Special Collections Department
Winifred J. Robinson
Papers
1912 - 1949
Manuscript Collection Number: 413
Accessioned: Transfer from University of Delaware Archives, 1999
Extent:.6 linear ft.
Content: Ship’s plans, printed travel material, postcards, a letter,
calendars, greeting cards, books, ephemera, a baseball score card, and lantern
slides.
Access: The collection is open for
research.
Processed: Sally W. Donatello, June 2001
Special Collections, University of Delaware Library
Newark, Delaware 19717-5267
(302) 831-2229
Table of Contents
Biographical Note
Winifred J. Robinson (1867-1962) served as the first dean of the Women’s College of the University of Delaware. During her twenty-four years of service to the University, Robinson’s commitment and dedication increased student enrollment, faculty participation, and the attendance of women students. Carol Hoffecker wrote about Dr. Robinson, “From the beginning in 1914 until she retired at the age of seventy in 1938, Winifred J. Robinson provided the vision and leadership that shaped the Women’s College.”
Born and raised in Barry County, Michigan, Robinson was the only child of Walter Joseph and Pamela Wheelock Robinson. Her early teaching experience, liberal education, research, and travel paved the way for her administrative work at the University of Delaware. She earned a B.S. in biology from the University of Michigan in 1899, where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. She then worked at Vassar College, where she taught in the Botany Department. By 1904 Robinson had received an M.A. and by 1912 a Ph.D. in botany, both degrees from Columbia University. In 1913 she became Dean of Women at the University of Wisconsin’s Summer School. The combination of these experiences, as well as work as principal of secondary schools in Pennsylvania, prepared her for the administrative responsibilities at the University of Delaware where she spent the rest of her professional career.
After retirement Robinson was honored in 1940 when Science Hall was renamed Robinson Hall. In 1947 she documented her years on campus in the article “History of the Women’s College of the University of Delaware 1914-38,” which was published in the twentieth series of Delaware Notes.
Winifred J. Robinson was twice elected president of the College Section of the National Association of Deans of Women. She also was inducted into the Hall of Fame of Delaware Women. In her final years she lived in Winter Park, Florida, and Newfane Hill, Vermont.
Sources:
Hoffecker, Carol E. Beneath Thy Guiding Hand: A History of Women at the University of Delaware. Newark, Del.: University of Delaware Press, 1994.
Munroe, John A. University of Delaware, a history. Newark, Del.: University of Delaware Press, 1986.
See also collection folder for copy of “Memorial Service in honor of Winifred Josephine Robinson,” Newark, Del.: Mitchell Hall, University of Delaware, January 14, 1962.
Scope and Content Note
The Winifred J. Robinson Papers consists of a small group of eclectic material spanning the dates 1912-1949. The collection consists of ship’s plans, printed travel material, postcards, correspondence, greeting cards, books, ephemera, a baseball score card, and lantern slides. The papers are smatterings of Robinson’s life during her career as an administrator and educator at Vassar College, University of Wisconsin, and University of Delaware. The collection consists of eighteen folders that are arranged in the following order: ship’s papers and travel information, greeting cards, calendars, postcards, baseball score card, miscellany, a letter, books, and lantern slides.
The travel papers are particularly significant because they relate to the University of Delaware’s nationally- recognized study abroad program. The idea for the Junior Year Abroad was launched at Delaware, and had much to do with the institution’s rise in national stature in the 1920s. Raymond Watson Kirkbride, a University professor who had studied in France, initiated this new program. In 1923 eight male students participated in the inaugural intensive study program, which was centered in Paris. The students spent two months with a French family before entering the University of Paris. During its second year, the program became coeducational. Encouraged by the American Council on Education, the program was opened to students from other institutions of higher learning in the United States in 1925. Dr. John Munroe wrote that “to Dean Robinson, who was not easy to please, the foreign study plan was the outstanding feature of the University.”
Dean Robinson accompanied the third group (1925-1926) of coeducational students from the University and other educational institutions throughout the country, and the travel ephemera in this collection dates from that trip. The material includes souvenirs (mostly in French) from concerts, meals, and other activities from July 4 to August 20, 1925. A copy of a six-page daily publication l’Atlantique, dated August 17, 1925, was distributed on the S.S. Rochambeau. The newspaper, printed in English and French, featured articles and news, menu for that day’s dinner, current baseball scores, and advertisements. Oversize plans of the cabins on the steamship—two from the Rochambeau (M. Rollin, captain) and one from the S.S. Roussillon—show first-class to third-class accommodations. One of the plans of the Rochambeau, dated August 12, 1925, shows that Robinson shared a first-class cabin with Mrs. Inez Storey from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (F1). Other documents include an invitation for the students to attend an evening party on Thursday, November 19, 1925 at the Palais d’Orléans in Paris (F1).
The collection includes a group of ninety-one greeting cards from Christmas 1917-1949, most of which have great graphic and visual appeal. These cards are from colleagues and friends (Raymond Watson Kirkbride, F4), institutions (Balliot College, Oxford, F3), businesses (Western Union Telegraph Company, F6), and publications (The Atlantic Monthly, F3). There are four cards with limited edition images of Paris, France, by “Yvon” (F7); one card printed at Arden, Delaware; and a card from the Star Publishing Company in Wilmington, Delaware. Three of the cards and envelopes, dated in the 1940s, are addressed to Robinson in Winter Park, Florida. (F6).
