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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.

Sumner, Charles, 1811-1874 to Thomas L. Sprague

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC02095.04 Author/Creator: Sumner, Charles, 1811-1874 Place Written: Boston, Massachusetts Type: Autograph letter signed Date: 28 September 1851 Pagination: 2 p. : Height: 18 cm, Width: 11 cm Order a Copy

Thanks Sprague, a schoolboy, for his compliments: "Through my mother, who recently visited your friends in Hingham, I have learned your kind interest in me, & the manner in which you have spoken of me in one of your exercises at school. The words of a soul, so young & ingenious as yours, are precious to me. I receive them as an encouragement for myself & as an [illegible] of your own consecration to a great cause."

Sumner, Charles, 1811-1874
Sprague, Thomas L., fl. 1851

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