Florence Williams Papers and Photographs

The Florence Williams Papers and Photographs consist of four handwritten diaries that Williams wrote from 1867 to 1870, documenting her life as a young adult. The contents of these diaries include descriptions of her classes in subjects such as philosophy, algebra, and physics; her attendance at church and at prayer meetings of her Presbyterian faith; her outings with friends, often ice skating or playing croquet; and the various illnesses that she, her family, and her friends all experienced. Williams discusses these subjects very personally and as such, the diaries reflect the concerns of a teenage girl making her way through the world. She judged the quality of each sermon she heard at religious gatherings and gave her opinions about every visiting preacher. Throughout the diaries, Williams wrote about her mental health consistently, often feeling unhappy, whether from frustration or dissatisfaction with herself, or from anger at her friends for excluding her. The first two diaries also contain a few loose documents which Williams wrote, including two letters to her sister-in-law "Jennie" Williams and a playbill for the New Opera House advertising Maguire's Imperial Japanese Troupe. Williams wrote the letters to her sister-in-law several years after she wrote the diaries. There is one photograph in the collection, a headshot of Williams looking into the distance. The diaries provide insights into the daily lives of people in the late nineteenth century. They may also be a resource to understand how people experienced and understood mental illness at the time Williams was writing.