Place Files

This collection contains the papers of Mary G. Roebling (1905-1994), the first woman president of a major commercial bank in the United States. The collection is approximately 98 cubic feet in size and is composed of 94 records center cartons, three phase boxes and a newspaper box. It spans the period 1897 to 1994, with the bulk dating from 1937 to 1994.

The collection consists of files kept by Mary Roebling's personal secretaries, documenting her service to the military, federal, state and local governments, her involvement in the business community and professional organizations, her support of charities and the arts, her hobbies and interests, and her social life. The BIOGRAPHICAL AND PUBLICITY FILES series primarily consists of newspaper clippings which reveal Mary Roebling's public visibility through her connection with her bank (the Trenton Trust Company), her government service and philanthropic interests, as well as documenting the history of the Roebling family, in which she took a keen interest. The SPEECHES (12 cubic feet) and SPEECH MATERIAL (6.3 cubic feet) series are particularly important because they show Mary Roebling's ideas, particularly on women, the free enterprise system, and the value of the military, and show how widely these ideas were disseminated.

The PERSONAL FILES (15 cubic feet) consist primarily of correspondence with Roebling's friends, family members, business associates, and famous people, as well as correspondence and supporting materials which reflect her many hobbies and interests. One box of personal correspondence has been restricted until January 1, 2020. The ORGANIZATIONS FILES (26.5 cubic feet) primarily document organizations in which Roebling played a significant role, whether as a board member, donor, or member of a government commission. Although this series also contains correspondence, much of the material consists of minutes, financial statement, and publications from these organizations. Material in the GENERAL FILES (12 cubic feet), the bulk of which dates from the 1950s, 1960s, and early 1970s, includes both correspondence and documentation of Mary Roebling's service to organizations. She was less involved in most of the organizations represented in this series, as compared to those in the ORGANIZATIONS FILES. There is a great deal of overlap, however, in both dates and types of material among these three series.

The MILITARY FILES (5.8 cubic feet), the PATRIOTIC AND GENEALOGICAL FILES (1 cubic foot), the STATE INVESTMENT COUNCIL FILES (2 cubic feet), the RICHARD NIXON FILES (1 cubic foot primarily documenting Roebling's support of the Nixon Presidential Library), and the WOMEN'S BANK FILES (2 cubic feet) all contain material similar to that in the ORGANIZATIONS FILES, but, because of their size and discrete nature, constitute separate series.

Most of the material in the Mary Roebling Papers is in paper format. The collection contains a large number of newspaper clippings, particularly in the BIOGRAPHICAL AND PUBLICITY FILES, which, because of their brittle condition, have been photocopied and the originals discarded. In addition, the collection contains several items in book format, notably the appointment books, as well as a few books to which Mary Roebling contributed, all of which are stored in folders.

The collection contains one and one half boxes of photographs, primarily 8 x 10 black and white prints of Roebling attending various functions, as well as portraits, color snapshots of Roebling's family and friends, and a few views, negatives, and contact sheets. Photographs have been removed as noted from their respective series and filed together for preservation purposes. In addition, the collection contains three oversize scrapbooks, which include newspaper clippings, photographs, and ephemera documenting Mary Roebling's life and activities, which are stored in oversize phase boxes, and one newspaper box containing oversize broadsides, publications, photographs, and other documents drawn as noted from several different series for storage purposes. Finally, the collection contains a few other formats interspersed throughout, including a videocassette, a vinyl record album and a few reel-to-reel audiotapes.

Material received with the Mary G. Roebling Papers constituting records of the Trenton Trust Company has been moved to that collection and a scrapbook about Siegfried Roebling's ancestor Emily Warren Roebling, also received with the Mary Roebling Papers, has been moved to the repository's Roebling Collection.