The John Harvard Library is a series of books published since 1959 by the Belknap Press of

Harvard University Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is a publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University, and focused on academic publishing. It is a member of the Association of American University Presses. After the reti ...

. The series consists of reprints of historically significant American writings, including historic documents, fiction, poetry, memoirs, and criticism.

History

Founded in 1959, the series bears the name of the first major benefactor of

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

. John Harvard (1607-1638) bequeathed half of his estate and his personal library of about 400 books to "New College," which was later named Harvard College in his honor. During the 1960s and 1970s, the John Harvard Library consisted mainly of authoritative reprints of documents from the colonial era of American history. Among the most noted of these are

Bernard Bailyn Bernard Bailyn (September 10, 1922 – August 7, 2020) was an American historian, author, and academic specializing in U.S. Colonial and Revolutionary-era History. He was a professor at Harvard University from 1953. Bailyn won the Pulitzer Pr ...

's edition of ''Pamphlets of the American Revolution, 1750-1776''; Anne Bradstreet's collected works; and the ''Life of George Washington'' by

Mason L. Weems Mason Locke Weems (October 11, 1759 – May 23, 1825), usually referred to as Parson Weems, was an American minister, evangelical bookseller and author who wrote (and rewrote and republished) the first biography of George Washington immediately a ...

. Editorial contributors to the series included historians

John Hope Franklin John Hope Franklin (January 2, 1915 – March 25, 2009) was an American historian of the United States and former president of Phi Beta Kappa, the Organization of American Historians, the American Historical Association, and the Southern Hi ...

and

C. Vann Woodward Comer Vann Woodward (November 13, 1908 – December 17, 1999) was an American historian who focused primarily on the American South and race relations. He was long a supporter of the approach of Charles A. Beard, stressing the influence of un ...

, and poet Adrienne Rich. The John Harvard Library series was dormant during the 1980s. Beginning in the late 1990s, the series began publishing works from the late 19th century as well as earlier eras. With the fiftieth anniversary of the series in 2009, Harvard University Press released new paperback editions of four 19th-century works: '' The Red Badge of Courage'', by Stephen Crane; '' Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass''; '' The Common Law,'' by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.; and ''

Uncle Tom's Cabin ''Uncle Tom's Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly'' is an anti-slavery novel by American author Harriet Beecher Stowe. Published in two volumes in 1852, the novel had a profound effect on attitudes toward African Americans and slavery in the U ...

'', by

Harriet Beecher Stowe Harriet Elisabeth Beecher Stowe (; June 14, 1811 – July 1, 1896) was an American author and abolitionist. She came from the religious Beecher family and became best known for her novel '' Uncle Tom's Cabin'' (1852), which depicts the ha ...

. The new editions had a uniform paperback design.Harvard University Press Publicity Blog
"The John Harvard Library, back from the grave"
21 January 2009.

References

{{Publishing-stub Series of books Harvard University publications