Description: Coates and Reynell family papers

Coates and Reynell family papers

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author:	Coates and Reynell family (Creator)
Collection:	Coates and Reynell Family Papers
Collection Number:	0140
Format:	Manuscript
Language:	English
Online Access:	Link to finding aid
Tags:	Add Tag No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!

Physical Description:	40.0 Linear feet 66 boxes, 143 volumes; 4 flat files
Summary:	This collection is the merging of several groups of materials (former collections 140A, 140B, 140C, and 2169, and parts of artificial collections 2001 and 108). Mary Coates (1707-1773) and her husband John Reynell (1708-1784) presided over a successful dynasty of Quaker professionals and philanthropists, despite having no biological children who lived to adulthood. After the death of Mary’s brother Samuel in 1748, John Reynell took on responsibility for her three orphaned nephews, Thomas, Josiah, and Samuel Jr. Little Samuel (1748-1830) eventually succeeded his “Uncle Reynell” as the head of a prosperous international trade business, dealing in American lumber, Caribbean sugar, and European manufactured goods. A contemporary of Benjamin Franklin, Samuel was among the first shareholders of the Library Company of Philadelphia. His son, Benjamin H. Coates, was a poet and a physician, a founder of the North American Medical and Surgical Journal and an attending physician at several charitable institutions in Philadelphia. Josiah established his own shipping business with his friend Edward Randolph, and fathered a vigorous family. His son George Morrison Coates also became a merchant, specializing in hardware. George’s two unmarried daughters, Beulah and Mary, distinguished themselves as pillars of women’s charitable organizations in the mid-nineteenth century The Coates and Reynell Family papers document the professional and personal lives of elite Quakers in Philadelphia in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries through correspondence, scrapbooks, receipt books, ledgers, accounts, wills, deeds, and medical manuscripts. The collection is particularly strong in records of international and domestic trade, medical and scientific knowledge, and women's philanthropic activities. Letters and financial and legal documents recording the professional and personal activities of merchants John Reynell (1708-1784) and Samuel Coates (1748-1830) make up the bulk of the papers. The next most significant portion of the collection consists of scientific or medical essays, correspondence, and notes pertaining to Dr. Benjamin H. Coates. The papers of Mary and Beulah Coates consist of minutes for the meetings of their charitable societies and notes documenting Mary’s genealogical research on the family. The collection also includes correspondence and financial records pertaining to the Zane, Shewbart, and Morris families, whose estates were settled by members of the Coates clan.

Physical Description:

40.0 Linear feet 66 boxes, 143 volumes; 4 flat files

Summary:

This collection is the merging of several groups of materials (former collections 140A, 140B, 140C, and 2169, and parts of artificial collections 2001 and 108). Mary Coates (1707-1773) and her husband John Reynell (1708-1784) presided over a successful dynasty of Quaker professionals and philanthropists, despite having no biological children who lived to adulthood. After the death of Mary’s brother Samuel in 1748, John Reynell took on responsibility for her three orphaned nephews, Thomas, Josiah, and Samuel Jr. Little Samuel (1748-1830) eventually succeeded his “Uncle Reynell” as the head of a prosperous international trade business, dealing in American lumber, Caribbean sugar, and European manufactured goods. A contemporary of Benjamin Franklin, Samuel was among the first shareholders of the Library Company of Philadelphia. His son, Benjamin H. Coates, was a poet and a physician, a founder of the North American Medical and Surgical Journal and an attending physician at several charitable institutions in Philadelphia. Josiah established his own shipping business with his friend Edward Randolph, and fathered a vigorous family. His son George Morrison Coates also became a merchant, specializing in hardware. George’s two unmarried daughters, Beulah and Mary, distinguished themselves as pillars of women’s charitable organizations in the mid-nineteenth century The Coates and Reynell Family papers document the professional and personal lives of elite Quakers in Philadelphia in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries through correspondence, scrapbooks, receipt books, ledgers, accounts, wills, deeds, and medical manuscripts. The collection is particularly strong in records of international and domestic trade, medical and scientific knowledge, and women's philanthropic activities. Letters and financial and legal documents recording the professional and personal activities of merchants John Reynell (1708-1784) and Samuel Coates (1748-1830) make up the bulk of the papers. The next most significant portion of the collection consists of scientific or medical essays, correspondence, and notes pertaining to Dr. Benjamin H. Coates. The papers of Mary and Beulah Coates consist of minutes for the meetings of their charitable societies and notes documenting Mary’s genealogical research on the family. The collection also includes correspondence and financial records pertaining to the Zane, Shewbart, and Morris families, whose estates were settled by members of the Coates clan.

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Coates and Reynell family papers

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