New & Notable Collections

League of Red Cross Societies. The Red Cross Cookery Book. [Hong Kong]: Printed by South China Morning Post, 1919. 
Jacqueline M. Newman Chinese Cookbook Collection

 

Citizen’s Committee for a Fire Island National Seashore Collection
In September 2024, the University Libraries received a historic donation of documents detailing the grassroots battle to prevent the construction of a highway on Fire Island and secure the creation of the Fire Island National Seashore (FINS), New York. The collection, donated by the Barbash family – siblings Cathy, Susan, and Shepard Barbash – provides a comprehensive look at the efforts of the Citizens’ Committee for a Fire Island National Seashore. This committee, founded in 1962 and co-chaired by their father Maurice Barbash and uncle Irving Like, played a pivotal role in the successful fight against Robert Moses’ proposed highway and in the eventual establishment of FINS in 1964. The donation includes committee meeting minutes, press releases, and correspondence with key political figures such as New York State Governor Nelson Rockefeller and U.S. Secretary of the Interior Stuart Udall. The timing of the donation coincided with the 60th anniversary of the legislation that created FINS as part of the National Park Service.

The collection is digitized and freely available online, offering valuable insight into the strategies and determination of the grassroots movement that helped protect Fire Island’s natural environment. Cathy Barbash explained that the decision to donate the materials to Stony Brook University was motivated by the university’s proximity to both Fire Island and the pre-existing collection of their uncle Irving Like’s papers. The Barbash family is proud to contribute this significant historical record to a major research institution, ensuring that the legacy of their father and uncle’s civic activism continues to inspire future generations of researchers and environmental advocates.

The Emory Payson and Jean Wilcox Tuttle Estate Collection
The study of Long Island history is greatly enriched by this archival collection, which spans 9 linear feet and contains materials from the 18th to the 20th centuries. The collection includes diverse records such as correspondence, financial documents, genealogies, photographs, diaries, wills, deeds, and ephemera, offering a rich tapestry of historical insight. Central to the collection are the experiences and histories of the Tuttle/Tuthill, Hawkins, Van Brunt, and Darling families, with an emphasis on Brookhaven and Southampton Townships, including the communities of Eastport, Setauket, and Port Jefferson. These materials not only provide a detailed account of family life but also shed light on the broader transformation of Long Island from an agrarian society to a suburban one. The collection serves as a valuable resource for understanding the social, economic, and cultural shifts that took place over several generations, offering essential context for those studying the development of Long Island and its communities.

Eversley Childs Collection 
The papers of Eversley Childs (1867-1953) and family members, residents of Crane Neck (New York), New York City, and Norwalk, Connecticut were donated by Childs’ great-granddaughter, Wendy Lockwood Fidao. The collection is trove for researchers studying all facets of Long Island history from local politics to business to marine sciences. It includes thousands of photographs, papers, maps, and textiles documenting generations of the family. Childs headed and invested in several lucrative companies in the early 1900s, including Bon Ami and Technicolor, and was a philanthropist, founding a hospital in the Philippines for treating leprosy and donating land in Setauket to the Salvation Army. The papers of the Lockwood family include original accounting records and correspondence from the period of the American Revolution in which Eliphalet Lockwood was a captain in the Connecticut Militia through the 19th century.

Samuel Hopkins Miller Collection 
A important collection of original account books, diaries, ledgers, correspondence, and land deeds dating from 1705 to 1967 that document several generations of the Miller, Tuthill, and Tillotson families on Long Island, New York primarily in the areas of Miller Place and Rocky Point in the Town of Brookhaven. Andrew Miller (1634-1717) of East Hampton settled in “Miller’s Place,” later named “Miller Place” on Long Island in 1679.

