Delaware--History--Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775

Abstract Leon De Valinger, Jr., served as Delaware State Archivist from 1941 to 1970. The Leon De Valinger papers contain his personal and professional records, primarily related to his work as State Archivist and as a historian of Delaware. His professional, administrative, and subject files offer a window into the varied concerns of the archives profession as it evolved during the 20th century. Additionally, his work to document, preserve, and promote Delaware history and culture forms a theme...

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Written copy of speech delivered by Deputy Governor of Colonial Pennsylvania, Charles Gookin, to the Delaware Assembly, on March 27, 1716, together with the response from the Assembly's Speaker, Jasper Yeates. Also included is a written copy of a speech delivered by Gookin to the Assembly on May 2, 1716. The speeches and the response concern difficulties between Gookin and the Assembly.

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Holograph receipt signed by Delegate to Continental Congress and signer of the Declaration of Independence Thomas McKean related to money received from Rev. John Ewing concerning land purchased for the Academy of Newark.

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One autograph document by Lieutenant Governor of Colonial Pennsylvania, John Penn, certifying Caesar Rodney's role as a Colonial Supreme Court Justice in the counties of New Castle, Kent, and Sussex in Delaware. The lower portion of the document is missing.

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Founder of the Pennsylvania colony William Penn sent these instructions to William Keith appointing him as Lieutenant Governor of the Province of Pennsylvania and the Counties of New Castle, Kent, and Sussex upon Delaware, on November 29, 1716. This is a handwritten copy on parchment recorded from Patent Book A, No. 5, pages 229-232, affixed with the seal of the Land Office of Pennsylvania and signed by Secretary of said office, James Brady, on June 16, 1823.

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Autograph letter from Caesar Rodney to his brother Thomas Rodney. Caesar wrote to his brother from New York, where he was attending the Stamp Act Congress as a member of the Delaware delegation, that he expected he would not be home before the Delaware Assembly, which he was also a member of, ended its session in New Castle because the Congress would "not end in less than eight or ten days."

Abstract Shipley, Bringhurst, and Hargraves are the family names associated with Rockwood, a Victorian Rural Gothic Revival mansion and estate that was built in North Wilmington, Delaware, between 1851 and 1854. The Hargraves were the last family to privately own Rockwood before its donation to New Castle County in the mid-1970s as a historic house museum and public park. The Shipley-Bringhurst-Hargraves family papers document the personal and professional lives of several generations of Delawareans...

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Brief autograph letter from Robert Taylor of Wilmington, Delaware, to Philadelphia merchant and banker, John Reynell, requesting 12 small loaves of loaf sugar.

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A manuscript land survey of plots of land in Town of New Castle, in the name of New Castle merchant Samuel Vanleuvenigh but probably written by a clerk, dated May 28, 1752.