Guide to the Annie Fields papers, 1870-1899

Descriptive Summary

Creator Fields, Annie, 1834-1915
Title Annie Fields papers
Dates 1870-1899 (bulk 1870-1880)
Identification MS 87
Quantity 0.5 linear feet (1 manuscript container)
Collection Abstract Collection contain correspondence, financial records, advertisements and clippings. The majority of the materials relate to Fields's support and promotion of coffeehouses known as the Holly Tree Inns. Correspondence and financial records reflect her involvement in renting rooms for the coffeehouses, hiring staff, fixing costs and raising funds. There are several progress reports from coffeehouse stewards or managers. Newspaper clippings report the opening of the Holly Tree Inns; the opening of German Volks-kuchen or people's kitchens; and items of general charity interest.
Historical Abstract Annie Adams Fields (1834-1915) was an author, literary hostess and social welfare worker. Born in Boston, she was a daughter of Dr. Zabdiel Boylston Adams, a Boston physician, and Sarah May (Holland) Adams, a descendant of Henry Adams of Braintree.
Language Material in English.
Location Collection may be stored offsite. Please contact Archives staff for more information.

Information for Users

Access Restrictions

Collection is open.

Copyright Notice

Copyright for materials resides with the creators of the items in question, unless otherwise designated.

Publishing permission

Please contact the College Archivist with requests to publish any material from the collection.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item: description and date], Annie Fields papers, MS 87, Simmons College Archives, Boston, MA, USA.

Acquisitions Information

Majority of material donated by Donald W. Moreland. One item found in a book in the Simmons College Historical Book Collection.

Accession number: 88.011, 88.028

A letter dated January 31, 1899 from social worker Mary Richmond was accessioned separately; the letter to Fields was found in a copy of Richmond's Friendly Visiting Among the Poor (1899) in the Simmons College Historical Book Collection.

Processing Information

Processed by Megan Sniffin-Marinoff, College Archivist, January 1989.

This collection guide was encoded as part of the LEADS project by Meghan Poepping, February 2013.


Biographical Note

Annie Adams Fields (1834-1915) was an author, literary hostess and social welfare worker. Born in Boston, she was a daughter of Dr. Zabdiel Boylston Adams, a Boston physician, and Sarah May (Holland) Adams, a descendant of Henry Adams of Braintree.(1) Marrying Boston publisher James Thomas Fields thrust Annie Adams Fields into the literary world. The couple's Charles Street home was a salon for such notable literary figures as Charles Dickens, William Thackeray, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry James.(2) Social welfare work was Field's late blossoming interest. She was a principal founder of the Associated Charities of Boston in 1879, serving as director (1879-94) and vice-president (1894-1906). Prior to her involvement with the professional organization of charity work and workers, she promoted and supported "coffeehouses" in working-class neighborhoods in Boston and throughout the United States; aided the homeless after the Boston fire of 1872; and helped organize the Cooperative Society of Visitors among the Poor.(3)

Left alone and childless when her husband died in 1881, Fields continued her literary activity. She began to publish her poetry such as Under the Olive (1881) and her literary reminiscences such as Whittier: Notes of His Life and of His Friendship (1893). In addition, she published How to Help the Poor (1883), a handbook for charity workers.

In her last years Fields served as a companion to Sarah Orne Jewett and Louise Imogen Guiney. She died at the age of eighty of myocarditis and arteriosclerosis.(4)

Notes:
1. W.S. Tyron Notable American Women "Fields, Annie Adams" 1971 ed.
2. Nathan I. Huggins Protestants Against Poverty. Boston's Charities 1870-1900 Westport, Ct.: Greenwood, 1971, p. 164.
3. Notable American Women.
4. Ibid.

Collection Overview

The Annie Fields papers contain correspondence, financial records, advertisements and clippings. The majority of the materials relate to Fields's support and promotion of coffeehouses known as the Holly Tree Inns.(1) Correspondence and financial records reflect Fields's involvement in renting rooms for the coffeehouses, hiring staff, fixing costs and raising funds. There are several progress reports from coffeehouse stewards or managers. Newspaper clippings report the opening of the Holly Tree Inns; the opening of German Volks-kuchen or people's kitchens; and items of general charity interest.

Most of the correspondence contains inquiries about the operation of coffeehouses. Letters were sent by representatives of temperance societies, the clergy and a variety of prominent citizens from across the country. A complete set of incoming correspondence, from original inquiry to the opening of a coffeehouse, can be found in letters to Fields from Charles Wendte of Chicago, Illinois in 1872. With little exception, correspondence is incoming and is arranged chronologically. Some of the correspondence appears to have been dated by Fields. Aside from the subject of coffeehouses, correspondence relates to a variety of charity interests.

Notable correspondents in the collection include: William H. Baldwin (1826-1909, merchant and community organizer); Henry I. Bowditch (1808-92, physician and abolitionist); Henry Morgan (1825-84, Methodist clergyman); Robert Treat Paine (1835-1910, philanthropist); Josiah Philips Quincy (1829-1910, author and historian); Whitelaw Reid (1837-1912, journalist and diplomat); Charles W. Wendte (1844-1931, Unitarian clergyman and hymn-writer); and Alfred Tredway White (1846-1921, pioneer in housing reform).

Notes
1. The temperance movement promoted coffeehouses as an alternative place of refreshment to taverns or saloons. The coffeehouses were organized for working-class men and situated in working-class neighborhoods. The U.S. coffeehouse movement seems to have emulated that of Great Britain's which began in the 1850's. At the Boston coffeehouses only men were served, no alcohol was offered and simple, hearty meals often were available at minimum cost. For further information see Raymond Calkins, Substitutes for the Saloon (Boston and New York, Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1901); Nathan Huggins, Protestants Against Poverty. Boston's Charities 1870-1900 (Westport, Ct.: Greenwood, 1971); and Notable American Women. A Biographical Dictionary , 1971 ed., s.v. "Fields, Annie Adams," by W.S. Tryon.

Online Catalog Headings

These and related materials may be found under the following headings in online catalogs.

Alcoholics -- Rehabilitation
Baldwin, William H., 1826-1909
Bowditch, Henry Ingersoll, 1808-1892
Charities -- Massachusetts
Coffee house ministry
Fields, Annie, 1834-1915
Morgan Henry, 1825-1884
Paine, Robert Treat, 1826-1909
Quincy, Josiah Phillips, 1829-1910
Reid, Whitelaw, 1837-1912
Richmond, Mary Ellen, 1861-1928
Temperance -- United States -- History
Wendte, Charles William, 1844-1931
White, Alfred Tredway, 1846-1921

Collection Arrangement

Collection is arranged into 2 series:


Detailed Description of the Collection

Series I: Holly Tree Inn Materials, 1871-1881 (13 folders)

Box 1

  • Folder 1-9: Correspondence, 1871-1878, undated
    • Folder 10: Financial records, circa 1870-72; undated
      • Folder 11: Reports from stewards/managers, 1871-72, undated
        • Folder 12: Advertisements, 1878, undated
          • Folder 13: Clippings, 1872, 1876, 1878, 1881, undated

            Series II: Charity Materials, 1880, 1899 (1 folder)

            Box 1

            • Folder 14: Correspondence and notes, 1880, 1899, undated