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At the Institute’s core is the Gilder Lehrman Collection, one of the great archives in American history. More than 85,000 items cover five hundred years of American history, from Columbus’s 1493 letter describing the New World through the end of the twentieth century.

Adams, John Quincy, 1767-1848 to James Bridge

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC00958.03 Author/Creator: Adams, John Quincy, 1767-1848 Place Written: Braintree, Massachusetts Type: Autograph letter signed Date: January 25, 1789 Pagination: 2 p. : address ; Height: 20 cm, Width: 15 cm Order a Copy

Adams describes acting like a recluse, spending most of his time in study. He praises the fourth volume of Edward Gibbon's "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." Adams asks that if Bridge sees a mutual friend, Stacey, to ask him to return Adams' copy of a work by Henry St. John Bolingbroke. He also asks Bridge to retrieve Adams' copies of Saunderson's Algebra and four volumes of Busson's works in French.

Adams, John Quincy, 1767-1848
Bridge, James, 1765-1834
St. John, Henry, 1678-1751

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