Manuscripts

Notebooks, publications, letters regarding pension, photographs, and sheet music

Description: The collection consists of some literary papers and correspondence of Elwyn Irving Hoffman. Of note in the collection are letters from Jack and Charmian London and related materials which include fifty photographs of the voyage of "The Snark," the Londons, and their ranch at Glen Ellen. Other correspondents represented in the collection include: Mary Hunter Austin, Temple Bailey, Maynard Dixon, Lyndon Dodge, Dudley Kinsell, Charles Fletcher Lummis, Joaquin Miller, and Israel Zangwill. There are also some notebooks kept by Hoffman and sheet music.
Type: Manuscripts(Opens in new tab)
Date: 1898-1948
Call number: mssHoffman
Creator: Hoffman, Elwyn Irving(Opens in new tab)

Jack London related material

Manuscripts

The collection consists of some literary papers and correspondence of Elwyn Irving Hoffman. Of note in the collection are letters from Jack and Charmian London and related materials which include fifty photographs of the voyage of "The Snark," the Londons, and their ranch at Glen Ellen. Other correspondents represented in the collection include: Mary Hunter Austin, Temple Bailey, Maynard Dixon, Lyndon Dodge, Dudley Kinsell, Charles Fletcher Lummis, Joaquin Miller, and Israel Zangwill. There are also some notebooks kept by Hoffman and sheet music.

mssHoffman

Image not available

Other correspondence

Manuscripts

mssHoffman

Image not available

Elwyn Irving Hoffman papers

Manuscripts

mssHoffman

Image not available

Photographs, 1915-1917

Manuscripts

The Edwin B. Hoffman collection mostly consists of professional correspondence and records related to Hoffman's career at sea, from 1901-1921. The first series includes accounts, forms, correspondence, financial records, legal documents, photographs, and printed ephemera pertaining to his time at the United States Lighthouse Service and United States Shipping Board. Letters and telegrams detail the loss of P.J. Abler (schooner) in 1915 and the collision of Dorr (schooner) and Oklahoma (schooner) in 1916. Included is a certificate indicating Hoffman was pilot on the first torpedo flotilla aboard the United States Ship Whipple. Most of the correspondence in this series is addressed to Hoffman. The second series includes accounts, certificates, correspondence, documents, logs, manifests, and reports concerning his service as Master of Eastern Leader (steamboat) in 1921. Letters and reports detail an accident to the rudder on 1921 May 26, while undocking in Limerick, Ireland for New York. Most of the letters are typed copies retained by Hoffman addressed to colleagues and family.

mssHoffmane

Yoshimatsu Nakata

Manuscripts

Bound in textured black material. The title "Yoshimatsu Nakata" is embossed in the center of the cover in gold lettering. Images are those collected, and some possibly taken, by the Londons' valet of eight years, Yoshimatsu Nakata. Nakata accompanied the Londons on the Snark voyage, Roamer river cruises and their journey and the Northwest via horse-drawn carriage.

JLP 530

Image not available

Charles Hoffman letter to William King

Manuscripts

This letter written by Charles Hoffman to William King was about guano, the excrement and urine of seabirds and bats, which was just being widely recognized as an excellent fertilizer and an important source of nitrates for gunpowder and explosives. It was primarily gathered off the coast of Peru, but Hoffman, who owned many vessels that regularly traded in peanuts and palm oil with West Africa's coast, was apparently the first American entrepreneur to find a source on the island of Ichaboe, now in Namibia.

mssHM 80484

Notebooks, publications, letters regarding pension, photographs, and sheet music

Opening Hours

Admission Info and Tickets

You might also be interested in

Jack London related material

Other correspondence

Elwyn Irving Hoffman papers

Photographs, 1915-1917

Yoshimatsu Nakata

Charles Hoffman letter to William King