November 20, 2008
Special Collections exhibit will include Bagley, Mercer family memorabilia
An exhibit of recent additions to the Pacific Northwest collection set to go up at the UW Libraries’ Special Collections in early December will feature items donated not long ago by descendants of two Seattle pioneers — Daniel Bagley and Thomas Mercer.
Bagley was a minister and one of the founders of the University. Mercer is credited with naming Lake Union and Lake Washington. Both have UW buildings named after them. Bagley’s son Clarence married Mercer’s daughter Alice, so the two families are related.
Among the collection of news clippings, printed ephemera, photos, letters and other family memorabilia that were donated are several items of particular note that will be in the exhibit.
One is a small (less than 6 inches long) red Bible that was presented to Alice Mercer by Captain G.E.U. Morris of the U.S. Navy ship Decatur while the ship was stationed on Puget Sound. The ship was involved in defending Seattle against an attack by hostile Native Americans in 1856.
Also included is a letter written by Cornelia Comstock Jenner, who came to Seattle by sea in 1878. Her long letter, addressed to family back in California, provides a vivid description of the voyage from San Francisco to Seattle, and her first impressions of her new home in Puget Sound and Seattle. Jenner later led the women’s suffrage movement in Seattle and served as president of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union. Her son Earle married Clarence Bagley’s daughter Myrta.
Jenner’s other son, Ernest, wrote another memorable letter that will be included in the exhibit. While recovering from an illness in a San Francisco hospital before departing for the Spanish American War, he mocked military and hospital life not only with words but with cartoons. Ernest was a commercial artist in his civilian life, so it was natural for him to illustrate his letters.
“The Bagley, Mercer and Jenner gift of additions to their family papers enhances the Pacific Northwest Collection’s record of early Seattle history, and will help future generations keep in touch with the human side of Seattle’s past,” said Nicole Bouché, curator of the Pacific Northwest Collection. “We appreciate the fact that descendents of these Seattle pioneers recognize the importance of bringing key Seattle memorabilia back to Seattle, and in particular to the University Libraries, where it will be accessible to all for study.”
She said these items join what is already a substantial body of documents on these families. The UW Libraries has Clarence and Daniel Bagley’s papers, both of which are quite large collections in themselves. Clarence Bagley was very interested in regional history and wrote a published history of King County.
The Bagley/Mercer/Jenner family frequently holds get-togethers in Seattle, Bouché said, and made their most recent donation last summer during a family reunion. The donors were Christine Jenner Cannon, a direct descendant of Earl Jenner and Myrta Bagley, and Susan Jenner Lichtenwalner, Cannon’s cousin.
The collection is available for consultation in the Reading Room of Special Collections, and a complete list of its contents is available online from the UW Libraries Special Collections Finding Aids database.
The exhibit will be up in the foyer outside Special Collections — in the basement of Allen Library — through February.
