Finding Aids

Alice Lea Spruance (1876-1967) was the daughter of Delaware governor Preston Lea (1841-1916) and his first wife Adelaide Moore (1846-1888). Since the 1770s, the Lea family were among the largest flour mill operators at the Brandywine Falls, north of Wilmington, Delaware. This collection of personal and business papers document Spruance's personal investments, a diversified portfolio of stocks and bonds that was managed by her relative Alfred E. Bissell (1903-1975) of Laird, Bissell & Meeds, brokers. Also included are descriptions, anecdotes, memoranda, and clippings relating to Wilmington and the Brandywine area, particularly the Brandywine Mills, the source of the Lea family's wealth.

Charles L. Huston (1856-1951) was an executive in the family business, Lukens Steel, and was active in religious and civic affairs. His papers are primarily personal in nature and include fragmentary Lukens Steel records.

Joseph Lincoln Gillson (1895-1964) was the chief geologist for the DuPont Company's Development Department from 1929 to 1960. As chief geologist he traveled all over the world making explorations in search of sulfur, ilmenite, fluorspar, barytes, celestite, and other raw materials, as well as conducting investigations in search of ground water supplies, foundations, and general site studies. This is a small collection that consists of a set of notebooks and related documents from Gillson's time working for the DuPont Company, as well as a set of papers and related documents from consulting projects he did during his retirement.

Margaretta Lammot du Pont (1807-1898) was the wife of Alfred Victor du Pont (1798-1856), who worked for E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co. This collection correspondence to du Pont from Joseph D. Reinboth, of Pennsylvania, and her grandson, T. Coleman du Pont (1863-1930).

Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours (1739-1817) was a French political economist, writer, publisher, and public administrator. This is a letter from du Pont de Nemours to his friend Joseph Jean Johannot (1748-1829), a Swiss banker living in Paris, regarding the receipt of a subscription.

Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours (1739-1817) was a French political economist, writer, publisher, and public administrator. These are three photocopies of items related to Madame de Staël. Anne Louise Germaine de Staël-Holstein (1766-1817), known as Madame de Staël, was a writer, philosopher, and politically engaged woman who survived the French Revolution and was exiled multiple times by Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821).

Robert Lenox Belknap (1848-1896) was a capitalist and financier of New York City. The Robert Lenox Belknap papers are a fragment saved by his descendants. The papers include Belknap's private letterbooks for the final years of his career (1892-1895), although 33 earlier volumes have been lost. They include both business and personal correspondence and give a good picture of the life of a New York financier of the second rank.

William Spruance (1873-1935) was an electrical engineer and corporate officer in the DuPont Company. The collection contains letters about shares in the E.I. du Pont de Nemours Powder Company awarded under the company's bonus system.

William du Pont (1855-1928) was an industrialist and member of the promienent du Pont family of Delaware, whose family business was the E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Company, also known as the DuPont Company which was a large manufacturer of gunpowder. He worked for the first DuPont dynamite manufacturer, Repauno Chemical Company, as secretary and treasurer (1880-1884) and after the tragic death of Lammot du Pont (1831-1884), as president (1884-1892). This small group of papers encompass both correspondence and various financial and investment accounts, largely covering his ten years spent in England after leaving the United States in 1893.