Margaret Gay Davies Papers

--By Paul H. Hardacre

The papers of Margaret Gay Davies (1901-89) were donated under two clauses of the Margaret G. Davies Trust, dated October 13, 1981. Section A, Article V, para. 1 directed that there be distributed to the Henry E. Huntington Library all correspondence, notes and other papers relating to the Gay and FitzRandolph families, or to the work of my late husband Godfrey Davies, which shall be found among my papers after my death. Most of the papers by or relating to Godfrey Davies had been donated by Mrs. Davies during her lifetime, and the few conveyed under the Trust have been integrated into the Godfrey Davies Collection.

She had also donated during her lifetime the Edwin F. Gay Collection, which included a large quantity of Gay and FitzRandolph materials. On her death there were found in her possession letters to the family from her two aunts, Mary Gay (1872 -1977) and Edith Gay Bittinger (1874-). These complement the letters of the same writers to their brother, Edwin Francis Gay, in Gay Collection, Box 84.

The Trust goes on (Section A, Article V, para. 2) to bequeath to the Trustee my personal correspondence and all papers, manuscripts, lectures and working notes relating to my historical work, to deal with in whatever manner shall seem fit to him. These materials were delivered in several installments. On April 5, 1991, two lots were accepted, consisting of Printed Maps and Photographic copies of 16th and 17th century records from various British repositories (see list attached). These are separately shelved and catalogued. Mrs. Davies' personal and professional correspondence was delivered over the following months (May 1991-February 1992). The lectures were prepared for delivery in various courses at Pomona College, and have not (with one exception) been preserved. The exception was selected as typical of her teaching, and is devoted to the Great Depression; it is a good example of her ability to combine the long (secular) and short (business cycle) views in dealing with complicated economic and social problems. The working notes were extremely voluminous, and dated from Mrs. Davies' first research trip to Britain (1927). They were in several forms: 3 × 5 slips, half-sheets, full-sheet tabulations, etc. It was judged as unlikely that another scholar could make use of them without consulting the originals from which they were derived. Moreover, the publications based on them are so thoroughly footnoted that there should be no difficulty in following her trail. Accordingly they have not been preserved.