This is a collection of historical documents written or signed by notable historical figures. The collection includes American, British, and European materials; the majority of the items are American. Among the American materials are the William McIntire Elkins collection of Jay Treaty Papers (1794). These include letters of George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Timothy Pickering, Alexander Hamilton, James Monroe, Thomas Rodney, Henry Knox, Rufus King, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, Thomas Pinckney, John Jay, and others. There are typed transcriptions of some of the letters in the collection. Other American historical documents and letters include items signed by: Neil Armstrong, Nicholas Biddle, John Wilkes Booth, C. W. Camac, Silas Deane, Albert Einstein, Ira Gershwin, Oliver Wendell Holmes, John Paul Jones, Tadeusz Kosciuszko, Marquis de Lafayette, Benjamin Franklin, Henry Lee, Joseph Leidy, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Abbott Lawrence Lowell, Charles Mann, Gouverneur Morris, Robert Morris, William Penn, Benjamin Rush, William T. Sherman, Bushrod Washington, William White, and Oliver Wolcott. In addition to the Jay Treaty papers, other presidential letters included in this collection are signed by John Adams, John Quincy Adams, James Buchanan, Abraham Lincoln, William H. Taft, Herbert Hoover, Thomas Jefferson, and Rutherford B. Hayes. The most recent document in the collection is a thank you letter signed by Barbara Bush. In addition to the American materials, the collection includes British and European documents. These include letters of kings and queens of England (Anne, Charles I, Charles II, Edward VII, George II, George III, George IV, George V, James I, James II, Victoria, William III, and William IV); Oliver Cromwell; Horatio Nelson; Napoleon; vicomte de Chateaubriand; and Jenny Lind. The oldest document in the collection is a fourteenth century deed concerning a parish church in Shropshire.
