THE
WINTHROP
COLLECTION
Read the Winthrop Article
BOOKS IN THE WILDERNESS:
The Winthrop Collection at The New York Society Library
by Margaret Mather Byard
In 1631 on his first voyage to the colonies aboard the Lion, John Winthrop the younger sailed across the Atlantic with his wife, children, servants and cattle. Even though the ship was overloaded, he insisted it carry a "barrell of bookes." To Winthrop the "barrell of bookes" was a basic necessity. "We are heere as men dead to the world in this wilderness," he wrote to a friend. He continued to order additional volumes from his London dealers until his death in 1676. His library became the largest in the colonies. In 1812 Winthrop's descendants, who had added to its holdings, distributed the collection to Harvard, Yale, New York Hospital and other institutions. This library received 290 volumes to make up its own treasured Winthrop Collection. The Winthrop Collection offers a remarkable record of the scientific revolution in astronomy, meteorology, mathematics and medicine, as well as political history and belles lettres. It also reveals the extraordinary range of Winthrop's interests. A skilled linguist, he collected books in Latin, French, Italian, English, German and Dutch. Questioned as to whether he wanted books in High Dutch, he answered that he made "dayly use of divers in that language." Winthrop also corresponded with such great figures of his time as Cromwell, Charles II, Hooke, Milton and Newton. In addition to being a passionate book collector, Winthrop was the first governor of Connecticut. As he described it, he "planted" the colony. He developed its economic strength and served as physician, treating both settlers and American Indians. A member of the Royal Society from its establishment in 1660, he also imported the first telescope to the colonies. John Winthrop is a respected figure in the history of colonial America. His books are evidence of his keen scientific and intellectual interests. He was a true Renaissance man planted in the New World.
Selected Winthrop Collection Books:
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