Edwin A. Bonewitz Papers

The Edwin A. Bonewitz Papers is a small holding of manuscripts, maps, drawings, correspondence, and notes of a lay historian relating to the history of Texas and especially Houston during the Republic and early statehood periods.

Although Bonewitz researched most of his adult life, the collection consists of material he compiled after 1950; the rest was destroyed. After Ed's death in 1969, his brother Fred Bonewitz deposited these remaining papers with the Houston Public Library. The collection consists of two segments: the manuscripts and the correspondence.

Bonewitz's seventeen original, unpublished manuscripts give one a great deal of insight into Houston, Texas, during the Republic Period and early statehood. This segment is the most useful part of the collection and should always be referred to first. The manuscripts describe Houston during the 1830's and 1840's, and explain much about its institutional life.

His voluminous correspondence with other historians comprises the largest part of the collection, but it is repetitious and difficult to use. Nonetheless, much extra material can be gleaned from the correspondence so as to supplement the manuscripts.

The collection also reveals the trials and tribulations of the non-professional historian, and the controversies which antiquarians in Texas dealt with in the 1950's and 1960's.