The Wallace Notestein Collection

The Wallace Notestein Collection is the working library of Wallace Notestein (Class of 1900), who was an internationally known scholar of British literature and social history.

The collection reflects his many interests, with more than 1,200 imprints from the 17th century. Many of the materials in the collection served as primary source material for Notestein's own research.

Two of the more outstanding pieces are early witchcraft tracts that Notestein used to write his work, "A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718." Notestein's copy of "The Severall Factes of Witch-crafte Aprooved and Laid to the Charge of Margaret Harkett of the Towne of Stanmore in the Countie of Middlesex" (1585) is thought to be the only copy in existence. The second tract, "A Detection of Damnable Drifts, Practized by Three Witches" (1579) [imperfect title page], is one of two known copies, with the other being held by the British Museum. Also included in the collection are a collection of "Fast-Day Sermons" (1640-1647) and such sets as "The Harleian Miscellany," "A Collection of the State Papers of John Thurloe," publications of the Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts, and publications printed for the Camden Society.

Along with the working library of Wallace Notestein, this collection includes the correspondence of the Jonas O. Notestein family. The Notesteins were contemporaries of the Comptons. Jonas was a professor of Greek and Latin from 1873-1928 and his working library of Classical literature is a part of the collection. However, the main emphasis of the collection is the correspondence between family members, serving to document the lives of a scholarly American family living both here and abroad during the first half of the twentieth century. The correspondence spans both world wars.

Daughter Lucy Lilian Notestein (Class of 1911) is the author of "Wooster of the Middle West," the best history of the College of Wooster written to date. The collection includes her notes for the history, as well as several unpublished manuscripts.

For Additional Information:

• Notestein, Lucy Lilian. "Wooster of the Middle West." New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1937.
• Notestein, Lucy Lilian. "Wooster of the Middle West: Volume Two," 1911-1944. Kent, OH: Kent State University, 1971.
• Notestein, Wallace. "A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718." Washington: The American Historical Association, 1911.