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Frances Crowe papers

 Collection
Identifier: SSC-MS-00249

Scope and Contents

The collection documents decades of Frances Crowe's social justice activism in the Pioneer Valley of Western Massachusetts, including activities of local chapters of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, Women Against the War, War Resisters' League, and Amnesty International. It includes extensive records from Crowe's work as the western Massachusetts representative for American Friends' Service Committee (1970s-90s), and numerous subject files, slides, cassettes, film reels, and scrapbooks. Writings, memorabilia, and printed material document her trip to China in 1974. The collection also includes a backup of Crowe's computer.

Dates of Materials

  • Creation: 1930 - 2019

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

This collection is open for use with following restrictions on access:

This collection is available for research use with the condition that researchers must sign an access agreement prior to use. Please consult with special collections staff at specialcollections@smith.edu to begin this process.

Conditions Governing Use

To the extent that she owned copyright, Frances Crowe assigned the copyright of her works to the Sophia Smith Collection; however, copyright in other items in this collection may be held by their respective creators. For reproductions of materials that are governed by fair use as defined under U. S. Copyright Law, no permission to cite or publish is required. For instances which may regard materials in the collection not created by Frances Crowe, researchers are responsible for determining who may hold materials' copyrights and obtaining approval from them. Researchers do not need anything further from Smith College Special Collections to move forward with their use.

Biographical / Historical

Frances Crowe was a major figure in peace and social justice activism in the Pioneer Valley of Western Massachusetts. Born in Carthage, Missouri in 1919, she graduated Stephens College (Columbia, MO), 1939; Syracuse University in 1941; and did graduate work at Columbia University and New School for Social Research. She married Thomas Crowe in 1945. They moved to Northampton, MA so that her son could attend the Clarke School for the Deaf. They had three children. Crowe became a pacifist after hearing about the bombing of Hiroshima in 1945. She was active in the Society of Friends and the American Friends' Service Committee(AFSC), particularly the Peace and Social Concerns Committee; and became Western Massachusetts Representative for the AFSC in the 1980s. During the Vietnam War she worked as a draft counselor for over 2,000 men. In the 1960s, she founded the Northampton chapter of Women's International League for Peace and Freedom; the Sane Nuclear Policy Committee; and the Valley Peace Center in Amherst, MA, all of which she held meetings for in her basement. Also a founding member of the Traprock Peace Center, Deerfield, MA, and the Committee to End Apartheid, Springfield, MA, Crowe attended Quaker Meetings frequently, and organized talks for speakers who passed through town. Crowe participated in numerous protests which led to her 100-plus arrests and imprisonments, including one month in federal prison. She had a radio tower built in her backyard to broadcast “Democracy Now!” locally. Crowe protested war by refusing to pay federal income tax and donating that money to Northampton Public Schools and peace organizations. She died in Northampton in 2019 at age 100.

Extent

104.794 linear feet (131 containers)

1.87 Gigabytes

Language of Materials

English

Additional Description

Abstract

Frances Crowe was a major figure in peace and social justice activism in the Pioneer Valley of Western Massachusetts. Her papers document decades of social justice activism in the Valley, including through local chapters of the American Friends' Service Committee, Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, Women Against the War, War Resisters' League, and Amnesty International. Materials in this collection include her writings, notes, photographs, posters, memorabilia, and publications.

Arrangement

This collection has been added to over time in multiple "accessions." An accession is a group of materials received from the same source at approximately the same time.

Physical Characteristics and Technical Requirements

This collection contains materials received from the donor in digital form that are not currently available online. Please consult with Special Collections staff to request access to this digital content.

Other Finding Aids

One or more content listings to individual accessions in this collection are available for download. Links can be found in the description of the individual accessions.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

The collection was donated by Frances Crowe from 1984-2019.

Related Materials

The records of the American Friends Service Committee of Western Massachusetts are in the Special Collections of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

Processing Information

The contents of computer media in this collection has been copied to networked storage for preservation and access; the original directory and file structure was retained and file lists were created.

Processing Information

Between September 2022 and February 2023, Smith College Special Collections renumbered many boxes to eliminate duplicate numbers within collections in order to improve researcher experience. A full crosswalk of old to new numbers is available.

Related Names

Subjects

Finding Aid & Administrative Information

Title
Finding aid to Frances Crowe papers
Status
Legacy Finding Aid (Updated)
Author
Ellice Yasner Amanna
Date
2005, 2019, 2020
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin
Sponsor
Encoding funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

Revision Statements

  • 07/26/2017: This resource was modified by the ArchivesSpace Preprocessor developed by the Harvard Library (https://github.com/harvard-library/archivesspace-preprocessor)
  • 2017-07-26T17:48:14-04:00: This record was migrated from InMagic DB Textworks to ArchivesSpace.
  • 2018-10-25: Updated to conform to DACS
  • 2020-01-17: Added new accession
  • 2020-02-24: Containers, barcodes, description added and finding aid updated to current standards
  • 2020-04-03: Description added for born-digital content.
  • 2021-07-08: Added content description from accession inventories
  • 2021-07-21: Added content description from accession inventory
  • 2022-03-15: Updated Conditions Governing use to be aligned with deed

Repository Details

Repository Details

Part of the Sophia Smith Collection of Women's History Repository

https://libraries.smith.edu/special-collections/about/sophia-smith-collection-womens-history
Contact:
Neilson Library
7 Neilson Drive
Northampton MA 01063

  • Smith College Special Collections
  • Neilson Library, 7 Neilson Drive
  • Northampton, Massachusetts, 01063
  • specialcollections@smith.edu
  • 413-585-2970

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Creative Commons License
Text and metadata are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.