To James Madison from Timothy Alden, [ca. 9 January 1824]
From Timothy Alden
[ca. 9 January 1824]
Sir,
At a meeting of the Trustees of Alleghany College, held in the borough of Meadville, on the 9th. of January, 1824, the following Preamble and Resolution were adopted.
“Cherishing all due respect for those illustrious Citizens of the United States, who have successively filled the highest office in the gift of their country and who are still spared to witness the rising glory of this western world; and, believing it will afford them gratification, to learn, that a Collegiate Institution, in Western Pennsylvania, which was commenced in 1815, has so experienced the smiles of Divine Providence, during the short period of its existence, as to have obtained, through the magnanimous bequests of the late Hon. James Winthrop, LL.D.1 and of the Rev. William Bentley, D.D.2 and the donation of Isaiah Thomas, Esq. LL.D. President of the American Antiquarian Society and of many other generous benefactors, a Library, valuable for the number of volumes it contains, but much more so from their intrinsic worth
“Resolved that a copy of the Catalogue of the Library of Alleghany College3 be forwarded to
| Their Excellencies, |
| John Adams, late President, |
| Thomas Jefferson, late President, |
| James Madison, late President, and |
| James Monroe, President of the U. S. A.” |
True copy from the Records of the College.
Timothy Alden,4 Sec. Board of
Trus. and Pres. Fac. Arts of All. Coll.
RC (DLC). Undated; conjectural date assigned based on internal evidence. Incorrectly docketed by JM “Jany. 6. 1824.”
1. James Winthrop (1752–1821), a Harvard graduate and college librarian, fought in the Battle of Bunker Hill. An energetic Republican, he served as register of probate, and later judge of common pleas, for Middlesex County, Massachusetts. One of the first members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a founding member of the Massachusetts Historical Society, Winthrop was overseer of Allegheny College from its inception in 1815.
2. William Bentley (1759–1819) was the Harvard-educated Unitarian minister of East Church in Salem, Massachusetts, 1783–1819, and a Republican in politics. He conducted an extensive scientific and philosophical correspondence and kept a voluminous diary. To Allegheny College, which had bestowed a doctorate upon him, Bentley willed “all his classical books, dictionaries & Bibles” (The Diary of William Bentley, D.D. [4 vols.; Salem, Mass., 1914], 4:638).
3. Catalogus Bibliothecae Collegii Alleghaniensis (Meadville, Pa., 1823; 11574).
4. Timothy Alden (1771–1839), of Yarmouth, Massachusetts, graduated from Harvard College in 1794 and served as minister to the South Congregational Church in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, 1799–1805. He founded Allegheny College in 1815 and was its president until it closed for two years for lack of funds in 1831. At 7,000 volumes, the college library was one of the most valuable of its time.