Papers of Fairchild and of his wife, Mary Salome Cutler Fairchild, library lecturer. The majority of the letters, 1897-1915, concern the creation and work of the National Institute for Moral Education, and are either by or to Milton Fairchild and Bernard Nadal Baker, a Baltimore businessman interested in moral education. Correspondents include magazine publishers, college presidents, school principals, educational societies, and patrons of the Institute. The papers of Mary Fairchild include her high school compositions, 1866-1870; notes of congratulations on her marriage, 1897; and letters from librarians in New York and Massachusetts. The collection also contains a binder entitled "Moral Education Board Illustrated Lessons in Morals Demonstration Lecture, Copy 1" (dating from about 1910), Fairchild's annotated typescript presentation notes for the lecture on the morals of young people that he presented to schools, churches, civic organization, and which he illustrated with lantern slides. The text is accompanied by 59 original photographs by Fairchild, and some pages have cut-out windows for an additional 10 photographs which were never mounted in. Fairchild noted in his introductory information that these "Photographs of things that actually happen in real life are taken especially for moral instruction... [with] Carefully prepared instructions as to what is right and fine in conduct is given as an explanation of the photographs while the children are studying them upon the screen." Each photograph is accompanied by explanatory text. Images include street scenes of children at play, workers, work sites, sports action shots (football, track, baseball), farm work, children sneaking into a circus, a boy without legs, kids pitching pennies, a truant boy, and children fighting. Included are evaluations of the lecture by student attendees, and endorsements of Fairchild's work by leading educators of the day, including John Dewey: "I am happy to know that you are to undertake a campaign to interest large numbers of people in your practical, sound and reasonable scheme of moral instruction of school children." Material pasted in includes an illustrated card with an evaluation of the lecture; a copy of 'Outline for "Who is the gentleman?"' providing rules for gentlemanly conduct; an informational brochure for the Moral Education Board and its work; and a printed endorsement containing statistics for the number of lectures presented in 1908, their attendance, and the cost to schools. Material laid in includes a printed letter regarding a request for information on Fairchild, and a three-page manuscript "Youth's Bill of Rights," which was written by an unidentified youngster.
