C. F. Voegelin Papers, American Philosophical Society

Table of contents

Abstract

Trained as an anthropologist at Berkeley under A.L. Kroeber and Robert Lowie, Carl Voegelin spent the majority of his career as a structural linguist specializing in Algonquian languages, including Delaware, Potawatomi, Fox, Menominee, and Shawnee, and on the Seneca, Ojibwa (Chippewa), and Blackfoot (Siksika). His most significant contributions came through his studies of Delaware, Shawnee, and Hopi, but he is also credited with reviving the International Journal of American Linguistics after the death of its founder, Franz Boas, and with nurturing the program in anthropology at Indiana University, where he was on faculty from 1941 until his retirement in 1976.

The Voegelin collection contains field notes, lexical files, notebooks, papers, correspondence, and other materials relating to Voegelin's work on Native American languages. The bulk of the collection concerns Delaware and Shawnee, but there is significant material for Blackfoot, Menominee, Ojibwa and Potawatomi, Seneca, and Penobscot. Notes on Turkish, kept during the Second World War, are also present. Among other important series in the collection are Voegelin's correspondence and notes concerning two of his major projects: the translation and interpretation of the Walam Olam and his study of Shawnee law. Correspondents include Leonard Bloomfield, Eli Lilly, and Morris Swadesh. A portion of the collection is indexed in Kendall (1982).

Background note
Scope & content
Administrative information
Additional information
- Related material
- Notes
Added entries
Contact information
Collection overview
- Series I. Correspondence, 1936-1968
- Series II. Card Files, 1930s-1960s
- Series III. Works by Voegelin, 1952-1968
  - Subseries III-A. Works Translated by Voegelin, 1942-1954
  - Subseries III-B. Works Authored by Voegelin, 1949-1968
- Series IV. Works by Others, 1836-1968
- Series V. Research Notes, 1925-1967
  - Subseries V-A. Language Notes, 1925-1968
  - Subseries V-B. Texts, 1946-1952
  - Subseries V-C. Other, 1966, n.d.
- Series VI. Notebooks, 1934, 1940-1941, n.d.
- Series VII. Photograph, 1936?
Collection inventory
- Series I. Correspondence, 1936-1968
- Series II. Card Files, 1930s-1960s
- Series III. Works by Voegelin, 1942-1968
  - Subseries III-A: Works Translated by Voegelin, , 1942-1954
  - Subseries III-B: Works Authored by Voegelin, , 1949-1968
- Series IV. Works by Others, 1836-1968
- Series V. Research Notes, 1925-1967
  - Subseries V-A: Language Notes, , 1925-1967
  - Subseries V-B: Texts, (See also Ser. VI), 1946-1952
  - Subseries V-C: Other, , 1966, n.d.
- Series VI. Notebooks, 1934, 1940-1941
- Series VII. Photograph, 1936?
- Series III-A, III-B, V-A. Oversized

Background note

Charles (Carl) Frederick Voegelin was an anthropologist and structural linguist best known for his studies of Native American languages. He was born in New York on 17 January 1906, the son of Charles and Elizabeth Herbst-Sepilius Voegelin. After earning his undergraduate degree from Stanford University in 1927, Voegelin received his PhD in 1932 from University of California-Berkeley, where he was a student of anthropologists Robert Lowie and Alfred Kroeber. Between 1933 and 1935 he received fellowships from the National Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies to pursue research as a post-doctoral fellow at Yale. In 1935, Voegelin was appointed Assistant Professor of Anthropology at DePauw University, where he remained until 1940. He also lectured at summer sessions of the Linguistic Institute held in Ann Arbor and Chapel Hill between 1938 and 1941.

Voegelin began his long association with Indiana University in 1941 as Associate Professor of Anthropology in the Department of History. In the Bloomington Faculty Council memorial resolution to Voegelin (Indiana University, Circular 820-87), James Vaughan and Paul Gebhard note that the position "came about in part because Eli Lilly wished to see a small group of anthropologists and linguists address themselves to some problems of Indiana prehistory." This team of researchers, which included Voegelin's first wife Erminie Wheeler-Voegelin, developed a new translation and interpretation of the "Walum Olam." Voegelin was named Department Chairman (1947-1966) and Professor of Anthropology in 1947 at Indiana University, when the Department of Anthropology was established at Indiana, and Professor of Linguistics in 1964. In 1967, Voegelin was honored with the title "Distinguished Professor of Anthropology and Professor of Linguistics;" he served in this capacity until 1976, when he continued as Professor Emeritus at Indiana University and, after 1978, as visiting scholar at the University of Hawaii.