The papers also include a modest postcard collection (F10-F13) that features five from Robinson’s days at Vassar College at the turn of the century. One depicts the daisy- chain ceremony used at the Seven Sister Colleges (Mount Holyoke, Smith, Vassar, Bryn Mawr, Radcliffe, Barnard, and Wellesley).
The collection has an American Baseball Club booklet of the Yankees of New York for the 1936 season. The game was a double header, and was played at Yankee Stadium in New York. It contains a player roster (with many who were later inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame: Joe DiMaggio, Lou Gehrig, Jimmy Fox, and Joe Cronin), scores for the two games against the Boston Red Sox, and many advertisements (F14).
Two books are included in this small group of Robinson’s papers, one of which is The Power of Christian Benevolence Illustrated in The Life and Labors of Mary Lyon (1858). The book was a gift to Robinson, as explained in a letter from Francis A. Cooch, January 2, 1935, who told Robinson about the connection of Mary Lyon to the Cooches and to his wife’s family (F16).
Finally, the collection box includes thirty-six lantern slides. These undated slides, produced by the American Museum of Natural History, contain images of Yellowstone National Park. There are some pictures with plants, which reflects Robinson’s passion for botany. The slides are numbered and some have people (slide #89 has two male Cornell students) as part of the scene. Some of the slides are in black and white and others are in color (F18).
Contents List
Folder -- Contents
F1 Ships papers and Travel Ephemera, 1925
19 items
Souvenirs from transatlantic trips for Delaware’s
Junior Year Abroad Program; diagrams of the ships; a
daily newspaper, l’Atlantique; and invitation to the
students for an evening party in Paris
F2 Miscellaneous Travel Booklets and Other Material, 1924-
1925
6 items
Includes a 1925 Thos. Cook & Son map of Paris, and an
undated American Express travel brochure
F3 Greeting Cards, circa 1921-1928
21 items
Christmas and New Year’s cards, some signed; noted
cards are from G. Cary Carter, Balliot College, Oxford, Christmas,
1925 with seal of college; and card from R.W. Kirkwood,
one of her colleagues, in French. Also included is
sachet in a sealed envelope with colored image of a
basket and ribbons on front, 1922; some handmade cards;
and a card from The Atlantic Monthly, Christmas 1927-
1928
F4 Greeting cards, circa 1920s-1948
23 items
Three of the cards and envelopes are addressed to Dean
Robinson at 818 Antoinette Street, Winter Park,
Florida; one card is from the Plimpton Scofield Company
F5 Greeting cards, circa 1920s
18 items
One of the cards is signed “The Faculty,” and one
unsigned card has thirty-one 1920 Easter seals laid
inside
F6 Greeting cards, 1917-1941
21 items
Cards and postcards; includes a 1921 holiday greeting
from the Star Publishing Company, Wilmington, Delaware, and a 1917
Western Union Telegraph Company greeting
F7 Greeting cards by “Yvon”
4 items
Limited edition images of Paris, France
F8 Calendars, 1929 and 1949
2 items
Small gift calendars
F9 Envelope with dried flowers
1 item
Addressed to Robinson at the University of Delaware,
return address from The Layyah Barakat Orphanage,
Lebanon, Syria; contains dried flowers from Mt. Lebanon
wrapped in a brown paper with a description that
relates to a golden crown worn by the Savior; has a
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania return address
F10 Postcards, Vassar College, 1912
5 items
Four show buildings on campus and the last one shows
the daisy-chain ceremony
F11 Postcard, 9 January 1943
A message to Mr. Holden from Robinson with her return
address in Winter Park, Florida. Signed, but
apparently never mailed.
F12 Postcards, n.d.
11 items
Four images of Rehoboth Beach, Delaware; others are
images from other states
F13 Postcards, n.d.
3 items
French images
F14 Baseball Score Card, 1936
1 item, 12 pp
American League Baseball Club season score card for the
Yankees of New York; Double header game was the
Boston Red Sox v. New York Yankees at Yankee
Stadium and played on June 30
F15 Cards
2 items
F16 Cooch, Francis A
ASL, 2 October 1935
2 items
Letter explained that Cooch’s wife sent Robinson a copy
of The Power of Christian Benevolence Illustrated in
The Life and Labors of Mary Lyon (1858). Mr. Cooch
explained the connection between Lyon and the Cooch
family as well as his wife’s family. Lyon (1797-1849)
was the founder of Mount Holyoke Seminary, 1837.
F17 Smith, Erwin F. For Her Friends and Mine: A Book of
Aspirations, Dreams, and
Memories. Washington, D.C.: Press of Gibson Bros.,
Inc., 1915.
Autographed by the author and sent to Robinson by him;
dated January 7, 1919; inside inscription: “In memory of
Charlotte May Buffett, sometime wife of Erwin
F. Smith”; copy 289 out of 510
F18 Lantern Slides,
36 glass slides (3 ¼” h X 4” w)
Most of the slides were prepared by American Museum of
Natural History, Department of Public Instruction
Back
to the UD Special Collections Home Page
Return
to List of Manuscript Finding Aids by Title
