| Level | Fonds |
| Finding Number (Click this to view full catalogue structure) | MS823 |
| Title | Papers of Beatrice Warde, May Lamberton Becker, and Alicia Street |
| Extent | 24 boxes |
| Date | mid-19th century-2001 |
| Thumbnail (Click this image to open a larger image) | 
|
| Description | Personal, family and professional papers of Beatrice Warde, May Lamberton Becker, and Alicia Street. The collection primarily relates to Beatrice Warde, principally from the 1920s-1960s, and includes extensive correspondence with her mother, May Lamberton Becker; other personal and professional correspondence including letters from her husband, Frederic Warde, and from Professor Sir Cyril Burt; copies and drafts of her writings and publications; papers of her overseas speaking tours; and various photographs. This collection of papers relate to Beatrice Warde's wide ranging activities and interests in publishing, printing, journalism, literature and the furtherance of Anglo-American relations.
There are various papers relating to the work of the three women and the orgnaisations they were involved in, including of and relating to 'Books Across the Sea' founded by Warde and May Lamberton Becker in 1940; papers of the English-Speaking Union which adopted 'Books Across the Sea' in 1947; publications of the political group, Americans in British Outpost of the Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies, with which Books Across the Sea was associated.
The collection includes papers of the Lamberton family of New York, 1860s-1890s, including letters of May Lamberton Becker's parents, Ellis Lamberton and Emma Thurston and family photographs and memorabilia; other personal and professional papers of May Lamberton Becker including material relating to 'Books Across the Sea' which she co-founded with her daughter, to her work as an author and to the opening of the May Lamberton Becker Reading Room at the National Book League by T. S. Eliot as Vice-President of the League in 1960; papers relating to the English typographer, Stanley Morison (1889-1967); and papers of Alicia Street, fellow American and editor of 'The American Outpost' and which include material relating to the British American Canadian Associates (founded in 1931 to further understanding and cooperation between the three countries, particularly through a two-way transatlantic lecture programme) of which she was Vice-President in the 1980s and early 1990s. |
| Notes | Image of Beatrice Warde and May Lamberton Becker reference: MS823/B/6/1. |
| Arrangement | The collection has a complex custodial history being made up of the papers of three different people (May Lamberton Becker, Beatrice Warde, and Alicia Street) which have been added to, re-organised, or mixed up, over the course of its creation. The provenance of some of the papers can not always be appropriately determined, and matched to an individual, especially since they worked on the same projects/same organisations. Due to this the collection has been arranged into series of material based on the identifiable personal papers of May Lamberton Becker, Beatrice Warde, and Alicia Street, but also arranged according to the different organisations and projects that the three individuals had worked upon.
The collection has been arranged in to the following series:
A: May Lamberton Becker and the Lamberton family papers
B: Papers of Beatrice Warde
C: Papers of Alicia Street
D: Kinsmen
E: Americans-in-Britain Outpost of the Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies
F: Books Across the Sea and the English-Speaking Union
G: English-Speaking Union
H: British-American-Canadian Associates
I: Miscellaneous items |
| Access Conditions | Access to all registered researchers. |
| Copyright | Permission to make any published use of any material from the collection must be sought in advance in writing from the University Archivist, Special Collections (email: special-collections@contacts.bham.ac.uk). Identification of copyright holders of unpublished material is often difficult. Special Collections will assist where possible with identifying copyright owners, but responsibility for ensuring copyright clearance rests with the user of the material. |
| Language | English |
| Finding Aids | A catalogue of this collection is available on the online archive catalogue. Click on the Finding Number to display the summary contents list of the catalogue and to view the full catalogue. |
| Access Status | Open, but subject to some access restrictions |
| Creator Name | Beatrice Lamberton Warde, (1900-1969) nee Becker, typographer
May Lamberton Becker, (1873-1958)
Alicia Street, (1911-2016), nee Kumpula |
| Administrative History | Beatrice Warde was born in New York City. She was the daughter of the celebrated childen's librarian and writer on children's literature, May Lamberton Becker. After graduating from Barnard College (the women's division of Columbia University), she was employed at the American Typefounders' Company Library in Jersey City becoming the acting head librarian under Henry Lewis Bullen. On 30 December 1922, she married the book designer and typographer, Frederic Warde (1894-1939), who was then the director of printing at Princeton University Press. Following a visit to the USA by Stanley Morison in 1924 and an offer of employment, Frederic resigned his position at Princeton to pursue his career in Europe In 1925 the Wardes arrived in England and Beatrice began writing scholarly articles on printing under the name of 'Paul Beaujon'. She was then recruited by the Monotype Corporation where she edited the Monotype Recorder and eventually became director of publicity. She also became a successful writer and lecturer; the educational aspect of typography became an important focus she and established connections with many printing schools and delivered a number of international lecture tours.: Her speech 'Printing should be invisible' presented to the British Typographers Guild in 1930 was republished several times. The Wardes separated in November 1926 and subsequently divorced.
In 1940, Beatrice Warde founded 'Books Across the Sea' in conjunction with her mother, May Lamberton Becker (1873-1958), author, journalist and editor in 1940. Following the cessation of import of printed books from America at the beginning of the war, Warde arranged with her mother, who was literary editor of the 'New York Herald Tribune' to receive copies of 70 new American publications and the parallel exchange of new British books lead to the formation of 'Books Across the Sea' resulting in a movement which promoted better cultural and literary understanding between the two countries. Societies were set up in London and Edinburgh in the UK and in New York and Boston in the US and by 1944, about 2,000 volumes had been received in London and 1,600 in New York .
May Lamberton Becker was the daughter of Ellis Lamberton (died 1886), and Mrs Emma Lamberton, described in her obituary as 'world traveller and educator', when she died at age 86. May Lamberton Becker was born in New York on 26 August 1873 and was a literary critic and wrote a weekly 'Readers Guide' with the New York Evening Post, Saturday Review of Literature, and then the New York Herald Tribune. She also wrote a number of introductions for 'Rainbow Classics' and produced a number of anthologies.
Alicia Street (13 November 1911-20 April 2016), was a school teacher and married John Hugh Street on 19 February 1938 moving to England to do so. She joined the British American Society and become the editor of 'The Outpost' newsletter during the Second World War. She also became the chairman of Books Across the Sea in 1941. She was Vice-President British American Canadian Associates in the 1980s and 1990s.
Sources: obituaries and other papers in the collection and wikipedia. |
| Custodial History | The Lamberton family papers were passed to Beatrice Warde on her mother's death in 1958; Beatrice Warde's own papers were subsequently passed to Alicia Street, presumably on her death; the collection was donated by a descendant of Alicia Street to the University of Birmingham per Professor Dick Ellis, American and Canadian Studies, University of Birmingham. |
| Acquisition | Presented in December 2010. |
| Archival Note | The collection was catalogued by Matthew Goodwin, Archivist, in 2025. |
| Related Material | Cadbury Research Library also holds small group of papers relating to Papers Across the Sea collection (GB 0151 MS877); and Records of the British Association for American Studies (GB 0150 BAAS). |
| Associated Materials | Other papers of Beatrice Warde in the UK are held by Cambridge University Library, Department of Manuscripts and University Archives MS. Add. 9817 |
| Warde's correspondence with Sir Sydney Cockerell held at the British Library, Add MS 52758 |
| St Bride Foundation hold papers relating to Beatrice Warde |
| Liverpool University also hold Beatrice Warde materials in their Papers of Sir Cyril Burt, D191 |