Throughout his career, Voegelin made significant contributions to research and scholarship in his field. He authored several books, including Tubatulabal Texts (1935) and Tubatulabal Grammar (1935), Shawnee Stems and the Jacob P. Dunn Miami Dictionary (1938-1940), Hopi Domains (1957), Linguistics and Anthropology (1975), and Classification and Index of the World's Languages (1977). Numerous scientific articles by Voegelin have been published in Language, The American Anthropologist, and the International Journal of American Linguistics, a journal first edited by Franz Boas and edited by Voegelin from 1944 to 1980. Voegelin also initiated several new research ventures: the monograph series Indiana University Publications in Anthropology and Linguistics and the journal Anthropological Linguistics; a summer field station at Flagstaff, Arizona with the Museum of Northern Arizona; and the Indiana Archives of the Languages of the World. His activities in professional associations included serving as a member of the Executive Committee of the American Anthropological Association and as President of the Linguistic Society of America.

In recognition of his many achievements, the American Anthropological Association honored Voegelin with the Distinguished Service Award, and Indiana University awarded him an Honorary Doctor of Letters. Voegelin died on 22 May 1986, survived by his second wife and professional colleague, Florence Marie Robinett.

Scope and content

The C. F. Voegelin Papers contain correspondence, manuscripts of published and unpublished works by Voegelin and others, research notes by Voegelin and others, and one photograph, which document Voegelin's career as an anthropologist and linguist.

The papers (45 boxes; 25.25 linear feet) are divided into seven series:


Series I. Correspondence	1936-1968	1 box;.5 linear feet
Series II. Card files	1930s-1960s	25 boxes; 14.75 linear feet
Series III. Works Written or Translated by Voegelin	1942-1968	10 boxes; 4.75 linear feet
Series IV. Works Written or Translated by Others	1836-1968	2 boxes; 1 linear foot
Series V. Research Notes	1925-1967	4 boxes; 1.75 linear feet
Series VI. Notebooks	1934, 1940-1941, n.d.	6 boxes; 3 linear feet
Series VII. Photograph	1936?	1 box; 1 folder
Series III, V. Oversized		1 folder; stored with oversized manuscripts in vault

Oversized materials follow the same series arrangement as noted above. Cross referencing to oversized material appears on the folders in the standard sized boxes. Reprints have been moved to the printed materials collection of the APS library. To retrieve reprints, consult the card catalog for printed materials. One sound recording, "The Buffalo Story," has also been removed from the collection and cataloged as Recording #190. Sound tape reels of Voegelin's field research, e.g. Shawnee Laws, are archived in the Archives of Traditional Music at Indiana University and are indexed in A Catalog of the C.F. and F.M. Voegelin Archives of the Languages of the World, a copy of which is available in the manuscripts department of the APS. Researchers interested in Native Americans of the Eastern United States, particularly Shawnee, should also consult the Newberry Library for the papers of Erminie Wheeler.

Administrative information

Provenance

The Voegelin Papers were donated to the APS Library by C.F. Voegelin in 1979 (Accession #1979-650ms) and by F.M. Voegelin in 1987 (Accession #1987-1087ms). The earlier accession was partially processed under the call number "B/V86p," and described in Daythal Kendall's A Supplement to A Guide to Manuscripts Relating to the American Indian in the Library of the American Philosophical Society(Philadelphia: APS, 1982). The two accessions are now integrated and share the call number "Ms Coll. #68."

Accruals:

The final accession of Voegelin Papers (16.5 linear feet), received in 1999, has not been inventoried.

Preferred citation

Cite as: C. F. Voegelin Papers, American Philosophical Society.

Processing information

Processed by Jan S. Ballard, 1994

Other finding aids

Indexed in part in Daythal Kendall's A Supplement to A Guide to Manuscripts Relating to the American Indian in the Library of the American Philosophical Society (Philadelphia: APS, 1982)

Additional information

Related material

The papers of Erminie Wheeler-Voegelin are housed at the Newberry Library.

Carl Voegelin appears as a correspondent in several APS collections, including the papers of Frank Speck, William N. Fenton.

Notes

During processing, the collection was re-foldered and re-housed in acid-free folders and boxes. Metal fasteners were removed and replaced with plastic clips when necessary. A separate listing of torn or severely deteriorated manuscripts and manuscripts that need to have glue and tape removed has been compiled by series and submitted to the Conservation Department.

All newspaper clippings were photocopied onto acid-free paper; the original clippings were then discarded. Other brittle or torn items were also photocopied, and when considered valuable, were retained.