Annual Meeting November, 1961

    THE Annual Meeting of the Society was held at its House, No. 87 Mount Vernon Street, Boston, on Thursday, 16 November 1961. At the dinner which preceded the meeting, the Reverend Richard D. Pierce said grace.

    The President, Mr. Richard Mott Gummere, called the meeting to order at half after eight o’clock. Mr. Samuel Eliot Morison read the Mayflower Compact.

    With the consent of those present, the reading of the minutes of the last Stated Meeting was omitted.

    Mr. Leo Flaherty, of Boston, was elected a Resident Member of the Society.

    The Annual Report of the Council was read by Mr. Walter Muir Whitehill.

    Report of the Council

    FOUR meetings were held during the past year at the Society’s House, beginning with the Annual Meeting on 17 November 1960. On the afternoon of 15 December, Mr. Thomas C. Barrow read a paper, “The Shirley-Belcher Feud,” and on 16 February 1961 Mr. Allan Ludwig of New Haven showed slides of colonial New England gravestones to illustrate a paper on “The Visual Imagery of Puritanism.” At the evening meeting on 28 April 1961, Mr. Marcus A. McCorison, the new Librarian of the American Antiquarian Society, spoke on “The Bayley-Hazen Military Road,” showing color slides of the region between Newbury and St. Johnsbury, Vermont, through which this route toward Canada was built in the later part of the American Revolution.

    The Society has continued its support of the New England Quarterly, of which it is joint publisher. Volumes 39, 40, and 41 of our Publications, The Records of the First Church of Boston, 1630–1868, edited by the Reverend Richard D. Pierce, are nearing publication and will be distributed to those members who request them early in the new year. The printing of the 1,086 pages of text was completed many months ago, but the compilation and proofreading of the 167-page index, which includes a fantastic number of proper names, required many months of exacting labor by Dr. Pierce. The printing of the Introduction, which opens Volume I and of the Index, which concludes Volume III, is now being completed, while Volume II, which contains pages 345 to 568 of the records is already bound. While many pages of the records, consisting of lists of admissions to membership, baptisms, marriages and the like, will be chiefly consulted for reference, some of the earlier years will provide more entertaining side lights upon the habits of seventeenth-century Bostonians. In the Index under “Discipline” one finds such subjects as “Ale-house hunting,” “Disorderly singing,” “Disorderly walking,” “Drowning of children,” “Irregular prophesying,” “Joining Quakers,” “Sporting at quoytes.”

    The following gentlemen have been elected to membership during the past year:

    Resident:

    • Philip Hofer
    • Thomas James Wilson
    • John Codman
    • Henry Seton
    • John Daniel Cushing
    • Roger Allan Moore
    • Thomas Churchill Barrow
    • Marcus A. McCorison

    Corresponding:

    • James J. Heslin
    • Edward Chase Kirkland

    Thomas C. Barrow having accepted an appointment to the faculty of the University of Missouri a few months after his election as a Resident Member has been transferred to Non-Resident Membership. With great regret we record the deaths of four members:

    Mark Antony de Wolfe Howe, Resident, 1911, Honorary 1955, died 6 December 1960. The senior man of letters in Boston, and the beloved friend of nearly every member of this Society. Few men have pursued their craft with such industry and inspired such affection on every hand.

    Lawrence Waters Jenkins, Resident, 1943, died 20 April 1961. A remarkable collector in many fields, who gave nearly sixty years of his life to the Peabody Museum of Salem, of which he was Director Emeritus at the time of his death.

    Carl Purington Rollins, Corresponding, 1952, died 20 November 1960. A great printer and a great man, who after forty years in New Haven remembered more of his native Essex County than most people have been able to learn.

    Lucius James Knowles, Resident, 1949, Non-Resident, 1955, died 14 January 1961. A huge, generous and lovable survival from the eighteenth century, who enjoyed the company of scholars as greatly as they enjoyed being with him.

    The most notable gift to the Society’s House during the year was the portrait of Sargeant Adair by George Romney, given by Andrew Oliver. The house has been used during the year by the Harvard and M.I.T. History Departments, by the Trustees of Emerson and Marlboro Colleges, and the Peabody Museum of Salem, and other appropriate groups. In June, 1961 the Harvard—M.I.T. Joint Center for Urban Studies held a two-day conference of city planners there. As always we are greatly indebted to Mrs. Joseph Greene for her admirable care of the house and the excellence of the annual dinner. Henry M. Channing and the William Ellery Channing Memorial, of which he is President, continue the care and embellishment of the Channing Room on the third floor, and assist the Society generously in many ways.

    A vote of thanks to Mr. Whitehill for his continued care of the Society’s interests was unanimously passed.

    The Treasurer submitted his Annual Report as follows:

    Report of the Treasurer

    In accordance with the requirements of the By-laws, the Treasurer submits his Annual Report for the year ending 30 September 1961.

    Statement of Assets and Funds, 30 September 1961

    ASSETS

    Cash:

    Principal

    $23,604

    Income

    −1,315

    $22,289

    Savings Bank Deposit

    4,209

    Savings and Loan Association Deposits

    40,000

    Investments in Securities:

    Bonds (Market Value $270,250)

    277,483

    Stocks (Market Value $423,770)

    97,780

    Total Assets

    $441,761

    FUNDS

    Principal Funds

    $443,076

    Income (deficit)

    −1,315

    Total Funds

    $441,761

    Income Cash Receipts and Disbursements

    Balance of Income Cash, 30 September 1960

    −$7,418

    RECEIPTS:

    Dividends

    $11,263

    Interest

    12,139

    Annual Assessments

    985

    Sale of Publications

    570

    24,957

    Total Receipts of Income

    17,539

    DISBURSEMENTS:

    Publications: New England Quarterly

    $3,500

    Expenses of 87 Mount Vernon Street Property:

    Renovations, maintenance and furnishings

    5,242

    Heat and Light

    1,912

    Insurance

    1,129

    Telephone and Telegraph

    258

    Water

    45

    Editor’s Salary

    1,500

    Annual Dinner

    800

    Notices and Expenses of Meetings

    659

    Auditing and Accounting Services

    400

    Miscellaneous Supplies and Expenses

    108

    Gifts

    557

    Total Disbursements of Income

    $16,110

    Balance of Income, 30 September 1961

    $1,429

    TRANSFERS TO PRINCIPAL FUNDS:

    Sarah Louise Edes Fund

    $2,424

    Albert Matthews Fund

    320

    2,744

    Income Cash Overdraft, 30 September 1961

    −$1,315

    Mr. John Bryant Paine, Jr., read the report of the Auditing Committee, indicating that they had employed the firm of Messrs. Arthur Young and Company to make an audit of the accounts and to examine the securities, and presented the report of that firm to the meeting.

    The several reports were accepted and referred to the Committee on Publication.

    On behalf of the committee appointed to nominate officers for the ensuing year the following list was presented; and a ballot having been taken, these gentlemen were unanimously elected:

    • President Clifford Kenyon Shipton
    • Vice-Presidents Samuel Eliot Morison
      • Lyman Henry Butterfield
    • Recording Secretary Robert Earle Moody
    • Corresponding Secretary David Britton Little
    • Treasurer Carleton Rubira Richmond
    • Member of the Council for Three Years Dean Abner Fales, Jr.

    At the conclusion of the business meeting, Mr. David McCord read a selection of his recent poems. Mr. L. H. Butterfield, Editor in Chief of The Adams Papers, then addressed the Society.