Senator Jacob K. Javits Collection
Jacob K. Javits was an attorney, United States Congressman, Attorney General of the State of New York, and United States Senator. The collection comprises more than 1,200 linear ft. of documents and manuscripts, photographs, motion picture footage, audio and videotapes, slides, microfilm, and memorabilia of New York's longest-serving senator. "It is my hope and expectation that this collection of my official papers will be a stimulus for enterprising minds and a source of creativity in human and governmental endeavors. The lessons of both experience and moderation may be made to serve effectively for the solution of problems already crystallized or indicated in my time." - Statement of Senator Jacob K. Javits

George Washington Letters
Special Collections acquired two exciting American Revolutionary War-era letters authored by George Washington that document spy activities in Setauket, NY during 1779 and 1780. The purchase of these letters was made possible with a generous gift from Dr. Henry Laufer and laid the foundation for the establishment of a Long Island Historic Documents Collection. The collection includes primary and secondary source material on the history of Long Island from the earliest settlers through the present, with a strong emphasis on the period of the American Revolution through the War of 1812 (1764-1812). Consult the research guide forGeorge Washington and the Culper Spy Ring for more information and resources about this topic.

Dr. Jacqueline M. Newman Chinese Cookbook Collection
In 2002, Special Collections and University Archives at Stony Brook University was the proud recipient of the Dr. Jacqueline M. Newman Chinese Cookbook Collection, the largest cookbook collection of its kind. The collection includes: over 5,000 Chinese cookbooks and books about Chinese food culture, medicine, and history; haute cuisine magazines; archival materials; and audio visual materials. The collection provides a valuable record of the Chinese Diaspora that has carried its rich cuisine to every corner of the globe. 

Baker-Pisano American Art History Research Collection
The Baker-Pisano American Art Research Collection is a special collection of rare, first edition, and autographed art books published in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Ronald G. Pisano (1948-2000) authored several books on Long Island artists, and the definitive study of The Tile Club, which was the basis of a 1999 exhibition at The Long Island Museum of American Art, History, and Carriages. For over thirty years, he worked on the catalog raisonné of William Merritt Chase, which was completed by D. Frederick Baker, with the assistance of Carolyn K. Lane, in four volumes published by Yale University Press (2006-2010). Cataloging records can be accessed by entering "Baker-Pisano" in SBU Libraries' discovery catalog, SEARCH.

William Butler Yeats Collection
William Butler Yeats Collection is the most extensive collection of the famed Irish poet and author's manuscripts housed outside of Ireland. It was acquired in December 1974 by State University of New York for and on behalf of the State University of New York at Stony Brook. Through agreements with Senator Michael Butler Yeats and his daughter, Caitriona Dill Yeats, the State University of New York at Stony Brook received, on microfilm, the papers of William Butler Yeats and his family, held at that time in the National Library of Ireland (NLI), as well as in the family home, Cliff House, Dalkey, Ireland. Facsimiles were produced and cataloged, and now comprise more than 58 cubic ft. of manuscripts, correspondence, documents, printed materials, memorabilia, music, drawings, sketches, still pictures, and portraits of William Butler Yeats, his family, and his friends. 

Environmental Defense Fund Archive
Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) is a public membership, non-profit, tax-exempt organization of scientists, lawyers, economists and citizens dedicated to improving environmental quality through innovative strategies. It was created “to translate knowledge of the environmental sciences into public policy through advocacy before courts and regulatory agencies…the experience of EDF shows clearly that scientific knowledge, as testimony from the witness stand, exerts far greater influence on public policy than the same knowledge exposed through the normal channels of scientific literature or advisory panel.” In 1967, Environmental Defense Fund was incorporated in Stony Brook, Long Island. Its founding members were a group of scientists, citizens, local activists and legal minds who demonstrated the toxicity of dichloro-diphennyl-trichloro-ethane (DDT) in a class action suit against Suffolk County Mosquito Control Commission. 

Watch the film "Stony Brook's First Alumni: Reunion and Reflections"
From June 6 to June 8, 2014, a reunion weekend was held at Stony Brook University and at Planting Fields at Oyster Bay (first campus), in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Classes of 1961, 1962, 1963 and 1964, and reuniting the Founders Group, classes of 1961-1966. At Planting Fields, alumni were interviewed about their experiences and reflections of their time at the Oyster Bay campus and transitioning to the new campus in Stony Brook. Photographs from the University Archives are featured in the 16 minute film. A full weekend of activities was planned and included: viewing an exhibition of archival materials in Special Collections and University Archives; campus tours; a visit to Oyster Bay; and inductions into the newly-established Brook Heritage Society, for alumni who had celebrated their classes' 50th anniversary year.