About Archival Collections

Scope of Collection

The Stewart-Swift Research Center is a repository of primary source materials that document the history of Addison County, with greatest depth in Middlebury, from the 18th century to the present. It also includes materials pertaining to broader Vermont and the nation and complements collections at Middlebury College’s Special Collections, the Bixby Library, the Rokeby Museum, local historical societies, and other Vermont collections of historical records.

The Center’s archival collection comprises close to 1,000 linear feet of manuscripts; over 4,000 books, pamphlets and other published materials; scrapbooks; music scores and publications; and a near complete run of local newspapers since 1801. It also includes hundreds of historical maps; thousands of photographs and ephemera; and a diverse collection of prints, drawings, silhouettes and other materials.

Among the archive’s greatest strengths are the quality of its manuscripts and the extent of its local publications. Henry L. Sheldon, the museum’s founder, meticulously amassed throughout his life local family and business papers and, in an attempt to collect everything printed in Middlebury, publications since its first press in 1801 until his death.  The Center’s staff is dedicated to fulfill Sheldon’s wish and have continued his collecting efforts.

The archival collection covers a broad range of subject areas with particular strength in agriculture, art and architecture, marble and lumber industries, Merino sheep and dairy farms, religious revivalism, transportation, environment, abolitionism, women’s studies, education, politics, wars, recreation, and other topics of local and national significance.

Use of Collection

The Center’s archival collections are routinely used for research by the general public pursuing personal interests, college students, scholars both local and distant, genealogists, and the museum staff pursuing topics such as the environment, gender and women studies, town industries, the changing landscape, art and architecture, early education, music, entertainment, race relations, and more.

Results of research done here have been shared in exhibits, lectures, student papers, and numerous articles and books, including A Walking History of Middlebury (Glenn Andres, multiple editions); Charity and Sylvia: A Same-Sex Marriage in Early America (Rachel Hope Cleves, 2014); Green Mountain Opium Eaters: A History of Early Addiction in Vermont (Gary Shattuck, 2017); Historic Architecture of Addison County (Vermont Division for Historic Preservation); Visual Mechanic Knowledge: The Workshop Drawings of Isaac Markham (D. Jeremy and P. Darnell, 2010), and many others.

Collections are also loaned for exhibitions to major museums and institutions, including the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery, Bridgewater State University, the Minneapolis Museum of Art and many others attesting to the value and uniqueness of the Center’s collection.

The Stewart-Swift Research Center building, erected in 1972 to house and facilitate public access to the Center’s archival collections, received the generous support from a local benefactress, Jessica Stewart Swift, and other donors dedicated to the Center’s mission.