wolfe
- A Statement Concerning the Mob at Enfield
- The Shakers of Canterbury: Their Agriculture and Their Machinery by Elizabeth Gleason Bervy
- Hamilton College Library “Home Notes”
- Communal Societies Collection: New Acquisitions
- News from Richard W. Couper Press
Front cover illustration: House of David Jellies and Jams [Product label]. 1950s? For more House of David ephemera recently acquired by Hamilton College Library, see p. 108-18.
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American Communal Societies Series, no. 2. 456 pages with 45 b/w illustrations, 2010.
ISBN: 978-0-9796448-5-6 ($35)
This is a companion volume to her earlier work published by the Couper Press in 2007, which covered 1788-1849. This volume is a compilation of eighty-five accounts written by visitors to four Shaker villages. These two volumes will have enduring value for historians of the Shakers and American culture in general.
