Scope and Contents:
This collection consists of two volumes: one financial ledger and one letterbook. The financial ledger primarily contains figures related to cash and coal purchases. Tucked into the ledger book are four pages of lined paper with handwriting practice, two pages of scrap paper with arithmetic, and a printed “List of Stations and Agents” of the Chicago and North-Western Railway from June 1866. The letterbook contains copies of letters sent by Chapman from 1863 to 1865, primarily relating to his business at the New York Central Railroad and purchases made for items such as windows, doors, and wooden siding. Other letters copied relate to magazine subscriptions, the status of his business, and business trips to Chicago. Also included in the letterbook are several blank sheets of blank letterhead paper for Midland Pacific Railway.
Biographical/Historical Context:
Sidney W. Chapman was born on August 26
th, 1831, in Connecticut. By 1850, he moved to Geneva, Ohio, and to Cleveland, Ohio, by 1855. By 1865, he was working as a freight agent for the New York Central Railroad Company in Chicago, Illinois. Chapman was living in Bushnell, Illinois, by 1870, along with his wife Helen and their four children, where he worked as a lumber merchant. In 1875, they moved to Lincoln Nebraska, where Chapman was a general freight agent for the Midland Pacific Railroad Company. He died on March 5, 1903, in Lincoln Nebraska.
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