Coffee is such a normal, frequent occurence both inside and outside the walls of HSP that we often don't think twice about it beyond our daily morning pilgrimage. It ensures that those who drink it stay awake, functional, and most of all, pleasant enough to conquer the day, so much so that among the Folgers and Nescafé commercials and the Dunkin' Donuts and Starbucks bus ads, marketers have tapped into our need of coffee to make it commonplace, routine, and universal.

Of all the adopted collections that have come through the ranks, my favorites remain the ones that offer windows into Philadelphia's rich cultural history.  The John Neagle papers and related items (Collection 2112), which I recently processed, is one such collection.

Because Dana and I are primarily viewing the history of Bankers Trust Company through the eyes of Albert M. Greenfield- since we’re using his papers- we have come across other story lines relating to Greenfield and his numerous other ventures that continually weave in and out of the story of the bank.

An earlier blog post gave a brief introduction of the Oliver H. Bair Company collection, which is now properly preserved and accessible to users at HSP. This collection is comprised of nearly 83,000 burial records that span the time of 1920 to 1980. There were many surprises within these records, and this post is going to highlight some of the most interesting people that were located within these records.