This letter, by former President John Quincy Adams,
is in response to a request by the Mechanical Library Association of Baltimore for
Adam’s to speak at their facility at some future date. This association was connected
to and an outgrowth of the Baltimore volunteer Mechanical Fire Company, formed
by the company for member’s self education. Adams is informing them that he will not
be able to speak at the Association’s venue on the date requested. For a full description see the collection page.
Silk ribbon printed in black text reading "Young Men's National Whig Convention of Ratification" above an image of the American eagle seated on the shield emblem of the United States that is laid over tools and industrial implements while the eagle holds in its beak a ribbon reading "Protection", referring to Clay's belief in tariffs as protection for American manufacturing industries. Below this are the words "Henry Clay" above a black and white portrait of Clay; beneath the portrait are the words "Mind Your Business", again referring to Clay's platform; below these words is a color image of a farmer behind a plow pulled by one white and one grey horse with a large white house flanked by trees in the distance. Below the farm image are the words "The Ashland Farm" referring to the Clay home in Lexington, Kentucky. The ribbon is dated "Baltimore, May 2d 1844. Lith. by E. Weber & Co. Balto." Clay had been selected as the Whig party candidate for president at the convention in Baltimore on May 1, 1844.
This letter was written in 1849 by a forty-niner in St. Louis, one William H. Morse, to a friend back home in New England. He’s been in St. Louis for three weeks, the last stop on the frontier, as he prepares to embark on a journey westward on the overland trail, making his way to California in search of gold. He describes his 35 day trip thus far, from an unnamed town in the northeast, south through Baltimore to Harpers Ferry, through the Cumberland Gap to Morgantown, where he caught steamboats that carried him to Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, down the Ohio River, and up the Mississippi to St. Louis. Morse provides a colorful commentary along the way, describing the towns and major landmarks he passed.