MANUSCRIPTS

Summary: The series MANUSCRIPTS contains a variety of materials and material types representing Griffis's work in progress at various stages of completion. At the high end are galley proofs and completed typescript essays; at the low end are MS fragments and draft materials from projects never completed. Necessarily, there is some overlap between this series and NOTES AND SUBJECT FILES (q.v.).

Most of Griffis's manuscripts to published works are not extant, having been retained or disposed of by their publishers. Only a few complete manuscripts to books or published articles may be found in this series. Most items are manuscripts to articles never published, or draft manuscripts of writings in progress. Some items, such as the manuscript of the essay "The Daimyo's Government" or the fragments of reminiscences on early days in Tokyo, are very valuable; many others are clearly less so.

Because of this, and their generally ambiguous nature, these materials were not treated consistently by early archivists and researchers: some were removed to the more accessible early boxes, while others were overlooked or left as received. Since no attempt has been made to organize the manuscripts more systematically, their present order reflects nothing beyond the subject groupings used in the early boxes of the old arrangement. Numerous manuscripts treating American History or Europe may still be found in the America/Europe section. Occasionally the researcher may find a few source materials (not by Griffis) intermixed with manuscripts. More often, only coherent manuscripts were placed in this series and more fragmentary notes, intermixed with newspaper clippings etc., were removed to NOTES AND SUBJECT FILES (q.v.). Old folders were generally not preserved, even if they were Griffis's own, due to their decrepit condition and high acid content. On occasion such folders were photocopied to give researchers an impression of Griffis's working methods.