Papers, ca. 1868 - ca. 1918. They include 25 diaries kept at various times between 1868 and 1918, in which Wallace writes about family life in Brooklyn, Nyack, and Manhattan; his activities as a writer, artists and etcher, and the frustrations of his work in an insurance office; his reading, and books he bought; and notes for projected works of fiction. He also mentions public events and celebrations in New York, such as the celebrations for the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge in 1883, and the dedication of Grant's Tomb in 1897. A small pencil sketch was originally laid in to one of the 1874 diaries. There are also some notes written in 1913, which contain a memoir of his boyhood and youth in Brooklyn, and remarks on literature and other subjects which interested him. The collection also contains manuscripts of a short play and several short stories for children, many of them about the history of New York City.