Palmer family correspondence

Collection — Box: 1

Identifier: 6874

Scope and content

Letters from primarily from Benjamin Palmer to Phebe Ann Jones, with a few from other family members about family matters, 1846-1890.

Scope and content

Minerva Palmer correspondence includes a letter to Minerva from her father in the Iowa House of Representatives, 1866; letter from Emilie Palmer to Minnie, 1867; three letters from Minnie when a student at Cornell to her cousin Irving Rouse in Rochester, N.Y. and one from her brother, Edward H. Palmer to Irving Rouse, 1873-1876; note from Irving to Minnie, with a tintype of an unidentified friend; six letters from Minnie to her mother, 1879-1887, one from Paris, France; letter to Minnie from Anna Botsford Comstock, 1883; also a letter from Cornell about residency requirements, 1886; and a letter relating to insurance, 1889.

Dates

1866-1889.

Creator

Language of Material

In English.

Biographical / Historical

Benjamin Robert Palmer married Phebe Ann Jones from Quaker Hill, Dutchess County, N.Y. The Palmer family were Quakers. Their daughter, Minerva "Minnie" Palmer was born in Clintondale, Ulster County, New York on May 12, 1853. Minnie attended Geneva Union and Classical School in Geneva, N.Y. before coming to Cornell in 1873. "Minnie" stayed at Cornell until 1876, but apparently did not graduate. She was roommates and friends with Anna Botsford Comstock. She went on to receive a medical degree from the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania (the first medical school for women) in 1880. She married Mr. C. S. Walker from Rochester, N.Y. in 1892. In 1907, she lived in Charleston, West Virginia, and reported her occupation as "Home-making for self & husband." She died in Charleston, WV on September 16, 1921. Her brother, Edward Herendeen Palmer graduated from Cornell in 1877.