Contains materials relating to Putnam's writing of Theodore Roosevelt: The Formative Years, 1858-1886, though there are additional materials related to his advocacy for racial segregation and white supremacy. Series I. includes Putnam’s personal correspondence related to his writings, along with correspondence with the publishers Scribner’s and the Theodore Roosevelt Association. Series II. Includes resources for Theodore Roosevelt: The Formative Years, 1858-1886, including materials from Anna Cowles, Hermann Hagedorn, Henry Cabot Lodge, William Sewall, as well as Roosevelt family letters and copies of Theodore Roosevelt’s correspondence, diaries, and will. Series III. Contains two sub-series, one with transcripts and written notes, and another with Dictaphone recordings of interviews and Putnam’s related note. Included in the recordings are also further discussion of Putnam’s ideas supporting racial segregation and white supremacy, though this content can also be found throughout additional recordings, notes, and materials in the collection. These materials may be related to his second book, the racist pro-segregation Race and Reason: A Yankee View. Series IV. Drafts includes handwritten and typed drafts of Theodore Roosevelt: The Formative Years, 1858-1886. These materials all date from the mid-twentieth century as Putnam prepared his book on Roosevelt in 1958 and racial segregation and white supremacy in 1961, though the original contents of letters and diaries may be from Roosevelt's lifetime in the nineteenth and early twentieth century.
